WEBVTT 00:00:00.400 --> 00:00:07.840 Let us pray. 00:00:08.380 --> 00:00:29.280 Dear Gracious Eternal Father, we thank you for another day's journey, and we ask that you continue to touch our law enforcement, touch the bereavement of the soldiers who were lost in war, touch, Lord, all around our city, all of the officers that serve so gallantly and bravely to do the duty they do every day. 00:00:29.280 --> 00:00:33.460 And we ask this and many more blessings, in Jesus' name, amen 00:00:33.460 --> 00:00:37.700 I obtain a motion for approval of tonight's agenda 00:00:37.700 --> 00:00:38.920 So moved 00:00:38.920 --> 00:00:41.400 Moved by Mr. Busker 00:00:41.400 --> 00:00:43.120 Second 00:00:43.120 --> 00:00:44.460 Second by Mr. Newton 00:00:44.460 --> 00:00:47.300 Any questions? All in favor? 00:00:48.100 --> 00:00:48.540 Aye 00:00:48.540 --> 00:00:49.240 All opposed? 00:00:49.640 --> 00:00:55.680 Okay, the approval of 80 minutes for February 10, 2026 00:00:55.680 --> 00:00:58.400 So moved 00:00:58.400 --> 00:01:29.010 moved by Mr. Busker, seconded by Mr. Moon, all in favor, all opposed, approval of claims, have you guys seen the claims, public safety, $195,362.05, and public property, $53,465.81. 00:01:29.010 --> 00:01:36.770 Moved by Mixon News, seconded by Mr. Busker. All in favor? All in favor? All opposed? I'd like to follow 00:01:36.770 --> 00:01:45.330 comment. Report to committee, sheriff's department. Thank you, Mr. Bush. Right now we have four in the 00:01:45.330 --> 00:01:50.370 FTO program still. We still have two at school. They'll be graduating in April. We held a mayor 00:01:50.370 --> 00:01:54.650 commission interview last night. We had seven corrections officers that interviewed, all of 00:01:54.650 --> 00:01:57.590 to be good candidates. They're all going for one position. 00:01:59.510 --> 00:02:03.850 Crime suppression unit stats, I believe, were sent out. We had a pretty good month. 00:02:07.530 --> 00:02:13.150 New business. What have we got here now? Well, that's all I have. 00:02:13.470 --> 00:02:18.230 Okay. All right. Any questions? Okay. Mersey, May. 00:02:19.010 --> 00:02:23.870 Thank you, Mr. Bush. That's all my report is quite lengthy. I'm not going to read it to you guys. 00:02:23.870 --> 00:02:26.310 and I'm going to cover a few of the things I think I'm kind of recording. 00:02:27.010 --> 00:02:42.710 Deputy Director of Wardswine attended a Little Night Fire Service Institute and three-fourth policemen hosted an active shooter incident command and school safety violent event incident training on February 12th and 13th, shooting on a island. 00:02:43.530 --> 00:02:46.690 It was two-fold. The first day was the director of law enforcement. 00:02:46.690 --> 00:03:13.790 for the second day was cured towards the school system and school supervisors. He worked out really well. The training was excellent. Robin was very impressed with that time's loss spent. I think we're going to try to do more of that in the future, trying to include our Stevenson County ERT team and so forth and so on. Another training that we attended was obviously the annual 00:03:13.790 --> 00:03:17.350 So, where are you at here? 00:03:19.600 --> 00:03:25.300 It was a mass casualty tabletop drill held at FHN Mercy Health, put on by Night Park. 00:03:26.220 --> 00:03:28.020 That was on February 25th. 00:03:28.020 --> 00:03:29.960 That was a bus accident with fatalities. 00:03:30.260 --> 00:03:39.140 A tabletop drill included sheriff's office, our office, police department, hospital, fire, other local agencies, too. 00:03:39.800 --> 00:03:41.760 So, we've been busy with doing these drills here lately. 00:03:42.000 --> 00:03:43.320 That's a good thing for us. 00:03:43.320 --> 00:03:51.840 We have our upcoming training, which is the Homeland Security and Exercise Evaluation Program training on April 1st and 2nd at the County Courthouse 00:03:51.840 --> 00:03:55.120 That is still on schedule and on track to happen 00:03:55.120 --> 00:04:04.120 We are still working on trying to get a date for the senior officials and appointed officials NIMS training 00:04:04.120 --> 00:04:09.760 This will happen before May 16th, it'll be on a Saturday morning, I just don't have the date yet 00:04:09.760 --> 00:04:14.520 And as soon as I get the date confirmed, I want to get that out to you guys as soon as possible. 00:04:15.100 --> 00:04:17.480 We had some issues with the instructor being able to attend. 