The Vanderburgh County Drainage Board met in session this 30^th day of March, 2010 at 5:00 p.m. in room 301 of the Civic Center Complex with President Troy Tornatta presiding.

President Tornatta: Okay, thank you, Mr. Jeffers. We’re going to open up the Tuesday, March 30, 2010 Vanderburgh County Drainage Board. I need roll call.

Bill Jeffers: –while we’re opening bids, basically for anyone who may be interested, or is viewing remotely, what we’re doing is we’re opening bids for ditch maintenance on our regulated drains in Vanderburgh County. We have 30 drains we take care of, and we have, several bidders this year have submitted bids for such things as spraying, mowing, silt dipping, bank repair, bottom sterilization, various things you do to ditches to keep them clean and free flowing. The Drainage Board is responsible for examining the bids and letting contracts to the lowest, responsive bidder in accordance with State statute. Mr. Ted Ziemer, our attorney, is opening the bids, and he will examine them for, to make sure they’re appropriate, filled out properly, have the proper bonding and so forth in the envelope, in the sealed envelope. Then he will pass them to Linda Freeman, the Chief Deputy Surveyor, and she will write down each of the bid prices on a sheet of paper here, and then I’ll begin reading them shortly into the record. After we read them into the record, the Board will take those under advisement for a period of several days, and we will come back on April 6^th and award contracts. That’s the standard procedure we follow each year.

President Tornatta: Alright, so any questions from the audience? Eldon, why don’t you come on up here and let’s talk?

President Tornatta: No, no, no, you don’t have to approach the bench, just the microphone.

President Tornatta: Explain the, you know, I’ll be a Commissioner almost going on four years now, and it never ceases to, what is bottom sterilization?

Eldon Maasberg: Sterilization of the bottom is the same thing as clean till of farm land.

President Tornatta: Did you receive any calls from a neighbor farmer? Okay, and did we come to any consensus on that issue?

Eldon Maasberg: Well, I kind of agree with Bill and the way he’s got it set up.

Eldon Maasberg: Being on 41, being that, it’s, what do you call it, the Corps of Engineers looking down our throat on it, I kind of almost got to agree, which I would rather it wouldn’t be on t.v.

Eldon Maasberg: That Larry is wanting to pile it up and be able to farm up and then spread it after the crops are in, which, but we get our best seeding and less wash, it would do the work, what’s the dates, August something to September something, wasn’t it?

Bill Jeffers: Yes, sir. Basically, what my objection to the proposal to leave the spoil piled up until after the crops are harvested is two fold. First of all, I want to do this in complete conformance with the current rules. If we were to pile that up, it would be substantially mounded up. Just outside the waterway it might be three feet high, or whatever, higher than the natural ground is today, and should we have flooding or where the creek would naturally get outside of its banks, that would prohibit the water from spilling out naturally across the flood plain. We’re only allowed to spread the spoil as thinly as we possibly can with no greater, no rise in elevation greater than six inches. That’s the rule. So, and the reason for that is, because when you have natural flooding you don’t want to choke the water down in the channel because, well, it would spread out either on the other side or it would go on down stream and cause flooding on other people’s property greater than it would naturally. So, that’s one objection I have to leaving it there until after crop harvest. The other is that–

President Tornatta: So, the first objection, if I may understand, it’s not legal?

Eldon Maasberg: It also would help, if it’s knocked down, if we would happen to have a flood, you have less likely back up on 41.

Bill Jeffers: Right, so you’re protecting your federal highway as well. That’s true. And there’s a pump station there that’s owned by the Water and Sewer Utility. The second reason would be that we get our best seed sprouting and grass growth, so we get some root growth to hold the seeds in place, to hold the new grass in place we get the best response from the grass seed between August 1^st and September 31^st, and that’s what I’ve outlined in our specifications. To get the work done, spread the spoil and begin seeding in the first week or so of August, and have it all completed by no later than September 15^th, I believe, so it’s all up and growing. Other than that, well, basically, we’re just trying to follow the rules of the Corps of Engineers and the rules of nature.

Eldon Maasberg: I kind of told him that too this morning when I talked to him. We’re talking about Larry Goebel, am I right?

President Tornatta: Yeah. Where do we stand on, I know this is going to be a point of contention, but where do we stand on the two stage ditching?

Eldon Maasberg: That is hard to sell. It would have been nice if we could have done some of that here. I think if we could have, I think Bill would be, or I shouldn’t say Bill, the Corps of Engineers would be more lenient in what we’re going to do than a three....I would prefer a three to one. We did finally talk them into two to one.

Eldon Maasberg: Cause, three to one will lay that water back, it slows it down, it just makes a nicer, holds the banks better in the long run.

