To record or not And new fire boundary lines to be drawn
Carleen Wild
Posted 2/21/23
Moody County Commissioners
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To record or not And new fire boundary lines to be drawn
Posted
Carleen Wild
The boundary lines are being redrawn in Moody County for certain first responders.
Commissioners voted this past week to redraw the fire contracts for the Flandreau, Trent and Colman Fire Departments. In large part, the move is being made to keep Moody County dollars within Moody County departments, and to ensure that those three departments are the primary responders to calls versus a nearest out-of-county entity. Closest assisting departments will still respond, but until now, Moody County had been paying the nearest outside entities to respond to in-county calls if it appeared it might make a difference in response times.
This would eliminate the payments to departments outside of Moody County, said Colman Fire Chief Jason Landis, but not the quality of the response.
Landis said that new technology and newer vehicles over the years allow them to get anywhere they need to quickly and as quickly as any other department.
With the Commissioners approval, Moody County’s tax levy for local fire stations will go solely to Flandreau, Colman and Trent’s Fire Departments beginning in 2024. Commissioners otherwise, during their last regularly scheduled meeting, learned that they were one of the only counties to have been making such out-of-county payments.
The additional revenue, now slated for county entities versus other departments outside of the county, will go toward things like equipment and newer radio systems, according to Landis.
“We’re just trying to keep local money in the county to help,” he said.
Landis added that if any department gets paged out, mutual aid from almost every nearby department both in the county and from outside of the county, is still always automatically assumed until they know otherwise.
While not yet finalized, the new breakdown includes; the Colman Fire Department will respond to calls in the county anywhere along the entire I29 corridor from north to south and anywhere west of the interstate (Colman, Chester and Brookings areas); Flandreau will be the primary response for calls anywhere east of the Interstate and in the north and central areas of the county to include the Brookings, Aurora, Elkton areas; Trent will care for the area east of I29 in the southern part of the county along with the Trent, Jasper and Dell Rapids areas. The changes will most likely result in an extra $5000-$6000 going each year to the individual departments.
Also discussed at the most recent meeting of the Moody County Commissioners:
The county’s K9 unit and his handler will be attending another six-week training session this spring. The duo also has a new ride to get them there and wherever else they may be going.
A discussion about recording and/or live broadcasting county meetings. The issue, which has come up previously, has continued to either be vetoed by the Commission or avoided when it
Having just returned to the Commission being out of office for one term however, Commissioner Jerry Doyle again raised the request before his colleagues.
“I just feel with the technology that’s available, we should be broadcasting and recording our meetings,” Doyle told the board. “I think the public has a right to see all this.”
All other Commissioners, the State’s Attorney Paul Lewis, and Commission Assistant Marty Skroch laid out reasons they primarily believe there are more concerns and risks than benefits to offering online public access to their meetings. They included, “Negatives, a big one is you’re doing it in the name of transparency and it ends up backfiring on you. Nobody wants to come to meetings and discuss anything….It ends up being less transparent and people not wanting to talk,” said Skroch.
Commissioner Randy Hemmer said that if there is an issue someone wants to know about, he believes they’ll make time to be there in person.
Lewis added that the county, if they start to do any recording, would be required to store, maintain and do those recordings in perpetuity.
“This will be something you’re going to need to manage and make available and if there’s a tech issue or something happens, you’re going to have to look and make sure you’ve got the resources in house and make sure that public record is available. And that’s the danger of it. You’ve now created something that has to live on for as long as there is going to be a Moody County government,” Lewis told the Commission.
The Moody County Enterprise is seeking confirmation on this. At least one other county, Minnehaha, along with other public governing boards that the Moody County Enterprise has reached out to, do not appear to have the same understanding.
Codified law https://atg.sd.gov/docs/OpenMeetingLaw_2017_1.pdf states that only written minutes must be made available to the public within a given timeframe after the meeting of a public governing board.
“Finally, SDCL 1-27-1.17 requires that draft minutes of public meetings must be made available to the public at the principal place of business for the public body within 10 business days after the meeting (or made available on the website for the public body within five business days).”
The Moody County Enterprise is still working to confirm the facts of the matter with local and state officials.
Many entities and boards share recordings and live streams via YouTube and that is where their recordings remain, through that outside 3rd party entity. The City of Flandreau, which sees an average of 50-60 viewers each meeting, works with software designed specifically for open public meetings. A local tech provider services everything on the back end of the process and uploads the meetings to the City’s webpage. It is done as a public service versus an obligation, City Administrator Cohl Turnquist told the Commission. Anywhere from 40-60 people tend to either tune in or go back and watch the bi-monthly meetings. When a major issue is being discussed, that number is significantly higher, he added.
The Flandreau Public School District, which also sees between 50-60 viewers each broadcast, uses Live Ticket, the same program they now broadcast other events through. It is staffed by one of the school’s staff each meeting. The videos are then accessible on YouTube.
Skroch told Commissioners that really, one of the only positives he’s heard from others who broadcast their meetings to the public, is that people, including county staff, are able to go back and better reference what is said during meetings.
“There’s one auditor, Clay County, that said that if she misses something in a meeting she can go back and watch it and it helps her write her minutes.”
The costs and possible options for audio or video, should the Commission look further into broadcasting its meetings at any point in the future, were briefly discussed.
No decision was made other than to perhaps have Todd Kays from First District come in and offer a demonstration on the technology that that board uses for its meetings.
“I’m not opposed to a demonstration but I’m kind of aligning myself with Paul on this one. We’re setting ourselves up to keep another public record and we do have the (news)paper we are required to put that in, so we do have a public record. I appreciate the fact that all our minutes are in there,” said Chairwoman Carla Bruning.
A contract was signed with the Minnehaha County Jail. County officials plan, in the event that the Brookings County Jail is short on beds, to take inmates there for $106.15 per night.
County Highway Department Superintendent Andy Muller discussed a motor grader breakdown and the estimate for repairs. A fix could cost the county upwards of $26,000. The Commission decided it was best to instead look for a replacement. IMEG Engineering, which has done the county’s annual bridge inspections each year for nearly two decades, was approved for the job again in 2023.
Commissioners also, on Tuesday, March 7, approved the return of the Flandreau Farmers Market to the Crescent Street side of the Courthouse lawn this summer. The Farmer’s Market is planned to start June 15th and culminate with another Fall Festival mid-September. For more information, follow the Flandreau Farmer’s Market on Facebook.