JOINT MEETING

COUNTY COMMISSIONERS-CITY COUNCIL

JUNE 30, 2011

The Vanderburgh County Board of Commissioners and Common Council of the City of Evansville reconvened the joint session and public hearing from March 30, 2011 on the proposed Reorganization Plan this 30^th day of June, 2011 at 5:31 p.m. in room 301 of the Civic Center Complex.

Councilmember Adams: Mr. Chairman, Mrs. Bredhold would like to say that she would love to come, but she is a little bit under the weather with just a few days left to have that magnificent event called birth.

President Winnecke: Understood, we wish her the best. I would like to reconvene the public hearing that we began March 30^th, I believe.

President Winnecke: We’ll begin with the Pledge of Allegiance. So, please stand and join us.

(The Pledge of Allegiance was given.)

President Winnecke: One housekeeping item, many of you may know that WNIN is having some technical problems. They could not televise this meeting live, they are recording it tonight and it will be played back at a time that they will determine. So, they are here to video tape that.

President Winnecke: My thought on what we would do tonight, and certainly open to suggestions, we all have the redlined version, and actually we have some extra copies of the redlined Plan if anyone from the public would like to come up and get one, you’re welcome to do so. I thought we would just go through the changes that have been outlined for us, make sure that the wording is the way everyone thinks everyone is comfortable with, go through that. We have maps from, the Surveyor has maps for us to look at, and I know Chief Hill and Sheriff Williams are here to chat about the law enforcement component and the jurisdiction issues that we discussed previously. So, if that’s alright we’ll go immediately to the Plan.

President Winnecke: I believe page three has the first change, in the first paragraph, 1.22. Anybody have any issues with that? If not, we’ll move on. Page four is the next change, a deletion under 2.7, deleting the clause “ and are excluded from civil service”. As a reminder for those who haven’t been here through all of the meetings or are sort of catching up, have been with us through some, these changes were made via straw votes from each body in previous workshops. Page five, I have the next one in 3.11, deleting the phrase “or any department, unit, board, agency, subordinate body or any other part of the Combined Government”. Page six, we have several changes, beginning with 3.3, Number of Members. I’ll just read this to you briefly. It says, the changes, “The Common Council shall consist of fifteen (15) members. Twelve (12) members shall be elected, one each from single-member geographic districts, and three (3) at-large members shall be elected from the Combined Government at-large.” That is a change from the first Reorganization Plan. 3.4, Geographic Districts for At-Large Members, it reads now, “Each of the three (3) at-large members shall be voted upon by the entire Combined Government area. The Combined Government area shall be divided into three (3) separate “at-large” districts as shown on Exhibit “BB”. One (1) at-large member shall reside in and be elected from each of the three (3) at-large districts.” Section 3.5, Description of the Twelve (12) Common Council Districts and Three (3) At-Large Districts. 3.5.1, “Attached as Exhibit “B”, which we’ll see later, “is a map depicting the proposed twelve (12) Common Council districts and precincts for the Combined Government.” 3.5.2, adding, “Attached as Exhibit “BB” is a map depicting the three (3) separate districts for at-large members. There will be one (1) at-large member elected from each district as shown on Exhibit “BB”.” Any questions or concern with any of that wording? Hearing none, down to the bottom of the page, 3.11, Legal Counsel to the Common Council, “The Common Council shall employ legal counsel of their choosing to represent them.”

President Winnecke: Article four regards, relates to the Judicial Branch. I believe this is pretty straight forward.

Ted C. Ziemer, Jr.: We received a call from Judge Heldt, and both John and I, and the only thing that he requests is that Article Four be changed from Judicial Branch to Courts.

John Hamilton: Just on the heading.

Ted C. Ziemer, Jr.: Just on the heading, to say it’s Courts instead of Judicial Branch. His thought is that the courts are not a branch of this local government, they are a branch of the State of Indiana government. He would, so if we don’t want to go into all of that, he would be pleased if we just simply changed the caption to read Courts instead of Judicial Branch. Neither John nor I see any objection to that.

Commissioner Abell: I don’t see any reason for it. The Clerk of the Court is part of the Courts, and she’s addressed in here as an officeholder. If you put Courts there then you sort of have that confusion, because the Clerk of the Court does not fall under the Judicial Branch. The Clerk of the Court falls under county government, but if you put Courts then you’ve changed it to something that the Clerk of the Court is in charge of.

Ted C. Ziemer, Jr.: Let’s see, Commissioner Abell, 5.3.2 is the Clerk of the Court, and then it describes that office. It’s talking about court, so, I’m not sure that that would be in conflict if we changed the section, Article Four, to Courts.

Commissioner Abell: Well, if the Clerk of the Court is in Article Five and you change Judicial Branch, which is Article Four, to Courts, I think it’s confusing. I think it’s much better left Judicial Branch. That’s just my opinion, but I was Clerk of the Courts once and I know that the Clerk of the Court has 53 employees and they are county employees and we have a problem with the judicial branch thinking their employees are State employees. I think we’re asking for a big problem.

Ted C. Ziemer, Jr.: I would just comment to say, excuse me–

Councilmember Adams: Go ahead.

Ted C. Ziemer, Jr.: – to say that we’re not, he’s not suggesting that we in anyway change the language of 4.1. As it is stated now he is totally satisfied. He just suggests that if the heading would read “Courts” instead of “Judicial Branch”, the courts would be more satisfied. Neither John nor I see how that, in any way, contradicts other language in the Plan, but, I mean, the Clerk of the Court is still the Clerk of the Court, and will be. We just wanted to advise you of what the judges would like. It’s up to the Council and the Commissioners.

Councilmember Adams: Mr. Ziemer, one of the problems I have about changing that to “Courts”, and therefore reaffirming that that is a State group.

Ted C. Ziemer, Jr.: I don’t think we’re really reaffirming that. We’re simply calling this section “Courts”. They are courts. So, I don’t think, I don’t think it even addresses the problem–

Councilmember Adams: Well, let me tell you the problem.

Ted C. Ziemer, Jr.: Or the issue of whether they are State or local.

Councilmember Adams: Let me describe the problem before you go off on what you think the problem is.

Ted C. Ziemer, Jr.: Yes.

Councilmember Adams: The bottom line here is, the one thing that we’ve been toying around and talking a lot about is that the people who work under the judges seem to have the idea that they have their own rules to go by. I wonder if we allowed this to be separate, ie: a separate State thing, does that somehow free them up to believe that people can go home at 3:00 in the afternoon?

Ted C. Ziemer, Jr.: My response is, we’re not calling it “State Courts”–

Councilmember Adams: That doesn’t answer my question.

Ted C. Ziemer, Jr.: Well, it’s just calling it “Courts”, and I don’t think that that gets to the issue of all of who’s employees they are. Whether they are employees of the courts or employees of the county, or of the new Metro Government.

Councilmember Adams: I think I just heard you say though, by saying “Courts” that reaffirms the fact that it’s a State, they are under the State rather than the city. I don’t, I promise you I’m not versed enough to know, but I certainly wouldn’t want to reaffirm that these people are not being held accountable to the same rules that everybody else is that works for the county and city, the Metro. I think it should be uniform. If you say that changing this word won’t change that, fine, but I sense that there would be–

Ted C. Ziemer, Jr.: That would be my opinion.

Councilmember Adams: – I’m sensing there’s a flavor here that we’re letting, we’re starting to get separation of who owns who.

John Hamilton: I don’t think the heading has any substantive meaning at all in terms of how this is interpreted.

Councilmember Adams: Then, I guess it begs another question, how do we address the thing that you were so worried about that you made me aware of?

Commissioner Abell: Well, if the heading doesn’t make any difference, why don’t just leave it alone? Why change it if it doesn’t make any difference? Just because the judges want it changed?

Ted C. Ziemer, Jr.: No, because the judges suggest that calling them a “Judicial Branch” of the new Metro Government is incorrect. They aren’t a branch of the Metro Government, they are the Judicial Branch of the State of Indiana. To, I mean, I guess, this section could go into all of that and call them a Judicial Branch of the State of Indiana. He says that to avoid that problem, he would be satisfied if they were simply called “Courts”. I, well, from a legal perspective you’re not harming this language at all, nor are you granting any further credence to whoever the employees are employees of, whether it’s the courts or of the Metro Government. It’s simply saying this section has to do with courts, which it does.

Councilmember Adams: Can you tell me simply whether the judicial staff is under the courts or are they under the (Inaudible) rules of the Metro Council?

Ted C. Ziemer, Jr.: I cannot tell you that simply.

Councilmember Adams: Okay, fair enough. Fair enough.

Commissioner Melcher: I have a question I want to jump in on. What if we changed the word “Judicial” to “Judiciary”? Would that change anything?

Commissioner Abell: To what?

Ted C. Ziemer, Jr.: Judiciary.

Commissioner Melcher: Would that change?

Ted C. Ziemer, Jr.: Commissioner Melcher, I would think that that would be satisfactory, but I’m not a member of the judiciary, and I’m not sure that they would agree with me.

Commissioner Melcher: Well, they’re not agreeing with us right now.

Ted C. Ziemer, Jr.: No, but it seemed to John and I after he made that...and that’s the only request he made. In other words, he accepted the language that we have written in the document. He simply would like the Article Four to be called “Courts” instead of “Judicial Branch”. John and I are not arguing for the judges position, we just want to be sure you understand what it is. Whatever you decide to do is wonderful.

Councilmember Adams: Is Judge Heldt the only judge that feels this way?

Ted C. Ziemer, Jr.: Well, he is the judge of the Circuit Court and he called, I think, expressing the wish of the courts.

Councilmember Adams: But, we don’t know that, do we?

Ted C. Ziemer, Jr.: I’m pretty sure that’s what he’s doing. I’ll be very surprised if he is acting separately.

John Hamilton: I took it that he was speaking on behalf of the judges collectively.

Councilmember Adams: Okay.

Councilman John: I mean, if it has nothing to do with, other than changing, I don’t see what the long discussion is about. I don’t know why we wouldn’t just put “Courts”.

John Hamilton: You could change lots of headings in here and it really wouldn’t have any substantive effect.

Councilman John: Yeah.

John Hamilton: But, we need you to tell us (Inaudible. Not at microphone.)

Councilmember Adams: Well, Councilman John, I agree with you, but the question I have, is there some subtle meaning here where the staff somehow gets special privileges by being under the umbrella, if you will, of these people?

Councilman John: If I’m not mistaken, the Council is still going to have to approve their salaries, their benefits, everything that they’ve done in the past.

Councilmember Adams: Their working hours?

Councilman John: I would assume that you would have control over that. I mean, that’s, of course, there’s not uniform working hours in the county right now. I mean, some of them are open till 4:00, some till 3:30, they split their staffs. Yeah, I mean, I think that at some point in time the Council should probably have uniform employee schedules throughout the city and county, and we don’t have that right now. I don’t think changing it to “Courts” is going to address that issue. I think it’s going to take Council coming up with an employee manual across the board for all departments, and I think that really needs to be addressed.

Councilmember Adams: Well, let me ask you this, I’m sorry, would it be possible for us to put into this document that the Metro Council would have the opportunity to regulate all county court employees so that it’s uniform and have that be part of their responsibility to do exactly what is being suggested here?

Ted C. Ziemer, Jr.: It’s certainly possible for you to put that in the document. Whether that will be accepted by the courts or not is a question. I can tell you that, and I don’t know, Commissioner Abell, I know that you’ve talked to, from Barnes and Thornburg, Brad...I can’t think of his name right now, but I’ve spoken to him as well. He says, throughout the State of Indiana various counties treat them differently in this regard. It’s not uniform across the State. So, it’s not an easy issue. I agree that it’s one that should be worked out. I’m not sure that this document is the place to work it out, but that would be my response.

Councilmember Adams: Well, humor me.

Ted C. Ziemer, Jr.: I will always humor you.

Councilmember Adams: How do I make a motion that we include in this document that the Metro Council does indeed have the responsibility to review uniform regulations for all of the Metro employees, including the courts? I mean, people may not agree with me. We can vote it down. I mean, I just think it ought to be uniform.

Ted C. Ziemer, Jr.: I think it’s going, I can’t give you that answer sitting here this evening. What I would like to do is work with the language and then provide a response which addresses the issue you would like to raise.

Ted C. Ziemer, Jr.: God bless you. Have a wonderful time doing that.

Councilman John: Can you somehow come up with language that says that the Metro Council shall approve the employee manual as established by the administration?

Ted C. Ziemer, Jr.: Certainly. We can say that.