President Tornatta: Has anybody figured what you’re going to lose with a two stage ditch? I mean, I know you’re taking more ground, but over time are you losing that ground anyway?

Eldon Maasberg: Maybe Bill could probably explain this better than I, but the further down....well, where did John go? Did he leave? He would be another one to explain it. He, the more water capacity you’ve got, the wider it’s got. So, that, what you call second stage, up at the beginning might want to be three or five feet and then you go to your three to one, but then if you go down closer to I-64, you’re maybe talking about 20 foot down on each side. Are you following me?

Eldon Maasberg: But, then you’ve got to bring it back in to get under the bridge and then you go back out again.

Eldon Maasberg: So, the water capacity is the same, you’re just, the current is slowed down.

President Tornatta: Well, it’s slowed down, but it gets, I mean, the way it was presented it brings more nitrates back into the soils.

Eldon Maasberg: Well, the slower the water runs, the more fertilizer, silt, larger particles fall out.

President Tornatta: So, the vegetation absorbs it, more nitrates end up in your fertile, in your soil making them more fertile?

Eldon Maasberg: –we’re not farming this area. It’s just, and as through the years that second stage or that plateau down there will eventually fill in to probably you would figure from the water to the other you may have a, what, five to one, six to one?

Bill Jeffers: Well, you might have to, in some cases you might have to clean out that lower stage–

Bill Jeffers: –every ten years or so you might have to remove some and reseed it, but what it does is it gives a bench for vegetation to grow on. Above the ordinary high water mark you have this bench with dense vegetation, as you saw in those films, that vegetation essentially sequesters the phosphates and the nitrates, keeps them in place right there and absorbs them rather than allows them to flow on down stream into the Ohio, the Mississippi, and eventually the Gulf of Mexico. You don’t want all those nutrients down in the Gulf blossoming and causing red tides and so forth like that. You know, feeding the algae and causing red tides. So, what we’re doing is we’re holding them up in place in the farmland where they’re applied rather than allowing them to flow off into wetlands and marshlands and the ocean.

Eldon Maasberg: Not only that, when you’ve got a one to one like they were dredged, because you’ve got to remember, back before I was born, about the time my dad was born they had the, the dragline was a barge, and as they went down, they started at the top, they were sitting on water and they flipped the dirt out on both sides and down through there they went. Well, they had a one to one bank. Now we’re finally talking the people into two to one. I would love to see three to one. I really think that would be the route to go. Of course, it makes longer bridges, but I think it will be easier to keep it down the line. Now, Bill’s got, he can explain this better than me, back when this all was done, all of this ground was bottom land. They started it when that barge went down through there, they flipped it out on both sides. That made what you call it, a highlands then?

Eldon Maasberg: So, that became spoil lands. Then, now we keep dredging it we get higher and higher spoil banks now.

President Tornatta: Anything that’s in that ditch ,when you dredge it out, goes on top of that bank.

Bill Jeffers: Right, and we’re trying to avoid that. We’re trying to keep the bottom–

Bill Jeffers: –what’s called, below the ordinary high water mark where all the little critters live, we’re trying to keep that undisturbed.

Bill Jeffers: Right, and we’re doing that with this project this time. To kind of close out the discussion of what the farmer, the single farmers objection might be. I did tell him we would be opening the bids today, and by April 6^th we will be declaring the work that’s going to be done, and he can go in and negotiate with the farmer he rents from, rents the land from, okay, they’re doing the work so I’m not going to be able to plant within 50 feet of the ditch this year, I don’t want to rent that 50 feet.

Bill Jeffers: So, I think we’re being fair. If it all breaks down, if the negotiations all break down, then we’ll just do one side of the ditch, and leave the other side undone. That’s the bottom line.

Bill Jeffers: But, it will all be sani....the ditch bottoms will all be sanitized.

Bill Jeffers: Sterilized, excuse me. Sterilized. You’re getting me confused down there. Do you want me to go ahead and start reading here?

Bill Jeffers: Right, so he might lose an acre and a half of crop, this year only. We can discuss it in greater detail between now and...the part, not the Commissioners, or the Drainage Board, but the parties involved can negotiate between now and April 6^th and come back to you with a recommendation.

President Tornatta: Well, we were doing a fantastic job of killing time. So, thank you, Eldon.

President Tornatta: On the hot seat? See how you can do two things at once, how efficient are we?

Eldon Maasberg: Well now, since I was taped on this meeting, am I going to get taped on the next meeting too?

Bill Jeffers: Do you have a remote, or do you still use one of those little click, click, click knobs?

Eldon Maasberg: I’m still....I’m too tight to pay for the cable and the other t.v.