00:04:21.880 --> 00:04:22.840 Received an email. 00:04:23.120 --> 00:04:25.220 This is the situation for us. 00:04:25.940 --> 00:04:35.340 Our dispatchers in the CAD system, the PSAP, Public Safety Answering Point System, 911 centers, both for the county and for the city, 00:04:35.340 --> 00:04:43.180 The National Weather Service has reached out, and we're kind of in a bad area as far as radar goes here in Northwest Illinois. 00:04:44.300 --> 00:04:51.000 They have sometimes not been able to get competent weather instances and emergencies reported to them. 00:04:51.600 --> 00:04:59.380 So we're working on a system that will be able to automatically send our weather incidents to the National Weather Service in Davenport. 00:04:59.380 --> 00:05:19.400 as soon as the dispatch arrives and types it into their system, it will automatically email them and let them know hypothetically if we have flash flooding, if we have a tornado on the ground, if we have snow in excess, whatever the report comes in and it becomes a report via police or fire, it will go down to the National Service. This is in the process of happening, but I think that's going to go. 00:05:19.400 --> 00:05:48.660 So, a couple other upcoming trainings. CN Railroad, my experience with them has been nothing but professional. My ears are the fire service. They're a great organization. Unfortunately, they did have a derailment up in Nora here a couple months ago. Every year, they reach out and they have trainings. There's a couple coming up. Freeport Fire and a division hazmat team is going to be training down at Valley Shards in Freeport on Thursday, no, on Tuesday. 00:05:49.400 --> 00:06:19.280 the 14th of April. And then out in the ethanol plant in Lena, they have actually three dates set up for the rural fire departments to attend. It's just basically incident response training and car familiarization. So if they roll up on what they did in aura, they'll be more familiar. And this is really not like a reactive type training. They offer this every year. So it's something that CN is very good about. And I'm glad that they are the only railroad going through 00:06:19.280 --> 00:06:49.220 our area. Another thing, talking about the EMPG grant that supplies my budget, I received all of the money back that we applied for for fiscal year 2024-2025. I received a check in February that capped our total at $22,344, which is what we applied for. Right now, federal government, for that part, is shut down, so there'll be 00:06:49.220 --> 00:07:13.300 no more money's being allocated. So Stevens County, we're fortunate to get ours. There are a lot of counties out there that are not being fully funded at this point. And we're still waiting for fiscal year 2025 grant to come through. They're optimistic. I don't know. We'll have to wait and see. And I think that's, oh, two other things. 00:07:13.300 --> 00:07:43.100 Two organizations in the state of Illinois. One is IASMA. It's an Illinois Emergency Services Management Association. This is a longstanding organization that's been in the emergency management business for many years. I'm told, I have not thought of it yet, but I have not put a lot of time looking into it yet, but I'm told that our county did reach and pass a resolution to be involved. It's basically a mutual aid agreement is what this is. It's for county to county, i.e. 00:07:43.100 --> 00:07:53.280 If I needed something from Winnebago County, if we were part of this and we had to sign an agreement, we could exchange mostly material type things, equipment, okay? 00:07:53.940 --> 00:08:07.840 I'm going to research this. There's some pushback on our region level as to say as to why we need to have this in resolution form, maybe a memorandum of understanding might be a little easier to do and serve the same purpose. 00:08:07.840 --> 00:08:13.180 so I'm researching this. I may be back with this next month to take to the council and ask for your 00:08:13.180 --> 00:08:18.020 approval on but I'm just not ready to do that right now and very similar is the Illinois incident 00:08:18.020 --> 00:08:24.960 management system is IMS which is another organization this one a little different this 00:08:24.960 --> 00:08:31.120 one is a mutual aid agreement for the 13 counties in Northwest Illinois Region 2 that also includes 00:08:31.120 --> 00:08:58.780 equipment, and also includes like personnel. So if they needed to have Robin or myself to head down to Bureau County because they have a mass tornado go through there and they need some help running their EOC, we would send us down there. Again, we're still looking at maybe a memorandum of understanding would be better suited versus the resolution. But smoke supply sample language, both cannot be deviated from. That's the problem. 