Councilman John: And, whether or not the courts are involved with that, I mean, as Auditor we got mandated to do a bunch of things. So, they may come back and say, no, we run our own courts and we will set our own hours, and we will mandate it, and so be it. I don’t know that that would happen, but maybe to address Councilman Adams’ concern is you included something in there that the employee manual, as established by the administration is subject to approval of the City Council, or the Metro Council.

Councilmember McGinn: That may be, if you look at Section 10.8, Effect of Reorganization on City and County Employees, it says, “As of the Effective Date, all non-elected employees of the City and the County shall become employees of the Combined Government on the same terms and conditions as existed on the day before the Effective Date.” Maybe it ought to be they shall become employees of the Combined Government on the terms and conditions as established by the Combined Government, you know, the Metro Council, sure, you know, according to the employee manual. I mean, that’s where it ought to be.

John Hamilton: Well, I think the next paragraph addresses that, 10.8.2. It says, “Notwithstanding 10.8.1, employment shall be subject to such terms and conditions as the Combined Government shall establish from time to time.” I think 10.8.1 just says you keep it as it is until the Combined Government makes any changes, so that if they don’t do anything, you have a default to keep them the same.

Councilmember McGinn: Yeah, it’s covered. I mean, I think it’s covered. I should have kept reading.

President Winnecke: So, what’s the pleasure? We’re back to the heading.

Councilmember McGinn: Let’s call it “Legal Stuff”.

President Winnecke: Just “Legal Stuff”? Well, surely the judges would like that.

Councilman John: Let’s title it the way they think it should be titled.

Councilmember McGinn: They say it makes no difference to the substance of the law, flip a coin and put it on there. I vote they flip a coin and either call it “Judicial Branch” or “Courts”. Whatever they feel is, I think it has no bearing whatsoever.

Councilman John: It’s their department, so I would just as soon put “Courts” there, if it has no bearing on the interpretation or administration of the courts. Put it there, I mean, why get in an argument with the judiciary?

Councilmember Mosby: Councilman John, I agree with you. I mean, Judge Heldt is saying that, that’s his expertise, and I think that we should go with “Courts”.

President Winnecke: So, do we want to take a straw poll, a straw vote on the “Courts” titlement?

Councilmember Adams: The problem is it’s little, tiny changes like this, ten years down the road, five years down the road (Inaudible. Microphone not on.) We can’t foresee that. I’m not saying (Inaudible. Microphone not on.) I’m just saying that this sounds like it’s innocuous, but it may not be. I’m going to stick with Marsha.

President Winnecke: Okay, a show of hands on Councilman John’s recommendation to change it to “Courts”?

(City Councilmembers approved straw vote 5-1. Councilman Adams opposed. County Commissioners approved straw vote 2-1. Commissioner Abell opposed.)

President Winnecke: Okay, it’s to “Courts”.

President Winnecke: Okay, down, the next change is 5.3.3, saying the Evansville Police Department is responsible for parking enforcement and parking meter administration.

President Winnecke: Page eight, 6.1, Director of Budget and Finance, requiring that the Budget, the Director of Budget and Finance hold a CPA certification. We had a lot of discussion about that. Down to 6.3.2, changing the word “office” to “officer”. 6.3.4, increases in budgeted items by the Council. Changing that number from eight (8) to ten (10), and adding the sentence, “the Common Council may decrease any item in the proposed budget by a simple majority of eight (8) members.

President Winnecke: 7.3, it’s Exhibit “C-2". Section 7.4.1, “A geographic area in the General Services District may be converted to the Urban Service District or Special Service District upon either: (1) petition to the Mayor or Common Council by a majority of the registered voters of such an area”, rather than the “residents”; or “request by the Mayor and ten (10) members of the Common Council.”

President Winnecke: Section 9.2, describing the City Engineer and County Engineer being combined into one office, into the Department of Transportation Services. Section 9.3, adding the word “the”, and at the end, “Language on jurisdictional boundaries”. Who’s going to provide that for us?

Ted C. Ziemer, Jr.: The Police Chief and the Sheriff.

President Winnecke: On code enforcement?

John Hamilton: I think that belongs in 9.4.

Ted C. Ziemer, Jr.: Yeah.

John Hamilton: We need to put that in 9.4.

President Winnecke: Okay, good. So, that should be deleted and added to 9.4?

Ted C. Ziemer, Jr.: Right. Well, that’s just, advise us that that needs to be done.

President Winnecke: Right. Okay, 9.4 confirms our earlier discussion that the County Sheriff and the Evansville Police Department shall not be modified or combined in the Combined Government. They each shall continue their operations as separate departments. Notwithstanding the provisions in Article11 of this Plan concerning Amendments, no action or consideration to combine the departments shall be taken or acted upon prior to, we have left this date open. We had a lot of discussion around that last time. So, in my mind we need to insert a date here, and we need input from the Chief and the Sheriff regarding the jurisdictional issues that we discussed earlier. So, let’s start with the Chief and the Sheriff, please.

Brad Hill: So, I guess we can’t do eternity for that blank spot there?

President Winnecke: You could.

Ted C. Ziemer, Jr.: If you know the date.

President Winnecke: Yeah, if you know the date.

Brad Hill: I’m Chief Brad Hill. Eric and I have discussed it, and I’ll certainly let Eric talk as well, but we had discussed the idea of 12 years for that election cycle of discussing the law enforcement issue, consolidation issue again at that time. As I said, from my perspective, the idea would be to discuss it. I think it should be a discussion that’s had by law enforcement professionals from both sides to discuss that issue at that time. If that group comes up with an agreed upon plan, then I think it should go to the voters for, to the public for a vote, and not necessarily go to a vote if that body does not come up with an agreed upon plan. So, I guess, what I’m saying is in 12 years it gets looked at again by that body.

President Winnecke: So, that would be 12 years from the date of our referendum?

Brad Hill: That’s my thoughts.

President Winnecke: So, 2024?

Eric Williams: As I had said in the previous meeting, we discussed this, that I thought a time period was out there. I mean, personally, 12 years, I can live with that. As I told Chief Hill, I think that’s probably longer than it needs to be. I had said ten years originally, and my logic there was that that’s half of a deputy’s or policeman’s 20 year career, theoretically. That would give us ten years to understand how consolidated government works, because we’re basing all of these numbers on the assumption that this would pass and everything else would become consolidated. That means that everybody over the course of the next ten years would have been hired knowing that this was on the horizon and to be preparing themselves and be thinking that way, that administrations would change probably more than once or twice in that period of time, with that in mind to prepare themselves for it. So, I kind of, ten years, and it was purely a random number based on half of a 20 year career, and it gave us enough time to, what I would hope, become and develop an appetite to go ahead and consolidate law enforcement once we realize that the consolidation of all of the other forms of government locally and the sun still came up and we were providing services and things were going really well.

President Winnecke: Any questions or comments of either the Sheriff or the Chief?

Councilmember Adams: Have you two come up with a map delineating the service areas?

Eric Williams: We’ve come up with two maps.

Councilmember Adams: Good.

Eric Williams: We have his version and my version, and they don’t jive very well right now.

Councilmember Adams: So, you’re still hashing that out?

Eric Williams: Yeah, you know, I think both of us are operating with the spirit of we need to find a solution, that, you know, if we’re going to have two law enforcement agencies in this community and they’re going to stay as is for a period of time, we need to look at those jurisdictions as they are today and correct some of the inefficiencies that exist. I think that’s kind of the marching direction and orders that you gave us, and it’s kind of the pledge we made to you all. I think my version of future efficiencies and effectiveness are probably far more aggressive. I’ve looked at some bigger, sweeping changes, and Chief Hill did much more of a fine tuning of current things. So, you know, we’re probably on the same track, but pretty far apart.

Councilmember Adams: Okay.

Eric Williams: If that makes any sense.

Councilmember Adams: Yeah, it makes very good sense. I would like to take this opportunity to publicly apologize to you for being so glib when we last discussed this. You and I got into a repartee back and forth where you eventually said are you trying to tell me my Sheriff’s aren’t as good as the Police, and I, in my Irish unwit, said if you want me to say yes, I’ll say yes, or yes. What I really was trying to say, and I’ve e-mailed you about this, but I wanted to say this in public, was that while I was trying to say that if we are going to wait 12, 14 who knows, if we’re going to wait a long time, there may be areas of a contiguous nature that come into the city who are paying for full service, and I, Dan Adams, felt if they were paying for full services they should get fire and police protection from the city. That’s all I’m saying.

Eric Williams: And I truly, perfectly understand that. I appreciate your comments. I don’t take this stuff personally.

Councilmember Adams: Okay.

Eric Williams: Trust me, if I had known you were going to be that easy to get to say something I would have tried to get you to say something else, include me in the will, I don’t know.

Councilmember Adams: Well, now you know.

Eric Williams: But, you know, when I look at that, and I’ve tried to explain to people that the task that is in front of us, because we’re deciding to consolidate all of local government, at least, you know, what we know of county and city government, townships excluded, except for the two biggest pieces, which is the Sheriff’s Office and the Police Department. That’s difficult to make some people that are really following this understand. So, I’ve tried to take the analogy that let’s put it in the business world and we’re going to create this one large business, and this business is going to choose to contract with two people to provide a similar service to cover different areas of their operation. There’s some, because there’s no longer a city and a county, or a city boundary, it’s just all one happy family. It’s just that I will be policing one area, I won’t, but the Sheriff’s Office will be, and the Police Department will be policing another one. I guess, not understanding the tax piece of it and how those are actually going to be extrapolated out and spread out across of it, it seemed to me that the law enforcement component of it, both city and county, should be pulled from that and both of those budgets should be spread across the entire general tax base, as opposed to being specific to the city, current city boundaries or that Urban Tax District. Because, truly, just like it is today, and I foresee in the future, unless something horrible would happen, when we have an issue the first people we call is the Evansville Police Department and they send their troops in. When something happens in the city and they need extra troops, the first people they call are the Sheriff’s Office and we send the troops in. You know, so, we already work, you know, very, very well together and we back each other up, and it seems to me law enforcement, as a total, the two of us combined, should not be separated like that. That should be applied across the entire tax base. Now, I don’t know if I’m crazy, but that to me makes the most sense.

Councilmember Adams: No, I don’t think you’re crazy at all. I just think the likelihood of a Full Service District coming in sometime in the next ten to 12 years is much more likely than not. I don’t know if my colleagues agree with me, I was just making that suggestion–

Eric Williams: And I understood your position.

Councilmember Adams: – and they can vote on that, if they like.

Eric Williams: I think the reason that we got to where we’re at in talking about locking these boundaries in, was to avoid this emotional discussion over and over again every single time something changes. That we were going to leave this alone, this component of this local government alone for this period of time and discuss it by itself at a period in time when everybody has had time to digest the entire concept.

Councilmember Adams: Okay, well, my colleagues will tell me whether they think that little, tiny change is worth doing.

Commissioner Abell: Mr. Winnecke, did we decide that, as I recall, we intended that this will go back to a vote of the people once we make a decision about, is that correct? In ten years will they vote on how they want, right, isn’t that correct?

Councilmember Adams: Did we make that decision?

Commissioner Abell: I think we did make that decision. I would say that I think you should, the two of you whether whoever’s got your uniform on at that time, should be prepared for this to go to a vote in November of 2024, not be prepared to just putt it around. I mean, to vote, because in 2023 there will be no election, 2025 there will be no election, because if we have consolidated government there will be no city election anymore, they will only be done on the county, on the same sequence, correct? Am I correct on that? Okay, then 2023 is normally a city election, 2025 is the off year, so, I would think that it needs to be on the ballot in November of 2024.

Eric Williams: I sincerely hope I am not still wearing the brown uniform at the time, and that I’m just a voter that will cast a vote in that election.

Brad Hill: I don’t know that I would necessarily agree that it needs to go to a vote then. I think, as Eric had said, by the time, 12 years, I don’t think this is the right time for consolidating the law enforcement, in 12 years maybe it is the right time, but it may not be either. I don’t think we should be mandated to put it to a vote if there is still the will of the people let’s say that law enforcement doesn’t need to be consolidated. I’m okay with a vote, but I think it needs to be studied again, ten years, 12 years, and then possibly go to a vote depending on what that group decides, rather than decide now that it’s definitely going to a vote.

President Winnecke: I have a legal question for–

Councilmember Adams: Doesn’t the vote decide that?

Commissioner Abell: I think it does.

President Winnecke: Let me just jump in here, jumping ahead to Section11, which makes the Amendments to the Plan, if you follow that, it tells me that changes in law enforcement in 12 years or whenever would not be required to go to a vote, but I think what the feeling is that people would like for that component, in 12 years or whenever, to go to a vote. Is that–

Commissioner Abell: I think you have to put a date on it or it will never happen.