Bill Jeffers: Okay, we’re going to read these, what we came to do is to read these bids into the minutes, and then get out of the way so the consolidation committee can gavel down at 5:30. So, let’s go. We have, we’re beginning with Pond Flat Lateral “A”, RR Rexing Farms bids $743.54; Pond Flat Lateral “B”, RR Rexing Farms bids $391.58; Pond Flat Lateral “D”, RR Rexing Farms bids $641.06; Baehl Ditch, John Maurer bids $861.25; Hoefling Ditch, John Maurer bids $537.10; on to Cypress Dale Maddox Ditch, Union Township Drainage Association bids $5,160.30; Helfrich Happe Ditch, Union Township Drainage Association bids $380.94; Barnett Ditch, Union Township Drainage Association bids $1,828.80; Edmond Ditch, Union Township Drainage Association bids $604.50; Kamp Ditch, no bid; Baehl Ditch, Eldon Maasberg bids $1,102.40; Kneer Ditch, Eldon Maasberg bids $410.40; Maasberg Ditch, Eldon Maasberg bids $220.60; Wallenmeyer Ditch, Eldon Maasberg bids $1,253.25; Barr Creek Ditch, Big Creek Drainage Association bids $8,061.53; Buente Upper Big Creek, Big Creek Drainage Association bids $4,039 and no cents; Maidlow Ditch, Big Creek Drainage Association bids $3,174.07; Pond Flat Main, Big Creek Drainage Association bids $5,527.80; Rexing Ditch, Big Creek Drainage Association bids $2,051.52; Aiken Ditch, Shideler Spray Service, for dormant spraying bids $376; Barnett Ditch, dormant spraying, Shideler Spray Service, $271.44; Cypress Dale Maddox, for dormant spraying, Shideler Spray Service bids $735.46; Eagle Slough, dormant spraying, Shideler Spray Service bids $5,407.20; Eastside Urban south half, dormant spraying, Shideler Spray Service bids $2,675.82; Edmond Ditch, Shideler Spray Service, dormant spraying, $585.20; Henry Ditch, dormant spraying, Shideler Spray Service, $349.69; Keil Ditch, dormant spraying, Shideler Spray Service bids $283.12; Sonntag Stevens, Shideler Spray Service for dormant spraying bids $621.45. Okay, the next group is for foliar spraying and broadleaf and brush. All the following are by Shideler Spray Service; Aiken Ditch, $931.63; Barnett, $271.44; Cypress Dale Maddox, $735.46; Eagle Slough, $4,806.40; Eastside Urban north half, $1,985.93; Eastside Urban south half, $2,675.82; Edmond Ditch, $585.20; Harper Ditch, $265.50; Keil Ditch, $283.12; Kolb Ditch, $402.75; Sonntag Stevens, $621.45. The following bids are for sterilization of ditch bottoms, and the following are all Shideler Spray Service; Eastside Urban south half, $1,878.40; Harper Ditch, three hundred, excuse me, scratch that, Harper Ditch, Shideler Spray Service, sterilization of ditch bottoms, $236; Kolb Ditch, $375.90; Sonntag Stevens, $556. That’s all the sterilization? Okay. The following bids are Mark Naas, N–a-a-s, until I say different the following will be from Mark Naas; Henry Ditch, $995 plus $22 per ton rip rap; Maidlow Ditch, $3,825, that’s for embankment repair. Pond Flat Ditch, the whole ball of wax from U.S. 41 to the railroad tracks, $17,750. That’s for the embankment repair that we were discussing earlier in the meeting. Aiken, for mowing, $4,020. Also Mark Naas for Eastside Urban south half, the Crawford Brandeis and Bonnie View extension, late spring and fall mowing, $1,072.50. That will be for the subdivision area south of the Target Greatland complex. Mark Naas, Eastside Urban south half, mid-summer mowing, $899; Harper, $2,360 for mowing; Kolb, Section B, mowing, $1,385.25; Kolb Ditch, fall mowing, $1,504; Sonntag Stevens, late spring mowing, $2,464; Sonntag Stevens, fall mowing, $8,457. Allen Relleke, the following bids are submitted by him until I say different. Henry Ditch, $1,242.50; Maidlow for the embankment repair, $3,895; Pond Flat, the whole kit and kaboodle, $12,433.52. Henry Ditch, Rust of Kentucky bids $2,626.92, plus $25 a ton for rip rap; Maidlow for the embankment repair, $7774.30; Pond Flat Main for the entire project as described earlier in the meeting, $24,776.78. Elliot’s Excavating, for Henry Ditch, $4,025, plus $100 total for the rip rap; Maidlow, $5,600 for the embankment repair; and Pond Flat, the project we were discussing earlier, $43,480. This is it, right here?

