Housekeeping Ordinances Go Quickly at Last Meeting of 2021
An 11-member Quorum Court quickly dispatched four housekeeping/clean-up Ordinances at the December 21 meeting, while paying extra attention to adjustments made to County millage listings. Other than the millage listings, JPs asked very few questions.
Both Democrats, JPs Tyler Pearson (Dist. 7) and John Pickett (Dist. 11), were absent from the half-hour meeting and the Courtroom was mostly empty except for a handful of observers.
Journal Corrected
When JP Randy Higgins (R, Dist. 2) moved to approve the minutes from December 14, JP Kris Kendrick (R, Dist. 9) pointed out that he had voted “present” on Ordinance 21-45 and the minutes reflected “Pearson.”
JPs gave unanimous consent to make the change, and then voice voted unanimously to pass the Journal as corrected.
Treasurer Report
In the Treasurer’s Report as of December 21, County Treasurer Scott Sanson these “big five” revenue accounts:
County General: $4,282,731
County Road: $4,724,926
County Road Sales Tax: $3,771,768
Animal Control: $1,407,131
Criminal Justice Sales Tax: $1,930,609
Revenue “Surpasses” Projections
At 106% of projected, Sanson said County General revenue “is above the $12 million point … the first time,” adding that it’s “quite a bit above last year’s numbers — actually the last three years have been pretty close and we’re going to surpass last year’s number as well as projections for this year.”
Sales Tax Up $15.4%
Sales tax totaled $1,005,782, which is “14.99% better than last year.” Sales tax “is continuing,” Sanson added, at “15.41% higher than 2020.”
No other County officers gave reports.
AAC to Defend Amendment 79 Lawsuit
In Pickett’s absence, Higgins reported on the five Budget & Finance Committee meetings that resulted in the 2022 Budget. He gave updates on a lawsuit against the County as well as the latest activities of the animal shelter development committee:
He explained that the Association of Arkansas Counties’ Board was briefed on “the Amendment 79 lawsuit” and that “Faulkner County is named as a defendant.” Because over 20 counties are defendants, “the AAC Board voted to allow AAC’s legal team to actually take the lead in this case,” he said.
Animal Shelter Committee Update
Higgins said the Community Animal Shelter Development Committee met with “all of the city mayors” and “a few of the police chiefs” along with state Senator Missy Irvin, who is setting up a January “field trip” visit to the Stone County Animal Shelter in Mountain View that her family played a large part in developing.
At a second meeting in December, Higgins said the Committee reviewed and discussed an architectural services fee proposal “that I’ll be bringing to Committee in the near future.” He added that “the modular building on the animal shelter property in Springhill has been removed.”
Amended Ordinance 21-40, County Millage Rates
The Ordinance, which Higgins brought to the table and was seconded by JP Jerry Boyer (R, Dist 12), drew several questions from JPs about the millage rates that had changed from the original.
Kendrick asked, “Is there an attachment with this to show the changes? Because there’s not one in our book.”
County Judge Jim Baker asked County Attorney Phil Murphy if “an attachment should be coming over.” As Murphy answered, “I can’t speak to it,” he offered to “make sure to see if this on found on the website…” (County Clerk Margaret Darter, who prepared the information, was absent.)
Higgins then moved to table the Ordinance “and come back to it,” followed by a second from Kendrick. JPs voice voted unanimously to table Ordinance 21-40.
Ordinance 21-43, Cleanup on Premium Pay from CARES Act
Higgins again moved for consideration, and JP Jake Moss (R, Dist. 13) provided a second. After County Attorney Phil Murphy read the Ordinance by title only, JP John Allison (R, Dist. 3) asked for more information.
Higgins explained, “If I remember correctly the discussion in the Budget & Finance Committee was this was just clean-up, so moving some numbers into the right departments so that we could get it matched up…. it’s not any additional money, just putting it into the right categories.”
JPs voted unanimously by roll call to approve Ordinance 21-43.