President Winnecke: No, yeah, I understand that, but my question is–

Councilmember Adams: (Inaudible. Microphone not on.)

President Winnecke: –my point is the mechanism, because in Section 11 when it talks about amending the Plan, it does not call for that. To amend components of the Plan that we’re considering does not go to, none of those changes go to a vote.

Commissioner Abell: We can amend it as a Combined Government without it?

President Winnecke: Correct, and there’s a mechanism, but if there’s a willingness by this body to change that, for law enforcement only, then we need to add that language.

Eric Williams: I think that is what we kind of discussed that this would be one of those issues that’s going to go back to a ballot someday to the people, as opposed to, of this, because, I mean, the argument was that this was the issue that was going to, you know, cause this to fail miserably anyways because of the emotion and all of the reasons that everybody had that it should or shouldn’t occur. If those emotions are here today, I can’t imagine that they won’t be here tomorrow and the next day, that we ought to, I agree with the idea of just putting the date in there and having a vote and know that we are going to prepare to that and put forth the best plan at that date, and either the people vote for it or they don’t.

Ted C. Ziemer, Jr.: To just answer you, Commissioner Winnecke, when the provision was drafted with the date provision in there, what that means as the Plan is currently written or as revised, it means that on that date, if it’s 2024, will be the first time that the Metro Council could go through the amendment provision provided for in Article 11. You would simply follow that. You’re quite correct, it does not require a referendum to amend the Plan. If you want to have a referendum to amend the Plan regarding law enforcement, you can provide for that.

President Winnecke: Okay, we would just need to create the language, I suspect, in Article 11, or maybe mention it twice, I don’t know, in nine and 11.

Brad Hill: May I speak? If it does go to a vote in 12 years, one thing I would want to make clear is, that it’s not a vote on this current plan that was presented by the committee. That it’s a vote on a plan that is prepared by law enforcement professionals.

Councilmember Adams: Well, sorry to challenge you, or gently disagree. I agree with what you just said, but this concept of let’s discuss it in 12 years, we started, I think with four, or five or six, and we’ve gone to ten, now it’s 12–

Brad Hill: No, I started much higher.

Councilmember Adams: –I think–

President Winnecke: The Chief started at 20 actually.

Councilmember Adams: Right, well, that’s where I started, anyway, the problem with, I think, if we don’t set a date, I think that referendum will do exactly what you say you want, that the people will decide whether they want that. But, if we’re just going to start discussing it in November of ‘24, there is no impetus for the two people to get together and really spend some time, over the next decade, to figure out what is the best course for us. So, I’m very much in favor of saying let’s put it to the test, let’s put it to a vote in November of 2024.

Brad Hill: I think we’re on the same page now. If you’re going to choose to put it to a vote, my point is that we’re putting something to a vote that’s not planned yet.

Councilmember Adams: Yeah, no, I got that point.

Brad Hill: It’s not the current plan, but it’s something that’s put together by law enforcement, rather than some other group.

Councilmember Adams: I don’t have any problem with that.

Commissioner Abell: Well, I think that’s our idea, because if we’re going to put the current plan, we’ll put it out there today. We’re giving you ten years to work out a better one.

Brad Hill: I just want to make sure that that’s not an understanding ten years from now that it was that plan.

President Winnecke: We could lay that out, we could specify that in the modified language.

Councilmember Mosby: I really feel there does need to be some type of discussion, because this has been very healthy for Council and Commissioners, along with constituents to, you know, talk and see what everybody wants, and not just let’s put it to a vote.

Councilmember Walker: Leave it as it is.

Commissioner Abell: Well and you may leave it as it is, who knows.

Councilmember Walker: Leave it as it is.

Eric Williams: Just for the record, I agree that in the course of that ten, whatever that date is, that period of time, that it would behoove everybody to begin and constantly be working towards that end, to come up with the best plan. Now, I wouldn’t have any issue if you wanted to take the current plan and just put that in the future, but I understand how it works, and we ought to constantly be working to the best plan, because the best plan is usually the next one, because we learn from each one before it.

Councilmember Mosby: How about if we start the discussion in ten years and then have it on a referendum in 12?

Councilmember Adams: I would love to see them discuss it over the next decade to tell you the truth.

Eric Williams: I agree with you, Councilman Adams.

Councilmember Mosby: I do too, but–

Eric Williams: I would like to say, put the date in, I started with ten years and I’ll stick to ten years, have that date and the date this passes, the referendum, and we consolidate local governments is the day that whoever is at the helm of both of those agencies needs to sit down and start the process.

Councilmember Adams: If we leave these two bodies together and start to discuss it in 12 years, they’ll ignore it for 12 years. If they know that down the road they’ve got a date that they’re going to have to vote on it, it will really make these people think and really work hard, I think.

Councilmember Mosby: But, I think there needs to be public discussion like we’re having now.

Councilmember Adams: Yeah.

Councilmember Mosby: So, you know, in ten years start public discussion, and in 12 years have the vote on it.

Councilmember Adams: But, we have to vote and amend it so that we have that process (Inaudible. Microphone not on.)

Brad Hill: Like Councilman Mosby said, if you started the discussion in 2010, that’s still two years as opposed to the length of time this one was in process. So, that’s still a healthy length. It’s not to say that it can’t be, the discussion might start earlier, but I think that sounds reasonable.

Ted C. Ziemer, Jr.: Mr. Chairman, one issue, I think–

Councilmember Walker: I wanted to make a motion that we leave the Police Department and the Sheriff’s Department as it is.

President Winnecke: Well, in this Plan, it does.

Ted C. Ziemer, Jr.: One consideration, when we’re talking about maybe having a referendum, we cannot have a referendum on the ballot unless it’s authorized by the State, through legislation. So, we can’t change this to require a referendum. You can do anything you want to make the approval process more difficult, if that’s what you want to do, require a super majority of everybody on the, not just ten, 15 people on the Council. You could do that, but you can’t require a referendum without legislation authorizing the referendum.

Councilmember McGinn: Don’t you think that the issue of consolidating law enforcement will come up the next election for Sheriff? I mean, I would think that this process and these plans would be vetted during an election campaign.

Eric Williams: The only thing I can tell you for sure is that I will not be a candidate.

Councilmember McGinn: I know you won’t be. The law says you can’t.

Eric Williams: But, I will ask the questions of the candidates.

Councilmember McGinn: I already have them written down. I mean, I think this is going to be vetted. I think it’s going to become a campaign issue in primaries and in the general election. Whoever is running for Sheriff, are you in favor of consolidating law enforcement, why? So, I mean, I’m not really worried about it not being brought up in the next ten years, and how, how much are you going to save us? So, I’m not concerned it’s going to be a secret.

Councilman John: Not to stop the conversation about this, but what’s to prevent the Metro Council, four years from now, saying let’s amend the Plan and go and combine them right now and they vote? Ten of them, ten of them vote.

John Hamilton: They would have to follow the procedure in Article 11.

Councilman John: So, I mean, they can do it. So, we could put ten years, 20 years, 50 years, 100 years, but a new Council can decide.

John Hamilton: We say (Inaudible. Not at microphone)--

Commissioner Abell: Unless you leave this.

John Hamilton: – can, (Inaudible. Not at microphone) might not be able to.

Commissioner Abell: Well, this says no consideration can be acted upon prior to a certain date.

Councilman John: But, you can’t amend it?

Commissioner Abell: If you leave this you can’t.

John Hamilton: We’re trying to set in stone an exception.

Councilman John: Okay, so you would put in there that this cannot be amended pursuant to section–

John Hamilton: That’s what we (Inaudible. Not at microphone.) notwithstanding Article 11. That they cannot do it until a certain date.

Councilman John: Do your ten year–

John Hamilton: (Inaudible. Not at microphone.)

Councilmember Adams: Then render me, because I didn’t really want to get into this, but I thought about it last night, then render me a legal opinion as to whether the new Metro Council could indeed supercede and overrule this thing. I mean, they’re a brand new group of people.

John Hamilton: There is no precedent or no law to guide us on it.

Councilmember Adams: Yeah, so, I think what I’m hearing is the chances are they can do that.

Ted C. Ziemer, Jr.: No, I think it’s the reverse. I think the chances are they cannot, but it could be challenged in court. I think the challengers lose. The object here is to prepare a Plan which is going to set the stage for the new government, and after this Plan is approved by this body, and we’re putting in the Plan what the amendment process is, we can make that amendment process anything we want to. Then we can, if we can put in an amendment process, we can also say that some portion of this Plan is not subject to that amendment process, or won’t be subject to that process until 2024. I think we have the right to do that, and I believe that in a challenge we would win. The Plan is going to supercede any chance to change it, except as provided in the Plan.

Councilmember Adams: By doing so we would be showing the will of the people at this particular date.

Ted C. Ziemer, Jr.: Always.

Councilman John: What if you include in there in ten years, 2022, the Council petitions the State to authorize a referendum and they start developing a plan for 2012, or 2024? Excuse me.

John Hamilton: Are you wanting to mandate that they do that? Or, what if the Council decides by ten out of 15 that they don’t want to do that? Do you want it to be mandated? I’m just asking.

Councilman John: No, authorize them on that date to petition the State for a referendum for the 2024, but they can’t do it before 2022.

Councilmember Adams: That’s the most legal way that I (Inaudible. Microphone not on.) what I hear you guys say, this is just (Inaudible) allows the Metro Council to start doing it at that time–

John Hamilton: It authorizes them, but you don’t want to mandate that they shall do it.

Councilman John: Yeah, authorize them to do it.

Councilmember Adams: What we’re looking for here, obviously, ten or 12 years (Inaudible. Microphone not on.) I think we’ve got that. Then the question is how do we process it so that it is discussed and voted on by the people?

John Hamilton: What if the Metro Council decides they don’t want (Inaudible)?

Councilmember Adams: Well, that’s their problem.

John Hamilton: Okay.

Councilman John: Yeah, then they don’t do it.

John Hamilton: That’s what I’m asking. Just so we understand.

Councilmember Adams: I can’t (Inaudible) won’t.

Councilman John: I’ll put that in the form of a motion.

Councilmember Mosby: I agree.

President Winnecke: Okay, do you want to summarize it one more time?

Councilman John: In the year 2022 the Metro Council is authorized to petition the State, through one of our legislators, to authorize a referendum in the year 2024 on combining the Police and Sheriff’s Department, and during that interim they develop the plan, if they decide to do that, on the implementation of the merger.

President Winnecke: And did that plan, just to piggyback on it maybe, and then that plan be developed by–

Councilman John: The Police and Sheriff’s Department–

President Winnecke: Right.

Councilman John: – the professional law enforcement officers.

Councilmember Friend: Second.

President Winnecke: Is everybody clear on that?

Councilman John: Does that make sense?

Councilmember Friend: Yeah, I think I followed you.

President Winnecke: Okay, a show of hands for people who support Councilman John’s idea.

(City Councilmembers approved straw vote 5-1. Councilman Walker opposed. County Commissioners approved straw vote 3-0.)

President Winnecke: Okay.

Ted C. Ziemer, Jr.: Just for the lawyers sake, and we hate to ask you to do anything for the lawyers sake, but, so, are you suggesting that there can be no discussion about this prior to 2022?

Councilman John: No, I don’t think it says that, it just says at that year they can petition the State.

Ted C. Ziemer, Jr.: But, that’s the first time they could authorize, that’s the first time they would be authorized to seek legislation to provide for a referendum in 2024? Then, is it your thought that they still go through the amendment process provided for in Article 11? Or, does the Metro Council in 2022, working with police agencies and so forth to set up a plan? If they do that, that plan will go on, will be the question on the referendum and we don’t have to go through the process provided for in Article 11?

Councilman John: Right.

Ted C. Ziemer, Jr.: So, what we’re saying, in effect is, if the Common Council at, if the Metro Council at that time determines that they want to amend the Police Department and the Sheriff, they’ll begin discussing it, they’ll have meetings, they’ll deal with experts in the area, they’ll come up with a plan, and that plan, if voted on by a majority of the people on that Council will be put to referendum in 2024?

Councilman John: Right.

Ted C. Ziemer, Jr.: Okay, thank you.

President Winnecke: Okay, the other, well, they’ll come up with some language and we’ll get a chance to bat it around. The other issue, just to clarify the earlier, we started the discussion regarding jurisdiction issues, I thought I heard you say that you’ve each put together ideas that go beyond jurisdiction. Is that right?

Eric Williams: I don’t mean to speak for the Chief, what we both came up with was initially a plan to attack who the primary responder for 911 services would be. When you call 911 who are you going to get? And to discuss where those boundaries were. What we had talked about during the whole planning process of the committee’s meetings is that there are some inefficiencies in the way the boundaries have been designed to this day. You know, annexation is not by, you know, street center lines and places that people are easily identifiable. What we both did, just at different degrees, looked at those places where it was very confusing, where there were some inefficiencies in how we deployed our personnel to make it more efficient and more effective and tweak those boundaries, and that’s what they would be from that day until the next day that’s established. Like I said, I have a version and Chief Hill has a version.