00:08:58.780 --> 00:09:19.440 for my submissions for Cardinal. Cardinal may want to make some changes. They really can't be because it's a regional agreed upon language. I'm going to continue to research this a little bit more here next week or two, and I'll make a presentation next month about how I'm going to pursue this fluid. And that is all I have. 00:09:19.440 --> 00:09:28.360 You know, Rob and I were talking in December, January is kind of slow. Nobody want to do anything. And man, February hit and we've been 00:09:28.360 --> 00:09:41.860 wrong. That's good, though. That's good. As far as with the school shooting training, that done at the school or do schools have any kind of drill in the school shootings or what? 00:09:42.540 --> 00:09:52.220 Yes. Throughout the county, well, the city does for sure, but throughout the county, there's mandatory fire drills and lockdown drills, what they have. 00:09:52.220 --> 00:09:59.990 and right now I'm doing all the training in all of our county schools for 00:09:59.990 --> 00:10:02.080 Active Shooter type of stuff. 00:10:02.700 --> 00:10:03.140 Okay. 00:10:03.580 --> 00:10:03.860 Okay. 00:10:04.340 --> 00:10:11.080 Yeah, this particular class was kind of instigated, I believe, by the fire chiefs, rural fire chiefs 00:10:11.080 --> 00:10:15.240 in the county that wanted to have some kind of training, and it was spirited by the city 00:10:15.240 --> 00:10:19.300 of Freeport Police Department, and it was good training. 00:10:19.460 --> 00:10:19.740 Okay. 00:10:19.880 --> 00:10:20.260 Good training. 00:10:20.540 --> 00:10:20.880 Good as well. 00:10:21.240 --> 00:10:21.400 Okay. 00:10:22.700 --> 00:10:23.220 Inquest. 00:10:24.500 --> 00:10:25.180 All right. 00:10:25.180 --> 00:10:28.000 You got a coroner. 00:10:28.000 --> 00:10:53.520 Coroner's report, February, there were 49 total deaths. There were six call-outs or six deaths on the scene. There was one autopsy. 16 death certificates were signed off by the coroner, 33 by a doctor, 42 were natural causes, and six deaths are pending investigation. 00:10:53.520 --> 00:11:29.790 Okay. And those stats are all down from January, which is amazing. Down from January? Yep. Okay. Total deaths in January of 59, we're at 49 in February. Okay. Any questions? Okay. Let's move on. Are they going to need old business? Any new business? If not, any comments from the committee members? 00:11:29.790 --> 00:11:48.670 You can probably hear this again, but the upcoming summer NACO's convention is in New Orleans, and we bumped up the, I don't think you forgot that, we bumped it up, $5,000 a county to get extra people to go 00:11:48.670 --> 00:11:50.270 Sorry, what month is that? 00:11:50.270 --> 00:11:55.850 It's in July, middle of July, towards the weekend, first couple days of the week 00:11:55.850 --> 00:11:59.510 Assuming it would be before UCCI? 00:11:59.790 --> 00:12:01.390 just before the conference. 00:12:01.550 --> 00:12:04.110 Yeah, it's like the week before. 00:12:04.510 --> 00:12:09.870 And then later that weekend, that Sunday is when the golf game happens. 00:12:10.150 --> 00:12:11.810 Do you have dates for the UCCI event? 00:12:12.610 --> 00:12:12.890 Yeah. 00:12:13.630 --> 00:12:20.230 While he's looking at that, Mr. Bush, did you want to comment at all on the interviews or interviews for the corner? 00:12:22.350 --> 00:12:23.290 You want me to talk? 00:12:23.390 --> 00:12:23.530 Yeah. 00:12:23.530 --> 00:12:40.090 We spoke with Tom Knezki yesterday, myself, Mr. Bush, and Mr. Hadley. We interviewed him. Not really in depth, just kind of got a feel for his ideas and some of the ideas that the board members wanted to see done in that office. 