Commissioners Open Law Enforcement Vehicle Bids

The County Commissioners opened the bids on four new 4-wheel drive patrol car vehicles and one full size SUV to be used as an investigation vehicle for the Mitchell County Sheriff Department at their meeting this morning. Beloit Motor Company and Beloit Auto & Truck Plaza were the two businesses submitting bids.

The Sheriff's Department hasn't purchased new vehicles the last year or two so the vehicles they traded in have a lot of age on them. Since Commissioner Marshall was gone this week the Commissioners will not be voting on which vehicles to purchase until their March 4 meeting.

Beloit Motor Company submitted one bid on a full-sized four-wheel drive 2013 Yukon SUV, in the amount of $46,350 with a trade in of $12,650 for a $33,700 difference on a used Jeep that the Sheriffs Department had gotten on a seizure. Beloit Motor does not have a lease program.

Business owner, Kelly Kimerer, explained that due to General Motors revamping their light pick-up line to be introduced in late April or early May he is not able to place a bid on the patrol cars now it would not be cost efficient for the dealership or for the county as they would not be able to deliver the vehicles until after that date.

Beloit Auto and Truck Plaza submitted bids as follows: On three Dodge Ram trucks to be used as patrol vehicles at a cost of $25,685 per vehicle times three. The total lease principal on the three pick-ups would be $104,980. The county has a choice of three or four payments a year. This would be three payments of $57.000 or four payments of $28,652 a year.

Sheriff Daugherty discussed purchasing a Black 2012 Chevrolet Tahoe Special vehicle traded in by the City of Beloit. It has 16,000 miles on it and is equipped with cameras, radar, and lights. It was estimated it has eight or nine thousand dollars worth of equipment on it. The list price is $30.000 and it has a trade in value of $27,500. They would trade for the Jeep vehicle.

Daugherty told Commissioners, Ed Debesis, Emergency Medical Services, is interested in purchasing one of the Dodge Chargers the county is trading in for their first responders to drive. They would take out the car-cam and radar devices to use on one of their other vehicles and leave the light bar for the EMS people to use.

Commission Chairman, Mike Cooper, asked Daugherty and the dealership representative to come up with an estimated value as to how this would effect the lease agreement. Cooper said it would make a difference whether this transaction was handled as a transfer from one county department to another or go through the dealership. They were told Beloit Auto would sell the vehicle back to the county for whatever the dealership has in it. Chairman Cooper asked Daugherty to get this information together and bring it back at their next meeting on March 4, when Commissioner Jim Marshall will be present. The commissions will make their decision at that time. He said this would also give Sheriff Daugherty time to look over the bids and determine which vehicles would best meet their needs.

Commissioner Tom Claussen told Sheriff Daugherty they have to do something about the meal situation at the Mitchell County jail. At the present time Mitchell County Hospital is preparing the meals for them. "While we have no complaints about the quality or the cost of these meals we have to find a way to get the cost of the meals down. This is a detention facility not a hotel with a chef," Claussen said. The hospital has expressed the wish not to have to handle this situation since the capacity numbers change so much that they never know how many inmates they are going to have to prepare for from one day to the next.

Chairman Cooper said, the fact is the county does not have enough money budgeted to cover this expense. It is costing about $300 a day to feed the prisoners; which makes it $12 a day per person or $2,100 a week for the meals.

Commissioners discussed building a small kitchenette to serve from, buying a large freezer and microwave and having the jail staff heat up and serve the meals.
They could purchase frozen meals in large quantities. Various ideas were discussed and they will look into prices for the equipment to do this. It was agreed that this plan should pay for itself in time and would be much cheaper in the long run.

Heather Hartman, Economic Development, Reported on the ROZ Resolution. She talked to the Kansas Department of Commerce about the conditions of the resolution. The program was actually set up for the applicants to have an address outside of the State of Kansas who want to come back and live in the state. She is not sure if they can still have their voter registration in the State or not. The resolution states they have to maintain residency outside the state at the time of application. Hartman will ask what determines residency and if living in a dormitory at a four-year college constitute residency. The whole point of the resolution is to get people to come back to Kansas to live. She does know they have to set up their own residence and can't come back and live with their parents. There are a lot of unknown factors about this program, she said.

Hartman talked about two proposals for ways to help the county fund this program. They could set up an endowment fund or businesses could set up a fund and name the person they want it to go to. They have six approved grant recipients and more on the waiting list. The commissioners approved Resolution 2013 - 02 to add $9,000 to the county's sponsorship to this program. They have already funded three applications for a period of 5 years with three years left on this agreement. The commissioners approved adding the additional funds in order to try to bring more people back into this county to live.

Larry Emerson, Public Works, reported they have finished clearing all roads at the present time. He explained they don't operate at night unless an emergency situation arises because it is too hard to see what they are doing. Commissioner Claussen said a person northwest of Hunter asked about any way to pre-treat a slick area along the north side of a shelterbelt. Emerson said they have never started using the liquid ice remover and don't have a machine to spread it. Local people pretty well know where the slick spots are and know to slow down. You can't get every spot in the county to where they are plum safe, he said. Claussen expressed how much people appreciate the work the road crew does to get this done.

Emerson said they have finished graveling the Wear Road north of Barnard except for about a mile north of Dennis Pearson's. He has ordered the backhoe for the landfill. Claussen said he has had several townships express interest in purchasing the old backhoe.

A Neighborhood Revitalization Rebate Application was approved for Eric Eilert to build a new home in the amount of $496,262 on Lot 10 and 11 of Block 4 of the Conroy Place addition.