President Winnecke: So, do we have an opportunity to sort of meld these two together between now and 12 years from now? No, I’m just kidding.

Brad Hill: My version is very conservative, his is, he uses a broader brush with his. From my personal perspective, I am comfortable with the current jurisdictional boundaries. What I proposed was a few changes to even out some of the borders and take out some islands and things, but as I say that, I think it’s conceivable that the current boundaries could be left in the Plan now, with the caveat that the Chief and the Sheriff could come together for a memo of understanding eventually for some changes in those boundaries, dependent upon, I guess, approval from the Mayor and the Council in the future, unless we come up with that before that.

President Winnecke: I exchanged e-mails with the Sheriff yesterday on this issue, and I suggested a memorandum of understanding, you know, that each agency have regarding jurisdictions as agreed upon by the appropriate bodies, but you expressed some reservation about that.

Eric Williams: My fundamental reservation with that concept is that it pretty much negates all of the previous conversation.

President Winnecke: I’m not following you.

Eric Williams: If it’s up to the two of us to figure out that we’re going to shift and move things around, why have the dates in the future and let’s just leave it alone. It seems to me that the goal of what we talked about was that we were going to come up with some efficiencies today, set those in place and we’re going to leave it alone. We’re not going to adjust it for this period of time. In that time we’re going to build a plan, but if during that period of time we’re pushing back and forth moving depending upon the personalities that are in office at the time or the Chief that happens to be in office at the time, it seems to me that that creates a whole lot of the unknowns again. I’m much more comfortable with let’s come up with something today and figure out and make it work for both of us and set it in place and leave it alone.

Commissioner Abell: Why don’t you both provide a copy of yours to all of us and we’ll see if we can come up with something.

Eric Williams: Quite honestly, I’m very comfortable with that.

Commissioner Abell: Good, I think that would be a good solution.

Eric Williams: You know, I, this is what we can do to best serve the people that we serve. So, you know, I’m more than willing to let as many eyes look at the plan and see what you think.

Commissioner Abell: Sounds great. Is that agreeable with you, Mr. Hill?

Brad Hill: Well, I was going to say, before you made that option, that we would meet and talk some more, but we are somewhat separated now on a solution, but it’s not that we can’t talk further. I would be happy to supply you with my (Inaudible).

President Winnecke: Why don’t you, if it’s alright, if it’s the will of the bodies here, each send electronic versions to the Commissioners office and they can distribute it to everyone electronically. Unless you have a better idea.

Eric Williams: No, I don’t mind doing that, just at the magnitude of these maps and the detail they are, the electronic version that you see on your computer screen, I just having been messing with it, it’s a little difficult to see. I don’t mind doing that, but I would like to make sure that the full size maps with the drawings are available somewhere that you can look at them in detail to see the big version, because it makes a difference when you’re looking at it.

President Winnecke: Just, maybe provide a hard copy to the Commissioners office and everyone knows whenever they are there, you can bop in and look at them.

Councilman John: You could put one in the Clerks office too.

President Winnecke: Any other discussion on the law enforcement component before we move on? Thank you, gentlemen. The other changes in Section Nine are deletions based on what we’re doing with the Sheriff’s Department and the Police Department as in leaving them alone. Any questions there?

President Winnecke: Section Ten, the Transition. Article, oh, I’m sorry, Mr. Ziemer. Yeah, I forgot this.

Ted C. Ziemer, Jr.: I just want to point out to the Commissioners and the Council that inadvertently when we were putting Exhibit “D” together we did not include the Police Merit Commission, and it should be. There’s a provision for Fire Merit Commission and there needs to be one for the Police Merit Commission. We’re preparing that and we’ll send the language around of the appointing authorities and so forth on that, and it will add one more committee to the group shown on Exhibit “D”.

John Hamilton: It was taken out because they were putting the Police under the Sheriff’s Office.

President Winnecke: Okay, Article Ten regards, relates to the transition. We decided in one of the workshops that the Transition Committee would consist of the nine members of the current City Council, seven members of the County Council, and the Mayor, and I thought we talked about being, there should be a County Commission presence on this versus just having advice from the Commissioners.

Councilmember Adams: We were trying to (Inaudible. Microphone not on.)

President Winnecke: Right.

Ted C. Ziemer, Jr.: It was just that you never took a straw vote on that.

President Winnecke: Oh, we didn’t. Okay.

John Hamilton: You discussed it and you talked about leaving an odd number–

President Winnecke: Gotcha.

John Hamilton: Someone said how about if you do it with the advice.

President Winnecke: I think there probably needs–

Councilmember Adams: Could we have a County Commissioner from both parties? Then it would still be an odd number. I think it’s important that the County Commissioners–

President Winnecke: No, I agree.

Councilmember Adams: –have influence in this.

President Winnecke: Yeah, what if, I mean, there have been situations where they’ve all been of one party.

Councilmember Adams: Well, then–

President Winnecke: It’s unlikely, but–

Councilmember Adams: Well, then just say two Commissioners, hopefully of either party.

President Winnecke: The Commissioners–

Councilmember Adams: You need an odd number. We need representation from the County Commissioners.

President Winnecke: –could decide. Two Commissioners decided by the County Commissioners.

Councilmember Adams: Yeah.

President Winnecke: How does that fly? A show of hands on that.

(City Councilmembers approved straw vote 6-0. County Commissioners approved straw vote 3-0.)

Councilmember Adams: Well then the dominant party outvotes the–

Commissioner Abell: Believe me, nobody will want to be on it.

President Winnecke: The rest of the changes in Article Ten are renumbering, with the exception of 10.5.2, which changed “polices” to “policies”, just a spelling change. Everything else, then in 10.9.2 we add a sentence at the end, under Unified Code of Ordinances, indicating that it is noted that the City of Evansville does not have a drainage code and that issue is to be addressed in a new, unified ordinance. That takes care of all of the changes in Article Ten.

President Winnecke: Article 11, in 11.1.1 changes the number of votes required from eight (8) to ten (10) based on our increase in the number of Council representatives. 11.1.2, the citizen petition is signed by at least five percent of the registered voters of the Combined Government who voted in the previous Secretary of State’s election. That’s consistent with the statute that created this, the enabling legislation for this process. I believe, oh, and 11.2.1 just changes the number of Council representatives. Any other Commissioner or Councilmember have any questions relating to the changes that have been presented?

President Winnecke: If not, I think it’s time we ask Mr. Jeffers to present his work to us. For anyone keeping score, there were 94 insertions and 98 deletions in the, from the original Plan.

Bill Jeffers: Yeah, come on. I’m going to get somebody down here who knows what they’re doing. The map that’s being passed around shows 12 districts, as requested. This would be your Exhibit “B”. It’s not headed, it’s not shown as that, but that would be Exhibit “B” in your document, if you choose to adopt it. Linda Freeman will be down here in just a, is down here and she’ll have it up on your screens in a moment. I apologize for the quality, what the audience will see, because unless the lights are turned off the colored shading, some of the blues are going to look like some of the greens. That’s why I’m handing out the hard copy. On your screens it should look exactly the same as the hard copy that’s in front of you. It’s decent, but if the lights were off you would see it better. Basically, what we did was followed the direction that was given us, divide the county into 12 equally populated districts. We gave absolutely no consideration to the residences of current elected officeholders. We gave no consideration whatsoever to political or partisan demographics. We simply started up in Armstrong Township, which is a very rural and agricultural area, and Armstrong and Scott we stayed on the west side of 41 and came south until we reached approximately 15,000 residents. We started in Union Township, which is similarly to Armstrong and Scott very rural and agricultural, and we worked north towards the Lloyd Expressway until we reached 15,000 residents. That left us with a piece of (Tape Flip) in between. We tried to make six of the 12 districts lie exclusively to the west of U.S. 41, because of the inconvenience of crossing 41 for some people. That was not totally possible, but that’s what we tried to do. Same on the east side of the county we did exactly the same thing, we started at the top, worked our way south, lopping off 15,000 people at a time, and we tried to use the Lloyd Expressway as a geographic boundary between districts because of the inconvenience of crossing Lloyd Expressway for some people. So, this is what we ended up with and we have 12 districts, which as I read the proposed Plan would still go to the Transition Committee, after the referendum, and before the effective date, and that the Transition Committee essentially would be made up of elected officeholders who could adjust these district lines should they see fit to make adjustments. Are there any questions about the 12 districts, how we arrived at those? We gave you the population, I guess, I should say also our target population was what, Linda?

Linda Freeman: 14,975.

Bill Jeffers: 14,975. I contacted the Election Board, both the Republican and the Democrat representative of the Election Board and they assigned the Democrat representative to me to answer my questions, and of all the questions I asked the lady, who I’ve known for, oh, 20 years or so, I worked with her on these districting projects, there was only one question that she was unable to answer me, and that was what is our leeway above and below 14,975, either in head count or in percentage, and she said there was no federal or state rule or law that gave us specific percentage that we could vary above and below 14,975. But, that any variance opens you to an action by a group of voters who may perceive an imbalance, but, this is the best we could do. That’s why I say the Transition Team still would have the opportunity, the Transition Committee would still have the opportunity to click one census block off here and add it over here and tweak this to get it as close as they would like to get it. This is the best we could do for you at this time.

Linda Freeman: It’s 3,000 plus census blocks, if you think you guys want to pick and choose.

President Winnecke: I have a question–

Bill Jeffers: Yes, sir.

President Winnecke: –for the legal staff. If, and this is my personal opinion, so, I don’t know if this is shared by others, but I would like, I guess I would like to take that power away from the Transition Board. I think, I think if this body approves a modified Plan, including maps, and that’s what folks go to the polls to vote on, and this is, this includes the latest census data, I don’t think the Transition Team, although they are elected officials should change that.

Commissioner Melcher: I agree with you, and I thought that’s what we were doing. I thought we agreed to that, that whatever we passed, the voters would know right away where they live and that.

President Winnecke: So, the question is really for Ted and John. In Article 10.3.1, Specific Duties, could we amend that language to reflect that?

John Hamilton: I believe so, as long as (Inaudible. Not at microphone.) polls establishing these districts, and we’ll look at that.

President Winnecke: Does anyone on this panel not agree with that? Okay, thank you.

(No one on the City Council or County Commissioners voiced opposition.)

President Winnecke: Thanks, Bill.

Bill Jeffers: The lady who I spoke with at the Election Commission in Indianapolis is named Michelle Brzycki. She’s very diligent, very well versed in all of this, and the question that she was unable to answer she referred to her supervisor, so there is still an answer pending from them regarding how far you can vary off of–

President Winnecke: Your base number.

Bill Jeffers: –the base number. So, if there’s no questions on the 12 districts we’ll put up the three districts version A. This would be a version, just an example of at-large districts, the county divided into three at-large districts in which the at-large member must, each at-large member must reside in one of these three districts, but the entire county votes on the at-large members. However, each one must come from one of these three districts. This version that’s up there now, basically we just took four districts, merged them into one, because that gives you a fairly even population distribution between the three. In this case we have one on the west side of 41, one on the east side of 41, and one south of the Lloyd on the southeast and east side of town. Our thinking on this was that an at-large member should travel the entire district and the entire district should reflect both rural and urbanized demography. So, they know what they’re looking at and know what they’re talking about when they come represent their district. They know what the farmers are thinking, they know what the city dwellers are thinking. We just geographically took four districts for each of the, four of the Councilmatic districts and merged them into one at-large district, did that three times. The next version is version B, which is just another example of the very same process. This one just simply looks more like it does today, the School Board districts and the Commissioner districts, the County Commissioner districts. We’ve got a north side district, a west side district and east side district. Again, it’s just four Councilmatic districts merged into each one of the at-large districts. Just showing you some examples. You can take any four districts and make an at-large district. We have had, in closing I would, if there’s no questions, I would just say we have had requests from the media, specifically the Courier & Press for copies. No one has seen a copy because we just finished these this afternoon about 4:00. I have three hard copies here, the person, the young gentleman from the Courier who requested it asked us if we could overlay the current city boundary on the 12 district map, and we can do that as well, for his–

Linda Freeman: (Inaudible. Not at microphone.)

Bill Jeffers: Right, all of it is digital, so their artists can do a rendering for the article. I’m just notifying you of that, and you can make that decision. Thank you.

President Winnecke: Bill, thanks for, this is a lot of work and appreciate everything you and Linda and your staff has done for this.