00:12:40.650 --> 00:12:50.650 I basically told everyone in the room that I've been working with Tom since probably November about getting him into this office and kind of getting his feet wet. 00:12:50.650 --> 00:13:00.190 He has been doing that, but once he takes over full-time, I'll work hand-in-hand with him with whatever he needs, and hopefully everything works out. 00:13:00.310 --> 00:13:18.070 Our recommendation at the time was unanimous that Tom would be put in that position after March 17th with a projection date of around April 1st, and then he would be in that position as appointed until November 5th when he would be elected, and he is on the ballot. 00:13:18.070 --> 00:13:44.230 Yeah, I was okay with it. I mean, he had been in that position and working. And so I guess the only question I had is, how serious are you for the position? Yeah. I think a lot of times people want to get into a position. They want to get in there about what it's about. Then they lose interest. 00:13:44.230 --> 00:14:14.230 so that was my major concern is you know was he gonna stay so um yeah yeah and I think one of the other questions that us three had without Tom in the room is when is the resolution up that the wages can be discussed is that this year? No I don't think so we're only halfway through the firm I believe so it'd be 27 00:14:14.230 --> 00:14:20.470 Spring of 27, it's 180 days prior to the election, I think, or is it this morning? 00:14:20.470 --> 00:14:24.230 Because this election cycle wins and will be discussed April, May. 00:14:24.230 --> 00:14:25.230 Yeah. 00:14:25.230 --> 00:14:26.230 So? 00:14:26.230 --> 00:14:29.230 So not until a year from now. 00:14:29.230 --> 00:14:32.230 Effective in 28, January. 00:14:32.230 --> 00:14:33.230 Okay. 00:14:33.230 --> 00:14:37.230 And I think another question that came out as far as Virginia for his deputy. 00:14:37.230 --> 00:14:39.230 Yeah. 00:14:39.230 --> 00:14:43.230 Well, increase in that. 00:14:44.230 --> 00:14:49.310 Oh, thank you. Can you handle that by resolution? Deputy Poynus? 00:14:50.270 --> 00:14:57.730 No, when Mr. Welch did it, I believe he presented it through the budget. 00:14:59.250 --> 00:15:01.270 Yeah. Okay. Okay. 00:15:01.510 --> 00:15:04.590 So that's something that, you know, budget gets addressed every year. 00:15:05.810 --> 00:15:06.110 Okay. 00:15:10.430 --> 00:15:13.090 Just a couple of dates. 00:15:13.090 --> 00:15:43.030 And I mean, just to keep in mind, April 14 to 15, you probably already know about that, but just put it out there, it's the UCCI legislative, and it's a dual, a joint event between the Chicago Association, which is ISACO and UCCI, and 14 to 15, it's going to be packed in state because both the House and Senate are in session, so everybody's in town. 00:15:43.090 --> 00:15:48.490 So if you're going to go make a reservation because the hotels are going to be gone 00:15:48.490 --> 00:15:54.990 Now I think Mr. Bush, myself, don't know that anybody else has gotten back to us on again 00:15:54.990 --> 00:15:57.110 Thank you, Jerry, I'll keep talking about it 00:15:57.110 --> 00:16:02.750 So that's the only issue is hotels will be challenging if you stay the night 00:16:02.750 --> 00:16:09.630 On that other piece, in July we have the annual NACO convention again 00:16:09.630 --> 00:16:12.430 That's the 17th through the 22nd 00:16:12.430 --> 00:16:42.430 and so we can also do this and yes again we've added more money in case somebody wants to go you'll see you probably get on if you haven't got an email about how they don't do it so and then the annual golf outing the annual UCCI event is 26 27 28 of July yeah so that's a Sunday Monday Tuesday okay thank you so July 00:16:42.430 --> 00:16:43.430 going to be a business owner. 00:16:44.810 --> 00:16:45.770 So that's all I have. 00:16:45.970 --> 00:16:46.370 Okay. 00:16:48.410 --> 00:16:54.290 One other thing, if we may take delegation to Washington, D.C., we're looking at doing that. 00:16:54.290 --> 00:16:57.430 We have just an Illinois delegation of county board members. 00:16:58.050 --> 00:17:02.770 So if you're thinking you might want to do that, that'll happen probably. 00:17:03.350 --> 00:17:04.510 But we can fall over. 00:17:04.750 --> 00:17:05.490 It'll be in the fall. 00:17:05.970 --> 00:17:06.110 Yeah. 00:17:06.870 --> 00:17:07.770 Thanks, sir. 00:17:07.930 --> 00:17:08.290 All right. 00:17:10.650 --> 00:17:11.970 There's nothing else. 00:17:12.430 --> 00:17:19.730 I'll entertain a motion to move by Mr. Busker, seconded by Mr. Newton. 00:17:19.850 --> 00:17:20.270 Yes, sir. 00:17:24.990 --> 00:17:26.010 All in favor. 00:17:26.010 --> 00:17:27.370 All in favor. 00:17:27.850 --> 00:17:28.910 Good night.