Bill Jeffers: Okay. Vieira Brothers for the Maidlow embankment repair, as the others bid, they bid $3,620.40; and for the Pond Flat Main project discussed earlier, $20,708. Larry Georges Excavating for the Pond Flat project, $6,975. I said earlier that we had no bid on Kamp Ditch, I was in error. We have a bid from Union Township Ditch Association, for Kamp Ditch, $334.80. That concludes the bids we received.

BIDDER	DITCH	AMOUNT
RR Rexing Farms	Pond Flat Lateral “A”	$743.54
RR Rexing Farms	Pond Flat Lateral “B”	$391.58
RR Rexing Farms	Pond Flat Lateral “D”	$641.06

John Maurer	Baehl Ditch	$861.25
John Maurer	Hoefling Ditch	$537.10

Union Twshp Ditch Assn	Cypress Dale Maddox	$5,160.30
Union Twshp Ditch Assn	Helfrich-Happe Ditch	$380.94
Union Twshp Ditch Assn	Barnett Ditch	$1,828.80
Union Twshp Ditch Assn	Edmond Ditch	$604.50
Union Twshp Ditch Assn	Kamp Ditch	$334.80

Eldon Maasberg	Baehl Ditch	$1,102.40
Eldon Maasberg	Kneer Ditch	$410.40
Eldon Maasberg	Maasberg Ditch	$220.60
Eldon Maasberg	Wallenmeyer Ditch	$1,253.25

Big Creek Drainage Assn	Barr Creek Ditch	$8,061.53
Big Creek Drainage Assn	Buente Upper Big Creek	$4,039.00
Big Creek Drainage Assn	Maidlow Ditch	$3,174.07
Big Creek Drainage Assn	Pond Flat	$5,527.80
Big Creek Drainage Assn	Rexing Ditch	$2,051.52

BIDDER	DITCH	AMOUNT
Shideler Spray Service	AIKEN	$376.00
Dormant Spraying	BARNETT	$271.44
	CYPRESS DALE MADDOX	$735.46
	EAGLE SLOUGH	$5,407.20
	EASTSIDE URBAN - S ½	$2,675.82
	EDMOND	$585.20
	HENRY	$349.69
	KEIL	$283.12
	SONNTAG STEVENS	$621.45

Shideler Spray Service	AIKEN	$931.63
Foliar Spraying or	BARNETT	$271.44
Broadleaf & Brush	CYPRESS DALE MADDOX	$735.46
	EAGLE SLOUGH	$4,806.40
	EASTSIDE URBAN - N ½	$1,985.93
	EASTSIDE URBAN - S ½	$2,675.82
	EDMOND	$585.20
	HARPER	$265.50
	KEIL	$283.12
	KOLB	$402.75
	SONNTAG STEVENS	$621.45

Shideler Spray Service	EASTSIDE URBAN - S ½	$1,878.40
Sterilization Ditch Bottoms	HARPER	$236.00
	KOLB	$375.90
	SONNTAG STEVENS	$556.00
Mark Naas	Henry	$995.00 plus $22/ton rip rap
Mark Naas	Maidlow	$3,825.00
Mark Naas	Pond Flat Main	$17,750.00
Mark Naas	AIKEN - Mowing	$4,020.00
Mark Naas	EASTSIDE URBAN - S ½ - CRAWFORD BRANDEIS & BONNIE VIEW EXT-Late Spring & Fall Mowing	$1,072.50
Mark Naas	EASTSIDE URBAN - S ½ - STOCKFLETH-Mid-Summer Mowing	$899.00
Mark Naas	Harper - Mowing	$2,360.00
Mark Naas	KOLB – Section B - Mid Summer & Fall Mowing	$1,385.25
Mark Naas	KOLB – Section A - Fall Mowing	$1,504.00
Mark Naas	Sonntag Stevens – Mowing – Late Spring	$2,464.00
Mark Naas	Sonntag Stevens – Mowing – Fall	$8,457.00
Allen Relleke	Henry	$1,242.50
Allen Relleke	Maidlow	$3,895.00
	Pond Flat Main	$12,433.52

Rust of Kentucky	Henry	$2,626.92 plus $25/ton rip rap
	Maidlow	$7,774.30
	Pond Flat Main	$24,776.78

Elliott’s Excavating	Henry	$4,025.00 plus $100 rip rap
	Maidlow	$5,600.00
	Pond Flat Main	$43,480.00

Vieira Brothers Excavating	Maidlow	$3,620.40
	Pond Flat Main	$20,708.00

Larry Georges Excavating	Pond Flat Main	$6,975.00

Bill Jeffers: The County Surveyor recommends they be taken under advisement, and that the Board set April 6th as the date for announcing the contracts.

President Tornatta: A motion and a second, and then set the bid awards April 6, 2010. All in favor say aye.