Bill Jeffers: Mostly Linda.

President Winnecke: Linda, thank you very much.

Bill Jeffers: 99 percent.

John Hamilton: Thank you, Linda.

Commissioner Melcher: Thank you.

Councilmember Walker: We know you didn’t do it, Bill.

Linda Freeman: I do have them all available as PDF’s so anybody that wants an electronic copy I can send it to them. If you want to give me your e-mail addresses. Oh, Madelyn.

President Winnecke: Linda, is it possible you can send that to the Commissioners website?

Linda Freeman: I can send, who, is that Karen?

President Winnecke: Marissa.

Linda Freeman: Oh, Marissa, okay.

President Winnecke: So, folks can access those.

Linda Freeman: Yeah, and then I know, oh, that was good, okay, I didn’t even see you.

President Winnecke: Richard.

Linda Freeman: There he is, the Courier & Press gentleman, Richard, he was asking for it. So, I’ve got his e-mail. So, when I get back down to the office here in a few minutes.

President Winnecke: Thank you. There’s a lot to consume in these maps. I certainly don’t expect anything but discussion tonight. In fact, people may be hesitant to discuss what they’re seeing for the first time, which is fine.

President Winnecke: Before we move on to public comment, just a thought about what I think we ought to do next, and I’m certainly open to ideas. We’ve given the attorneys additional modifications to make, we’re seeing the maps for the first time. I know there’s still additional data that, and information that we all need that we got an e-mail on late today that requires additional research. We have vacations coming up, and I would like to have as many people present as possible as we continue these discussions. I would like to think that we could continue this until August 4^th, which is a Thursday night, at which time we would reconvene to reconsider what we’ve seen tonight. Just an idea, food for thought. Go ahead.

Councilmember Adams: That’s great. Could we discuss a little bit the e-mail that we got late today?

President Winnecke: Absolutely.

Councilmember Adams: From Joe Gries.

President Winnecke: August 4^th first–

Councilmember Adams: Excuse me.

President Winnecke: – we’ll pencil that in and then we’ll move on. Okay.

Councilmember Adams: I guess, I was a little confused whether he was saying that he could or could not give us a pro forma of a guesstimate of what the property taxes would be if the merger occurred. I just think it’s mandatory.

President Winnecke: I think I need to talk to him more to understand the e-mail more.

Councilmember Adams: Okay.

President Winnecke: I would encourage everyone to reach out to him.

Councilmember Adams: Well, I e-mailed him back and said, hey, there was some sort of pro forma in the fall. I’m not quite sure whether it was valid, but I really think we’ve got to have that.

President Winnecke: You know, and frankly I don’t know if we need to, in conjunction with the Auditor and the Controller, engage Crowe Horwath to do some more, to do a deeper dive. I don’t know what he needs and whether that’s information he can readily or needs technical assistance on. So, that’s a question that I would urge all of you to run by him.

Councilman John: I have not read the e-mail, but until he knows what your urban areas are, and what your other areas are, it’s almost impossible to come up. I mean, if it was going to be a straight rate across the board, it’s simple, you take the assessed valuation and you combine the city and county budgets to estimate how much money you’re going to be using and it will give you a rate. But, if you don’t know who’s in what area, and what your assessed valuation you’re going to be basing your rate on, it would be very difficult.

Councilmember Adams: Sure.

Councilmember McGinn: Could we give him, you think, maybe some assumptions, you know, like ten percent of the county as it exists now is, every year becomes a full service then, so we at least have a number?

Councilman John: If you go with assessed value as opposed to ten percent of the area–

Councilmember McGinn: Yeah.

Councilman John: –if you throw in your assessed value, yeah, they could do that. He could probably give you a ten, 20 and 30 percent. If ten percent is rural, versus 20 percent is rural, versus 30 percent, yeah, he ought to be able to do that. Maybe that’s the guidance we should give him.

Councilmember McGinn: I mean, we need and the people need to look at something, like what’s it going to cost if we become part of the city?

Councilman John: Right.

Councilmember McGinn: We just have to know. So, even if it’s a generic, you can figure your assessed valuation, you know, a baseline, you know, assessed valuation of $112,000 then you just modify it up or down depending on what yours is worth. Yeah, I think he could give us something like that.

Councilman John: But, you would also have to, if you’re a rural area are you going to pay just the county rate that they’re currently paying? Or are you going to pay part of the city rate? There’s a lot of questions there that I can understand why he’s a little reluctant to say here’s what it’s going to do, because nobody knows.

Councilmember McGinn: Right, yeah, but baseline. If you are in your taxes go up “x” percent. You know, if, it doesn’t say, you know, who you are, but if. Yeah, I think he could give something generic. We’ll think about it a little.

President Winnecke: Okay. Any other....Commissioner Melcher?

Commissioner Melcher: I’m not going to be able to be here the whole night that night. If anybody doesn’t have a problem, can we start at 5:00, instead of 5:30? But, if it’s a problem, we’ll keep it at 5:30.

President Winnecke: That’s fine with me.

Councilmember McGinn: I have a 4:00, I’ll just leave it a half an hour early.

Commissioner Melcher: Well, I’ve got a 4:00 too, but I’ll be here at 5:00, because we have to run them out of here.

President Winnecke: Okay, 5:00 it is on the 4^th. Any other comments by anyone in this body? If not, I would–

Commissioner Melcher: The other, I guess, what is going to be the goals of that meeting? Is that the meeting, the night we’re going to try to pass it on a real vote?

President Winnecke: I don’t know that we’re ready to vote. I think, at that point, members of the public are still, they’re seeing this for the first, the redlined version for the first time–

Commissioner Melcher: No, I understand.

President Winnecke: – so, I would say it depends on what language we get regarding law enforcement. We’ll have a lot of discussion, I assume, on the maps. I suspect there will be feedback from all kinds of circles. I would not see a vote on that night, but further discussion and maybe putting everything to bed and figuring out when to continue the public hearing, and then when a vote could be done.

Commissioner Melcher: So, that’s what we’re doing now with this and we’re going to continue this one?

President Winnecke: Yes, sir.

Councilman John: Well, it’s my understanding that our formal votes will come at our, at the Commissioners meeting and at the Council meeting.

Commissioner Melcher: Right.

Councilman John: So, it would be just a straw vote that night anyway, if there was any.

President Winnecke: Right.

Councilman John: Okay.

President Winnecke: So, tonight, technically we would be continuing our public hearing to 5:00 p.m. on August the 4^th.

Commissioner Melcher: Okay.

President Winnecke: Anyone from the public that would like to speak? Bill?

Bill Jeffers: President Winnecke, if I might just interrupt for a moment? My Chief Deputy, Linda Freeman–

President Winnecke: Come to the microphone, please.

Bill Jeffers: Linda Freeman stables some rescue horses way out in Armstrong Township, and she has to attend to them tonight and again tomorrow morning. If, there’s a gentleman in the audience who wants us to pull up something from the Auditor’s office, to talk about taxes, could he go first so we can–

President Winnecke: Sure.

Bill Jeffers: Is that okay?

President Winnecke: Sure.

Bill Jeffers: Thank you.

Mark Fehrenbacher: My name is Mark Fehrenbacher, 14815 N. Buente Road, Evansville. I reside in Armstrong Township, which is outside the city limits of Evansville and outside Darmstadt limits. Before I get to my spiel, I would like to sort of piggyback on what the Sheriff and the Chief said and probably add two points for your consideration. One is for any decision that you all make, make it in an odd year, not an election year, so you keep the politics out of it. Then, second, for the concern that you’re making with law enforcement, the same thing you have to apply to the fire departments. That’s the other 800 pound gorilla in the room. Okay? Now, I would like to hand some material out to you all, if I could. What I’m passing around is an actual property tax bill for this year for a resident in Armstrong Township. The second page is what you see on the screen, which is the actual property tax rates. The reason I’m bringing this all to you is that at your last meeting, and maybe the meeting before you were going over various boards that you were making appointments to, and I’m going to make the proposal that some of them boards should be elected officials, not appointed. As we go over this property tax bill you’ll find out that some of those tax levy rates are made by appointed board members, not elected. Okay? So, if you go down to table three, and I’m sorry the audience doesn’t have a copy of this, but you look at table three, county, and look at your screen over here, county believe it or not is a little complicated, but we’ll come back to it at the end. Your next item, Township, which for this particular residence, for this tax year is .0788. If you look down, for Armstrong Township, you’ll see Township Assistance, Fire Equipment, Township, all of these items, total township rates, .0788, that’s the tax rate for this property. The Township Trustee and the Township Advisory Boards those are elected members. Okay? The next item, School District, .6060. Scroll down, you see various line items for your school, total school rate, .6060. Your School Board, an elected School Board. It’s not that far in the past, and believe it or not, I was around back then, that your School Board was appointed. Now, they’re elected, okay? Your next item, City, and you may find out why Armstrong Township is there something that says “City” on it. We don’t live in the City of Evansville, we don’t live in the Town of Darmstadt, okay? The city rate of .0939. Okay, scroll down to the very bottom, total City, .0939. What does that consist of? Scroll up, Parks and Recreation, .0903; Park Bonds, .036. Your Parks Board, an appointed board, has a tax levying rate on your property taxes. For you members up here, and I think all of you are city residents, none of you are outside the city limits, look at these other things that are at zero that you all appoint board members to; the Police Board, the Fireman Board, do they all set your tax rates? Library, next item, Library consists of three items; Operating, Debt Service, Special Library. They all add up, but your Library Board is appointed, not elected. Tax Increment, your TIF, doesn’t apply to this property in Armstrong Township, but in some parts of the city it does. Then, the last item, Special District, and if you try and figure out where Special District is, at a rate of .0242, it’s right there, the Levee Authority, .0242. Again, another appointed board, not elected. Okay, then go down to the, toward the end of that tax bill, the levying authority. Well, first off, let’s go back to county, there’s another appointed board that makes up that county tax levy, County General and these items here as established by your County Council, which are elected officials, but the rest of the items, scroll down here, where are they at? I’m looking for the airport. The airport, Cumulative Airport Building, Special Airport General. Them are appointed boards, they have taxing authority, they should be elected. Now, the final item, on table four, your levying authority, Barrs Creek, five dollars, we call it the ditch fee. I discussed it with Mr. Jeffers and it’s my understanding that it’s basically your Drainage Board, which consists of your three County Commissioners. That’s fine, I mean, you’re elected officials. So, I guess, basically, to summarize, is when you were going over your appointed boards, some of them have taxing authority, and I believe that those that have taxing authority should be elected officials. Any questions?

Councilman John: Any board that we appoint, we don’t appoint the library, we don’t appoint the airport, we don’t appoint a number of these boards, but any board that we appoint that has a budget, those budgets are subject to approval of the City Council.

Mark Fehrenbacher: I believe, unless the law has changed, that you review the budgets, but you don’t set the budget.

Councilman John: Yes, we don’t, they request it, we have to approve the spending. We can cut it, we can cut any of those budgets.

President Winnecke: The same applies to the airport–

Councilman John: Of the city.

President Winnecke: Same on the county side, the air board–

Councilman John: The county does that. I’m talking about City Council, the current City Council, we have to approve any budgetary requests of the bodies that we appoint.

Mark Fehrenbacher: The budgets, yes, but do you approve the tax rates for these appointed boards?

Councilman John: Well, the budget, what we approve in the budget determines what the tax rate is going to be. The Controller says, alright, here’s how much we have to raise through property taxes, here’s what the rate will be, based upon the amounts that we approved for the budget. We don’t do the library, we don’t do the airport, we don’t do a number of them that you’ve talked about here. We don’t do the township budgets.

Mark Fehrenbacher: Right, that’s understood.

Councilman John: Right.

Mark Fehrenbacher: But, some of them–

Councilman John: But, now, Police Pension, yeah, I mean, the Police Pension is determined by somebody else, but we have to approve their budget and approve the tax rate. Fire Pension, Police Department, Fire Department, all of those we have to approve.

Mark Fehrenbacher: But, the airport, and the library and all of that stuff, who–

Councilman John: Currently the county, under the new one, I would assume–

President Winnecke: The County Council has always approved the air budget, the Air Board budget. On the Library and the other budgets–

Councilman John: They are approved by the State, the Local Government–

President Winnecke: Right, they are approved by the, well, now they get a cursory look by the County Council, as a result of recent change in State law, and then they go to the Department of Local Government Finance to be approved. There’s more local oversight now than there was five years ago, let’s say, because of change in State law.

Mark Fehrenbacher: But, do you, to make a long story short, do you set the tax rate? You review the budget, but do you...in other words, if I look at, okay, Library, I don’t like how much that tax is, who do I go to and vote them out? Or vote whoever approved that out?