Ordinance 21-44, Cleanup on Premium Pay from ARP
As before, Higgins moved to consider the Ordinance, and Moss seconded. After Murphy read it by title only, he explained this is the “sister Ordinance” to Ordinance 21-43, clean-up of premium pay from the American Rescue Plan.
After Higgins called for the vote, JPs unanimously approved Ordinance 21-44 by a roll call vote.
Ordinance 21-46, Sheriff’s Office Clean-up
Higgins moved to consider the Ordinance, and Kendrick seconded then added that Angie Wooley, Fiscal Officer in the Sheriff’s Department, would discuss an amended version of the Ordinance.
After Wooley distributed the proposed changes, she explained
When we ran our last payroll, we looked at exactly what we needed to cover over time in each of the sections (of the Ordinance). So some of the I had to increase and some of them actually decreased. So that’s mostly what’s changed. That way, we didn’t transfer any more than we had to cover all the different overtimes in payroll.
Explaining sections 8 and 9, Wooley said the Department “received two payments from the state auditors, from Arkansas State Police, as reimbursement from the mini step grant program” where deputies perform local task force work and for equipment expenses.
She added that “a portion of those expenses were paid out of County General Fund and then a portion of that was cut out of Criminal Justice, depending on where the employees were paid out of…. This is just reimbursing it back to where the expenses came from.”
Wooley concluded, “This is, hopefully, to clean up the rest of our budgets for the rest of the year.”
JP Tyler Lachowsky (R, Dist. 6) moved to amend the Ordinance; Kendrick seconded and JPs voice voted unanimously to amend Ordinance 21-46.
Then Higgins called the vote and JPs voted unanimously by roll call to approve the Ordinance.
“Thank You” From Sheriff’s Department
After JPs approved Ordinance 21-46, Wooley told the Court,
I want to let you all know how appreciative we are at the Sheriff’s Office for understanding our needs, especially with our staffing issues we’ve had recently.
I want to let you know, just since the Budget has been approved on Tuesday we hired 9 detention officers, just since then. So they are rolling in. We’re getting a lot more attention, also, to our other positions that are open, dispatcher and patrol. So we just want to say thank you.
Ordinance 21-40 Again
Higgins moved to re-consider Ordinance 21-40 (and Boyer seconded) after Murphy reported he
just received from Ms. Darter a sheet that shows the millage rates for each school district..
These are all the millages that have been voted on by the individual school districts and, obviously, it’s just a matter of state law of us passing that on to the Collector through this process.
Several moments went by as each JP studied the single hard copy of the document they passed one-by-one down the line.
What Changed?
Kendrick asked if the sheet they studied was “the one we previously approved .. without the amended changes,” but Murphy said, “I don’t remember that being approved…” and Kendrick replied, “Something has changed in what we approved” at the November 16 Quorum Court meeting.
As Higgins and other JPs scrambled to locate the earlier approved Ordinance, audience member Jack Sotallaro reminded JPs that when the Ordinance was presented to the Budget Committee in November, “two districts had not reported.”
With that information, Kendrick pointed out that Pulaski County Special had decreased from 49 to 48.27 and Rosebud is the same at 47.6. (Districts can own property in Faulkner County and not be “administered through Faulkner County,” Murphy said.)
After a little more confusion about the rates Higgins moved to approve and Lachowsky seconded. JPs voted unanimously by roll call to approve Ordinance 21-40.
Reappraisal Plan
Baker waved a document he called the “3-year reappraisal plan” and told JPs, … “Our appraiser is communicating some information here for you….”
Murphy interrupted, saying “By state law, we’re required to give notice to the Quorum Court of the plan. So this is basically just the packet of how that process went about and then the actual reappraisal packet as well…”
After cautioning the room to “keep your guard up … the virus in Faulkner County” is back, Baker wished everyone Merry Christmas and the last meeting of 2021 adjourned.
Videos edited from original video on Faulkner County’s YouTube channel.)
Visit Faulkner County Reports on YouTube for more videos and video excerpts from this and other County meetings.