Councilman John: The County Auditor figures what rate is necessary to raise the money that the County Council approves. The City Controller determines what rate is necessary to raise the amount of money that the City Council approves for the budgets, and a number of things go into it. It’s not just all property taxes, there’s a number of miscellaneous incomes that the city has and the county has that offsets the amounts you have to raise through property taxes.

Mark Fehrenbacher: Right.

Councilman John: But, you get down to a bottom dollar, here’s how much we need to raise through property taxes. The Controller figures out that for the city, the Auditor does for the county. It’s all based on the amount of dollars that are approved by the two legislative bodies.

Mark Fehrenbacher: What I’m looking for, is that as you go through these board appointments, if I don’t like a particular item on that property tax bill, say the airport, say the library, I think it should be an elected official that I hold accountable. That’s, yes, the airport, their budget may be approved by the now Metro Council, that’s fine, as long as we have some accountability, you know, I’m fine with that.

President Winnecke: Okay.

Mark Fehrenbacher: Alright?

President Winnecke: Yeah, points well made.

Mark Fehrenbacher: Thank you.

President Winnecke: Thanks, Mark. Actually, this discussion did remind me, we did forget one thing. We did not review the 59 boards and commissions that we discussed. So, I would say we’ll put that on the agenda for August 4^th too. Who else from the public would like to....just in an orderly way, just come up, state your name.

Lucretia Powell: My name is, my voting name is Lucretia Faye Powell. I live at 1101 Suwannee Drive, 47725 in McCutchanville. I’m here, I came to one of the earlier meetings when a friend of mine called me and said, Faye, you really ought to find out what’s going on with consolidation. I said, oh, I’m busy with my career, you know, I don’t have time to go to meetings. She said, well, you know, if we consolidate they’re going to raise your taxes. So, she gave me an estimate of what my taxes were going to be raised, which was about $3,000 on top of what I’m paying right now. So, that got me to the first meeting, and that got me interested. That was a selfish thing on my part. Then I was standing in the grocery line behind a couple, and, obviously, the lady was buying the groceries and the gentleman was obviously upset and wanted to talk to someone, with tears in his eyes, and he said I just filled up my gas tank, it was $50, and my taxes have been raised $89, and that would be the loss of the home, the home whatever exemption. So, I’m looking at them and I’m judging, they’re senior citizens like me. I’m 83, going on 84, I still work, I’m fortunate that I can still work. There are a lot of senior citizens that own their own homes, so judging, doing the math, $89 raised in the taxes, so that would make their home value probably in the $100,000 area. So, if we are consolidated, moved into the city, these couples, these senior citizens are going to be paying maybe $300 more in taxes or whatever. So, if your Social Security is $1,000 or $1,500 that’s a lot of money. So, I’m sitting there and I think I’m worried about myself, you know, and here, you know, I think it’s time that we started thinking about other people. It is not a time to raise taxes on anyone in this economy today. The cost of living is going up, for Social Security people there’s no increase in cost of living whatsoever. So, I’m going to be fighting. I’m going to take less time out of my career. I like to live in the county because I fly a lot in my career and I like to be close to the airport. Also, in my earlier years I taught school 12 years, before, obviously, the schools were consolidated. So, I don’t have a really good taste in my mouth for consolidation. By the time my children were school age, the schools were consolidated. Everybody was taken out of the rinky dinky little neighborhood schools, put on a bus, and shoveled off to a huge, big school some place. Well, how did that turn out? You know, the kids on the bus, they could, you know, they’re away from their parents, they’re down in the long halls in the big schools and so forth. They can do a lot of things that their parents, you know, are not there to help them with. You know what the test scores are in our consolidated schools nationally. It’s a national disgrace, down, test scores are down. Recently, there was picture in the local magazine, or the newspaper, the Courier, of national honor students. A picture of ten students who had won national honors. Five at the top were from rinky, dinky little signature schools. One was from Evansville Day School, four were from parochial or our very expensive consolidated schools. I’m against consolidation, because I think consolidation is watering things down. I’m very happy out in the county. We have an excellent Sheriff’s Department. I mean, our burglar alarms go off, they’re there instantly. We feel very safe, and I’m very happy that that deal is going to be kicked down the road, you know, for a while and that our Sheriff’s Department is not going to be watered down. Any time you have consolidation, big is not better. You know, with our government, big is not better. So, you know, even my husband’s company, my husband was with Mead Johnson, went through the merger, which is really consolidation. How did that turn out? Well, you know, we’re back, that company is back where it was from the beginning. I would, you know, guess that more parents are going to be sending their children to signature schools, or as with my granddaughter, my daughter can’t afford a private school, so she’s home schooled. So, all of that is a result of consolidation. I just wanted to share, you know, my thoughts, my thoughts on consolidation as I talk with my neighbors and people, and people are saying, well, you know, what are going to be the benefits? You know, what are the benefits? Are we just going to pay for that big arena down in the center of town?

(Applause)

Lucretia Powell: You know, if you wanted to build a big arena down in the center of town, you should of asked us first. We should have been able to vote for it.

(Applause)

Lucretia Powell: So, you know, and I just thank you for listening. I just, you know, wanted to share those points, and I want you to think, you know, about the senior citizens. I happen to be a lucky senior citizen because I’m still able to work, but there are so many senior citizens who are not, that are living on the Social Security that they thought as they were young was going to be the thing that they could retire on. Any raise of taxes and so forth is going to be, you know, detrimental to them. So, where are they going to end up, you know, when they try to sell their house, the real estate is down. When they find out in 2012, in the health care bill, they are going to have to pay 3.8 percent to the government when they sell their house. No one knows that yet, they are going to have to have a new furnace and new appliances in the house, all, you know, with senior citizens. Well, where are the senior citizens going, you know, to government housing and more food stamps? So, I want you to think about it before you really decide on consolidation. Thank you very much.

President Winnecke: Thank you, Mrs. Powell.

(Applause)

President Winnecke: David?

David Coker: David Coker, I’m a city resident. I would put the parking meters under the County Clerk’s office, instead of the Police Department. On Exhibit “D”, the listing of the various boards and commissions, I’ve watched this process sometimes close up, sometimes from afar on television, when it was on t.v., and I saw some real growth and some real improvement in these appointments and how they were going to be made. I particularly appreciated the way that various Commissioners and Councilmembers reached across the aisle in bipartisan agreement to hammer out some of these compromises on how these boards are to be appointed. I particularly appreciated that and wanted to commend you all for the hard work that you went to to do all of these things. I still have a couple of questions. I’m up in the air about this and continue to have an open mind. I would like to know a little bit more about how the debt load for the overall county and the city is distributed among the various taxing districts and so forth. I guess, the bottom line question that I have, and one that I’ve not heard a specific answer to, and we may not be able to come up with a specific answer to these questions. Can city government, as it presently is in place, survive financially over the long haul? Can county government, as it’s presently constituted, survive financially over the long haul? I don’t know the answer to those two questions, and will not be able to make a decision on this until I do know the answer to those questions. So, when it comes to this business of drawing up the tax tables, if we could have a little fleshing out of the distribution of the debt load, and, of course, revenue bonds and so forth are limited by where the service is provided and so forth for sewer bonds and that sort of thing. I don’t think it’s right to be charging people in Armstrong Township for sewers that are on the southeast portion of the county. I think part of that is why there is this pronounced resistance to going in this direction from so many people. But, those are basically all of the remarks that I have. Thank you very much.

President Winnecke: Thanks, David. Who else?

Bruce Blackford: Good evening. Bruce Blackford, 8701 St. Wendel Road. On 7.3 of the proposal, in defining the General Districts–

President Winnecke: I’m sorry, which one? What number?

Bruce Blackford: 7.3.

President Winnecke: Thanks.

Bruce Blackford: In the second paragraph, on page eight, it says that the General Service District shall serve the taxing district for funds for law enforcement, courts, jails, detention facilities, probation, child care and all of those other items. Since the Urban Service District should be paying for the City Police, and that is one of the biggest expenses, it does not separate this in that item. It says law enforcement. So, I would read that that everybody in the county would be paying for the City Police and the County Police. Is that the way you guys read it?

Commissioner Abell: I don’t necessarily read it that way, because I think that it will be just like everything else, you pay for the service that you get. So, I think you would be paying in the county, your service would be the Sheriff, and in the city it would be the Police.

Bruce Blackford: That’s the way I understand it, but it’s not the way it’s written.

Councilman John: The city will also be paying 70 something percent of the Sheriff’s Department.

Bruce Blackford: Because they get the jail and other items.

Commissioner Abell: The city is in the county, the county is not in the city.

Bruce Blackford: Right. That was just one item that I noticed that I just wanted to bring to your attention, that it’s not separated saying that it would pay for the County Police Department and not the City. Maybe a correction that may be needed. In 8.4, it says, “All Appointments Report to the Mayor. All boards, commissions, agencies, authorities and departments currently reporting to the Mayor or the Vanderburgh County Commissioners will report to the Mayor.” Wouldn’t it make more sense, since we’re trying to dilute the Mayor’s power a little bit that boards that report to the County Commissioners now, report to the Common Council?

Councilman John: Who is saying that we’re trying to dilute the Mayor’s authority?

Bruce Blackford: Most of us back here.

Councilman John: Okay, because I hadn’t heard, well, I have heard it from a couple of members up here.

Commissioner Abell: Are you pointing at me?

Councilman John: I was going like this.

Bruce Blackford: And a few others.

Councilmember Adams: He was pointing to me.

Councilman John: No, I just went like this. I’m not pointing fingers at anybody.

Councilmember Adams: I’m just trying to make it even.

Councilman John: Well, but government is not even. You’ve got your legislative branch, you’ve got your executive branch, you’ve got your judicial branch. Now, anybody on Council that wants to run the city, they should run for Mayor. I mean, that’s my thoughts on it. There are decisions that the Mayor should be making, You know, whether it’s one of these two people that were here tonight, that’s what they’re running for, and if people don’t like the decisions they make, then they get rid of them the next election. You don’t take the power away and then give it to another body.

Bruce Blackford: I think he’s got quite a bit of power, or would have quite a bit of say in whatever happens. I’m just looking at, since it was thataway before, and, I believe, you made the comment leave it, let’s see, leave it as it is. Earlier when the Police Chief was talking about and they were discussing all of the different things, you said, leave it as it is.

Councilman John: I believe that was Don.

Bruce Blackford: Oh, I’m sorry. I couldn’t tell from the back.

Councilman John: It was Don.

Bruce Blackford: Okay, sorry.

Councilman John: And, we are leaving it as it is for the time being.

Bruce Blackford: Right. Let’s see, on your next meeting date, on August the 4^th, since most of us didn’t get this proposal until tonight, it’s really hard to have a fair, or an open discussion on the information that you’ve received one hour, three days. Is there anyway of leaving the date open somewhat so that there’s not, well, we’re going to meet, but, no, we don’t have all of the information, so, let’s push the meeting back again until we get some of the tax tables and the bond ratings and how all of the money is going to be distributed? So the public can have 15 to 30 days to read over the material so that we can have an intelligent discussion on all of the different things.

President Winnecke: I don’t mind that, Bruce. I mean, I’m willing to, I guess, I would rather keep the process moving, continue to continue the meeting so that people have the appropriate time to digest it.

Bruce Blackford: Right.

President Winnecke: I’m not trying to cut anyone off.

Bruce Blackford: I guess, I’m getting meetinged out, and you guys have a lot more of them than I do, and it’s just–

President Winnecke: Well, we conducted these meetings in the interest of letting everyone watch what we’re doing.

Bruce Blackford: Right.

President Winnecke: So–

Bruce Blackford: Right, and I’ve been to most of them.

President Winnecke: –right.

Bruce Blackford: So, you know, it’s just, you know, a lot of times we discuss it, well, let’s push it back to the next meeting, and it’s just if we could get the information and sort of have it all out right then and there, it just seems that it would be, a lot of discussion goes on and then it’s tabled to another time, and then it’s sort of forgotten about and we move on to something else. One other thing and I’ll sit down, is the two separate votes we’ve discussed in the past, or I have. I know a couple have came out and announced that they don’t, they won’t vote for this without two separate votes, a rural and city vote. What I’ve been told is that we can vote this down and then you guys could just basically re-appoint the committee, with the proposal that’s already in place, go through the motions and have two separate votes and we could still have this proposal ready for the next election cycle. I think that if you want to keep the community involved and, I know a couple of comments was made that, you know, we want the public’s engagement and all, this is one way that you, the public will feel like engaged, because when I was sitting back there I heard people say, well, I don’t feel like I’m making any input. I come to these meetings and nothing I say really matters. So, I think if we can have the two separate votes it will bring some people in and feel like they can be part of it, and we can still stay on the same time table and have a finished budget, or a finished proposal for the election. So, that’s just an idea that, you know, we could still do the two separate votes and stay on the same time table that we’re on now. Any questions? Thank you.

President Winnecke: Thanks, Bruce.

Edith Smith: Hello, my name is Edith Smith, and I live at 1606 Kings Bridge Road in McCutchanville. I would just like to mention something about getting older and getting your house paid for, because that’s all that we wanted to do, and now that we have it paid for we’re still having a lot of bills and worried about taxes, you know. Social Security didn’t get a raise, my husband is a federal employee and they are making us the lamb slain because of the inflation and all and our economy. I’ve talked to a lot of people about their tax bill, and most people don’t know what they’re paying for. It’s really sad to know that they take such apathy toward what they’re paying every month, or when they pay their bills. Most people have mortgages, so they’re paying that for them and they don’t even get a copy of it. Because we didn’t get copies of it until we paid for our house. So, but we make our payments ourselves. There’s a lot of people that I talk to also, they think that all of these new buildings, the arena and all of this stuff that’s going on is all paid for. I said those are bonds, they’re not paid for, there’s a whole bunch of debt. Why don’t we try to break that down so we’re not indebted? If you save on interest, it would make a big difference on how things cost. I would also like to say that, someone mentioned about how much our taxes are going up, that should be the first question that you answer for people before we have this referendum, because, you know, a lot of us are on fixed incomes, and, you know, young people don’t think about it. They think, oh, well, you know, they’ve got extra money, they’ll just pay it. I would like to know what that amount is. What are we going to get for our taxes going up? We already pay for our garbage removal, we pay for all of the libraries, everything that he was listing up there, we pay for those things. The school, that’s the biggest expense, and people don’t realize that in their taxes. I would also like to ask why are the city residents get to vote on our taxes to go up? I don’t understand that. You know, they need to take our word and see whether we want to have them go up. There should be one referendum and it should just be the people in the county. I don’t understand why the city has to even vote, because I don’t know what you’re going to tell them that’s going to happen, because, you know, they’re going to vote that we are annexed. Then, why are you supposing that this is getting passed? Everything in the newspaper that I read is, it’s all of these plans and everything, and nobody ever acts like this might not, you know, pass with the referendum. So, I just think you ought to be more clear to people, and when you have articles in the paper that you answer questions that I’ve addressed tonight. So, anyway, the next meeting might be a good time to get those questions answered. I thank you.

President Winnecke: Thanks, Edith.

Michael Sandefur: Michael Sandefur, 2425 Knob Hill Drive, Evansville, Indiana. I guess, one of the things that I want to reflect on is have we, have you ever thought what our founding fathers would say? I know that’s getting a little philosophical here, but they had just fought a war, most of them had died, and they were trying to move away from a consolidated government, okay? They were trying to move away from a consolidated government, and they died for that liberty. Now, here we are trying to go back toward that consolidated government. So, I’m going to ask you, what would our founding fathers do? Would they say you’re creating liberties, or are you taking liberties? If you ask that question, because if you do, I think there’s only one answer, but I don’t think a lot of you have asked that. Now, it’s possible that if you could come up and say, look, we’re going to save, we’re going to save, you know, 20 percent on this government. Well, that would be a lot of savings, and if a money return to the people, money I’m not paying, well, that is a liberty, because I’ve worked for that. So, the less taxes I pay, the greater liberty you have established. So, I would ask this, how much money are we saving? What is this measure going to save? Because it’s certainly not going to establish any more liberty. It’s going to take our liberties. So, how much money is it going to save me? Ask, can you answer that? Can anybody give me a range of dollars that this consolidated government is going to save the taxpayers? That wasn’t a rhetorical question. Can anybody answer that question for me?

Councilmember McGinn: We don’t know. Studies show it may cost more, Mike.

Michael Sandefur: Then why are we taking our liberties away so that we can take more money? It makes no sense to me.

Councilmember McGinn: We could get, you asked what would the founding fathers say, you know, they were such rugged individualists they may say, provide your own police protection, fire protection, build your own roads, build your own house, have no zoning requirements, clean your own water and handle your own sewage. So, if you want to be a rugged individualist–

Michael Sandefur: No, no, the government, the founding fathers didn’t say that. They came together and created a government because people wanted some functioning government. What’s the role? What is your role? Well, I can tell you what I think it is. I think it’s to create the minimal necessary social restraints to establish a functioning government. I’ll say the minimal necessary societal restraints, but we’re going in the wrong direction. We keep growing government. If I want to put tile in my house, ten square foot of tile, I have to get permission from the government? Does that make any sense? That’s the nonsense we’ve went to here. Okay? The other thing, like I say, if you could save some money, if you could save, give my money back, then that would be giving me some liberty back, but you’re not, you’re taking it. So, you’re taking my liberties from a societal standpoint, you’re taking my income, which makes me, throws me further into economic slavery. The other aspect of that is I say, well, okay are we saving money? Well, we may, but, guess what, the one money saver that we could make, with the police departments, we’re not doing it, because we’re too busy. I watched a group up here pander to, and the Chief and the Sheriff represent themselves very well up here, but I watched the group here pander to them. I wish they’d had that much discussion on the stadium.

(Applause)

Michael Sandefur: Had we, and it’s about 700, do they represent 700 people? We’ve got these many people out here that don’t want it and you’re not pandering to them at all. You’re just moving forward.

Councilman John: What you have to realize, we keep hearing we want a referendum, we want a referendum on all of these items. We’re not passing consolidation. We’re not passing reorganization. We’re presenting a Plan, for people like you to either vote up or down.

Michael Sandefur: People like me, I live–

Councilman John: You get to vote on it.

Michael Sandefur: Okay, so the city gets to vote on it and the county gets to vote on it?

Councilman John: Everybody gets to vote on it.

Michael Sandefur: No, you said people like me. There’s people in the city, and there are people in the county. We need two elections.

Councilman John: By “you”, I mean registered voters. Every registered voter gets an opportunity to vote on whether or not they want this Plan to go through. You know, if you’re for something you don’t want a referendum. If you’re against something, you want a referendum.

Michael Sandefur: No, I’m against it.

Councilman John: Are you against the referendum?

Michael Sandefur: Yes, I’m against the referendum because it makes no sense because it’s automatically stealing our freedoms if it passes, because consolidation is a form of liberty theft. That’s it. That’s as simple as it gets, and I appreciate you guys listening to me.

Councilmember Mosby: Excuse me. Excuse me, but do you understand that if we don’t come up with an actual Reorganization Plan to put on the referendum, that all the League of Women Voters have to do is get, what is it, five percent more signatures?

Commissioner Melcher: 4,600 more.

Michael Sandefur: That’s fine. Let them do it.

Councilmember Mosby: Then they can put that original Plan on the referendum.

Michael Sandefur: Let them ram it forward and you guys stand up for liberty and say we don’t support it, and, guess what, it will fail. That’s all it has to do. All it has to do to fail, and all we have to do to stand up for freedoms and liberties is for you just to say no. Thank you.

President Winnecke: Thanks, Mike.

(Applause)

Brenda Bergwitz: My name is Brenda Bergwitz, I live out in St. Joe in the county. This is going to be short and sweet. If we do, if this does come up for a vote, I think the city should vote and then the county should vote. It shouldn’t be all in one. It should be separated. Thank you very much. Thank you all, I know it’s been a lot of hard work, even though we don’t like it, you still have done a great job.

President Winnecke: Thank you, Brenda.

(Applause)

Mike Mahan: Mike Mahan, 1140 East Gum, Evansville. Just a couple of questions please. What was the over, you’ve got the maps and so forth, what was the total population of Vanderburgh County on the census?

Councilman John: 179,703.

Mike Mahan: Okay, and one item that I noticed in your Reorganization Plan that’s not addressed. You had addressed the employees, you know, keeping all of their, whatever they had previously, but it doesn’t address one, the formation of one department, a combined Human Resources Department. That’s all, that’s just a suggestion that I had. Thank you.

President Winnecke: Thanks, Mike.

Bruce Ungenthiem: Bruce Ungenthiem, 2037 Fleener Road in beautiful downtown Darmstadt. The nice thing about going last is that everybody’s already covered all of my points. So, I’m going to do what I told Lloyd, I’m going to be brief, I’m not going to go through all of this. I do have a couple of things that I want to identify. In Article Nine, Consolidation of City and County Departments, if you read through that it says more about what you’re not going to consolidate than what you are going to consolidate. We’re not going to consolidate law enforcement, we’re not going to consolidate fire protection, we’re not going to put Burdette Park and Mesker Park Zoo in with the Parks Department, we may do some code enforcement, but only if we think can get by with it. So, really, if I read this, the only thing we’re going to consolidate is the Engineer’s Department? You know, I’ve spent 33 years being an engineer at Mead Johnson. We consolidate real easy. It doesn’t take all of this paperwork to do that. We’re fairly logical folks.

(Applause)

Bruce Ungenthiem: We can consolidate just by saying, hey, you two guys get together and come up with a plan. So, we’re doing a whole lot to consolidate the Engineering Departments of the city and the county? Interesting. Still looking for that economic benefit, and do we know when we’re going to have that economic benefit? When we are going to have, what is it the Auditor, or whoever go through and determine what kind of savings that we’re going to–

President Winnecke: He’s working on it.

Bruce Ungenthiem: When?

President Winnecke: I don’t know.

Bruce Ungenthiem: Will we have it by the 4^th of August?

President Winnecke: I don’t know. I hope so.

Councilmember Adams: We can’t vote on it until we’ve got it.

President Winnecke: We’re not going to, yeah.

Bruce Ungenthiem: Yeah, okay.

Councilman John: (Inaudible. Microphone not on.) tax rates, that’s not (Inaudible. Microphone not on.)

Bruce Ungenthiem: I, just a question. The last thing I want to reiterate is also on the voter threshold. I sat and watched as the Sheriff and the Police Chief and we bantered back and forth as to what’s going on and how we’re going to do this, and it took 35 or 40 minutes, and that’s fine, because that’s an important part of this, but the reality of it is, it’s not going to be part of consolidation. We spend 35-40 minutes worrying about 700 folks and what they feel about their jobs. Yet, there are 50,000 people that live outside the city limits of the City of Evansville that live in the rural community who’s lives and taxes will change, and this Plan doesn’t give them the right to vote that up or down on their own. This Plan takes those 50,000 folks and adds them in with 120,000 folks who are in the city and says we’re going to look at this as Vanderburgh County all together. Well, that’s not fair, because you’re not forming Vanderburgh County government. You’re forming a greater Evansville government with a Mayor–

(Applause)

Bruce Ungenthiem: – and with Councilmembers, and you’re not changing what the city members are going to see. They’re still going to have a Mayor, but you are changing those 50,000 folks that live in the rural areas, you’re changing their form of government. You’re changing their tax structures. You’re changing their livelihood. They should have the right, in the United States of America, to vote independently of whether they want that government forced on them. To not do that, well, it will be on your conscience. Thank you.

(Applause)

President Winnecke: Bill, Bruce said he was last.

Bill Jeffers: He was wrong. Sorry, Bruce. I do appreciate, as has been said by others, the effort that’s been put forth by this joint committee and their attorneys, because a few months ago this was a Plan that had some awful content, and now much of that awful content has been amended to be not nearly as awful as it was before. My concern is that, as a county resident, Bill Jeffers, 2641 Mailbu Drive, in lower McCutchanville, down on Highway 57, my concern is, is the same as many of the speakers who have already spoken, that if this is to pass the referendum, that this document be thoroughly scrubbed of its awful content. So, probably it should be left in there and it will be more easily to be defeated, but at the same time I’m afraid that if it’s passed it should be the best it could be. So, this lady said the first question that should be answered is how much our taxes will go up, and I heard several Councilpersons say, we don’t know. Before the referendum we need to know what will we get for our taxes. Now, I’m speaking on the first page in regard to the fiscal impact analysis, which we’ve been assured will eventually come to us before you make a vote. I look up what the fiscal impact analysis should contain, and it’s the estimated effect of the proposed reorganization on taxpayers in each of the political subdivisions outside the corporate boundary, inside the corporate boundary, to which, okay, including; the expected tax rates, the tax levy’s, the expenditure levels, the service levels, the annual debt service, the payments in those two political subdivisions, a description of the plan services to be provided, an itemized estimated cost for each department or agency in the reorganized political subdivision, how specific and detailed expenses will be funded from taxes, fees, grants and other fundings and a description of the capital improvements to be provided by the Reorganized Government to the political subdivisions and the method of financing that. The Crowe Horwath report can’t possibly provide that, because it was done before you scrubbed this Plan of much of its content. The Crowe Horwath fiscal analysis that was paid for by, what, $68,000 was actually completed before the committee itself sent the Plan to you, well before. In there, you know, I heard earlier you were asking possibly to look to see if Crowe Horwath would come back and help our County Auditor. There’s a statement, I think it’s on page 14 of the Plan, I don’t have it in front of me. They say they’re done, and they ain’t coming back. Okay, so does the statute allow the Plan to go forward without a true fiscal analysis? That’s my question number one. As to partisan elections, it probably doesn’t come as any surprise to any of you, I wrote an opinion piece that was published, and I am for non-partisan elections, especially after what I’ve seen since 2008. As a long time politician, my father was a politician, same party, and all I can tell you is that I’ve come to the conclusion that in municipal politics, partisan politics is ruining our community.

(Applause)

Bill Jeffers: There’s no reason to vote for anyone other than the person who’s going to do the best job for your family, for your neighborhood and for your community. To vote on the basis of party affiliation is (tape flip). Now, I know your attorneys advise you that you cannot convert to non-partisan elections with this Plan, because to do so, they say, would conflict with existing State law. Yet, under the Act that you’re developing this Plan, that Act says, “the exercise of power to organize without complying with other laws”, that’s IC 36-1.5-1-4. “A political subdivision may exercise the powers granted under this Article to reorganize or enter into cooperative agreements without complying with the provision of any other law, statute or rule. This Article shall be liberally construed to affect the purpose of this Article, and except as otherwise specifically provided by law, to the extent the provisions of this Article are inconsistent with a provision of any other general, special or local law, the provisions of this Article are controlling, and compliance with this Article shall be treated as compliance with the conflicting law.” So, has anyone sought or received an Indiana Attorney General’s opinion on whether you may convert to non-partisan elections under this Modernization Act? Just a question, don’t need an answer at this time. Oh, the best corporate lawyer I’ve ever worked with has an answer. Some of these things can be asked October 4^th, and probably will be. So, I’ll just–

President Winnecke: August 4^th.

Bill Jeffers: August 4^th, excuse me.

President Winnecke: Maybe not.

Bill Jeffers: Urban Service District, 7.3.2, Services Provided, (1) fire protection, (2) public transportation, (3) street cleaning, (4) street lighting, (5) legal drains, what that means is the city pays the legal drain assessment that the fella from Barr Creek that spoke first is paying, out of his pocket, because he’s a county resident, the city would pay it if he’s annexed, and (6) other activities as may be provided for the general benefit of all residents blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. What are the other specifics? Are they sidewalks? They’re really no different than street lights. So, you’ve got five specific things there that are listed. Now you go to General Service Districts, when they are brought in, expansion of the Urban Service Districts. When a geographic area receives tax-based services provided in the Urban Service District, I’ve brought this up many times, and it still reads the same, that geographic area will be converted to the Urban Service District or Special Service District. It doesn’t list which of those five specifics, and the unnamed other things. How many of them and which ones have to be provided before you basically annex a neighborhood into the Urban Service District? It just say when some neighborhood in the General Service District receives tax-based services. Not how many, maybe not all five, maybe just one or two, you just go out there and grab them. I wonder how come we can’t change that to be a little more specific and restrictive. 7.4.1, how a neighborhood could be annexed, either by a petition to the Mayor, well, it could be done as I just said, but also by a petition to the Mayor or to the Common Council by a majority of the registered voters of such an area. Sounds good, but actually the people affected are the property owners in that area, not the registered voters. Some property owners may not, number one, live in that area, they may live in another area, and, number two, there may be a reason why a person isn’t a registered voter. There may be a religious reason why a person isn’t a registered voter, yet that person still has the right, as a property owner, to sign or not sign that petition, or be counted as, you know, in the 51 percent of the 49 percent. Just a thought. Okay, tonight, in Section 9.4, Law Enforcement, you passed a motion, which I assume will be put into the text, does that motion, which was adopted tonight, prevent the people or the voters, however you want to go about it, from petitioning via 11.1.2 for Police and Sheriff merger? In other words, what you did tonight sounds like, if the way it was worded, there’s no possible way the people could petition the government to merge the Police and the Sheriff’s Department until 2024 or ‘22 or whatever. Just another thought. Article 10.1, Transition Board, within 60 days after approval of this Plan, parentheses, start date, does that mean after passage of the referendum? Or after the Council approves the Plan?

President Winnecke: After the referendum.

Bill Jeffers: So, shouldn’t it say after passage of the referendum, rather than approval of the Plan? I think start date indicates that, but it’s just a question. 10.3.1, Specific Duties, the Transition Board is comprised of the Common Councilmembers, and the Mayor, but not the County Commissioners.

President Winnecke: We changed that.

Bill Jeffers: Not in the copy I took down off of–

President Winnecke: Just tonight.

Bill Jeffers: Oh, okay. Good deal because, you know why–

President Winnecke: Right.

Bill Jeffers: –the County Commissioners always do the re-districting, along with the City Council.

President Winnecke: Right.

Bill Jeffers: Turning lots of pages, I bet you all are getting excited. I talked to Ted about this one, right? Okay.

Ted C. Ziemer, Jr.: Yeah, let me have a copy of that.

Bill Jeffers: I think it’s a typo, but that’s okay. Everybody makes them, I make lots of them. Okay, 11.2.2, Purpose of the Plan Review Commission, when I read that, I understand the intent, it’s a good intent, but there’s no time line and there’s no drop dead date. So, let’s say the Common Council or the people succeed in bringing language or the request to amend the Plan. You guys are operating on a time line right now, you have a drop dead date, but the Council or the Mayor or somebody could just procrastinate forever under 11.2.2, and that could drag on for years before it ever came to a vote, even though the people want it to. 12.7, small point, Certified Professional Engineers, anytime in the State of Indiana you have a full time City Engineer or a full time County Engineer, those engineers must be certified professional engineers, and hold a license with the State of Indiana, but it’s a good thought, it’s just that it’s already taken care of. And, 11.3.3, Final Action on an amendment of the Plan, you’re giving the Mayor the pocket veto power. So, no matter how hard you work, and how many people on the Council, if all 15 of you vote yes for an amendment, he’s still got pocket veto potential. Thank you.

President Winnecke: Thanks, Bill. Anyone else? Bill, you’re not even last.

Cynthia Maasberg: I’m Cynthia Maasberg, I’m a rural resident of Armstrong Township. Excuse me, I have a sore throat this evening. I have about six, what I call format changes, and probably need to be directed to these gentlemen. If you look in Article 5.3, Office of Clerk, it says the Clerk of the Court and the Department of Transportation Services are generally set forth below. My comment is that the Department of Transportation Services should be replaced with the Evansville Police Department, because in 5.3.3 it states that the Evansville Police Department will be responsible. The next, as Bill said, is probably just a typo, 10.5.2, it says, notwithstanding Section 10.4.1, I believe that should be 10.5.1? I’m waiting for their nods.

President Winnecke: He said yes.

Cynthia Maasberg: Article 10.9, almost the same situation, it says, notwithstanding 10.8.2, that should be 10.9.2.

John Hamilton: Correct.

Cynthia Maasberg: Okay. Article 11.3, it talks about two thirds vote of the entire Council, I believe that should say Common Council instead of just Council. I did a word search of this document and everywhere where Council is referred to the word Common precedes it. In the Exhibit “D”, there are references to Metro Mayor and Metro Council, those two terms are not referenced in the Plan at all. I’ve heard them used a lot tonight. I would like to just ask that we come up at least with right terms. Is it just going to be Mayor, or is it going to be Metro Mayor? Is it going to be Metro Council or Common Council and that we all use the same terms. Those are my format changes. I have a couple of other items, Article 8.3, which is Boards, Commissions and Authorities Created after the Effective Date. It reads, “a majority of all appointments hereto shall belong to the Mayor of the Combined Government.” My comment is, the Mayor should not have a majority of appointments on future boards, commissions and authorities. The Common Council should be involved with those appointments. Move on to Article 8.4, All Appointments Report to the Mayor, my comment, there is that those reports currently going to the County Commissioners should report to the Common Council instead of the Mayor. Then, I find it very interesting, when I reviewed Exhibit “D” on the boards, that there are actually 16 boards, commissions, or authorities that have changed to give the majority of the appointments to the Mayor instead of the Council or Commissioners. Bruce’s comment may hold true, where Bruce is saying that the Mayor had too much authority. Here he’s getting to be the, have the majority of the appointments on 16 additional boards than he has currently.

President Winnecke: Yeah, those were by statute. Those changes were made because the law dictates that.

Cynthia Maasberg: I’ll check that, but I thought I looked at that as I went through and didn’t include those.

President Winnecke: Well, that’s what John and Ted said.

Councilman John: I think many of them were if the Commissioners had been appointing those members, the Mayor as the Chief Executive, as opposed to the Commissioners would be making those appointments. The Commissioners were the Chief Executive of the county, now those duties and responsibilities would transfer to the Mayor.

Cynthia Maasberg: Yeah, okay, I’ll look at that. I believe that’s all that I have then on those. Thanks.

President Winnecke: Thanks, Cynthia. Does anyone else want to be last?

Keith Jarboe: I want to.

Commissioner Melcher: State your name please.

Keith Jarboe: You know the good thing about going last?

President Winnecke: Ask Bruce and Bill.

Keith Jarboe: My name is Keith Jarboe, I live at 925 Johannes Court. First of all I want to thank each and every one of you for the hard work that you’ve put into this. This isn’t easy, and trust me, I understand that government isn’t easy. If it was, everybody would do it. I’m proud of the fact that I have a grandfather and a mother that are on those plaques behind you, because they got involved in their community, and they tried to move this community forward. A comment was made earlier, what would the founding fathers think today? I think that the founding fathers of Evansville would be very proud of what they’re seeing today. That this community is stepping forward, whether we agree or we disagree, whether we’re for a program or we’re against a program, I think they would be proud of the fact that we are engaged in looking at moving our government forward, that we are not complacent and we’re not settling for the status quo. That we are at least investigating the possibility that there may be a better Evansville and Vanderburgh County out there. Otherwise, we would still be a sleepy little town on the bend of a river. I think as you look at what’s happened within this community, back many, many years ago, the foresight of our forefathers, the things that they did that brought industry to this community, that brought people to this community, that gave this community an opportunity to grow, and I see that we’re at that same point in time today. That we have an opportunity today to say, is this enough, or can we be better? I think we can be better. I think we should strive to be better. Now, is it perfect? Of course not. It’s never perfect. If government was perfect you wouldn’t have half of the ordinances coming before you on the Councils today for changes, because government is a work in progress, always striving to get better. It is my thorough opinion and my belief that we have an opportunity today to move this forward, with some changes to make this a better government and a better community, and to be the community that our forefathers and people that came before us, that served before us always believed that we could be. Thank you for your time.

President Winnecke: Thanks, Keith. One more time?

Brenda Bergwitz: Just for second though.

President Winnecke: Only because you only spoke for like 30 seconds before.

Brenda Bergwitz: No, this really doesn’t have anything to do with this, but, you know, just three years ago I started coming to these meetings. I think, you know, the last election in ‘08 it woke a lot of people up. We’re getting off our behinds, getting away from the televisions, and we’re coming to the City Council meetings, the County Council meetings and we’re learning, because we want to elect good people, Democrats and Republicans, and we want to start holding the people though that we elect accountable. That’s why I’m coming. I’m taking a Constitution class, and I’m learning about the Constitution. You never get too old to learn. I’ll be 70 years old in October, and I’m proud of it. Again, thank you all for all of your hard work, but, there again, I’m still against it, but that’s okay.

President Winnecke: Thank you. We stand continued until August 4^th at 5:00 p.m.

(The meeting was recessed at 8:04 p.m.)

Those in Attendance:

Lloyd Winnecke                        Marsha Abell                            Stephen Melcher

Dan McGinn                             Don Walker                               H. Dan Adams

Missy Mosby                             Curt John                                  John Friend

Ted C. Ziemer, Jr.                    John Hamilton                          Madelyn Grayson

Brad Hill                                    Eric Williams                             Bill Jeffers

Mark Fehrenbacher                  Lucretia Powell                         David Coker

Bruce Blackford                        Edith Smith                               Michael Sandefur

Brenda Bergwitz                       Mike Mahan                              Bruce Ungenthiem

Cynthia Maasberg                    Keith Jarboe                             Others Unidentified

Members of Media

VANDERBURGH COUNTY

BOARD OF COMMISSIONERS

Lloyd Winnecke, President

Marsha Abell, Vice President

Stephen Melcher, Member

(Recorded and transcribed by Madelyn Grayson.)