BOCC: 2025 Budget Woes,
More OEM Empire Building,
County Attorney Gets Fired
by George Gramlich,
News and Commentary
The October 24, 2024 regular meeting of the Custer County Board of County Commissioners (BOCC) started at around 9:20 a.m. due to some computer issues. It was held in their royal annex across from the courthouse. All three Commissioners were present: Bill Canda, Lucas Epp and Kevin Day.
In Commissioner Items Canda said the two TV stations are broadcasting fine. Epp said that he had contacted a construction consulting company to look at all the issues of the courthouse and give the Commissioners a report on it. He also stated that the 2023 audit and the 2025 budget are both “posted”. Epp reported that the proposed 2025 budget expense is $923,000 over expected revenue and that the county would have to get money from the Cash Reserves account to cover some of that. Epp added that they are going over the budget cutting where they can.
In Department Reports, Finance was first. The County’s finance consultant Lisa Hemann, from Redland’s Accounting, reviewed the various items she worked on last month including the county’s lack of policies and procedures for the various departments. After her presentation, Canda stated that, “We need to talk about changing
the auditor. We’ve had him for a long time. We need to look at others and get prices.” Hemann agreed. Epp added that he has asked Finance to “research audit options including a forensic audit”. He said we need an “audit policy” and suggested we should change auditors every five years. (Folks, auditors should be changed every three to five years. You need to audit the auditors. We have had
this one for 15 years or so. Totally unacceptable.)
The Human Resources report was written. The Commissioners read it silently and didn’t discuss anything substantial to the public. (No transparency here, folks. Post it on the website, Commissioners, so the peasants can see where their money is spent. It ain’t that hard.)
The Veteran Services Office report was next. Dominic Edginton gave another excellent report on his work.
Coroner Brad Baltzly gave a brief report. He noted that the county’s suicide rate is double from what it was last year.
Road & Bridge filed a written report. The Commissioners read it in silence. At the end, Epp said they had to cut $100k from the R&B’s budget for 2025. (Another report denied to the public. No transparency.)
Planning & Zoning also filed a written report. The Commissioners read it in silence, so we don’t know what is going on. At the end of the silent reading, Epp said that P&Z’s receipts are down $241k from last year and that building and septic permits are also down a lot. He also said “compliance issues continue to grow.”
Landfill, Recycling and Human Services all submitted written reports that were read in silence by the Commissioners. The citizens don’t know what is in them.
The Office of Emergency Management Director, Robyn Knappe, was there in person to support her written report. Epp asked her about Knappe’s project to organize and program all the county’s radios. After some jiving, the bottom line was Knappe wasn’t even close to getting that done. (This is a big priority. Why this isn’t being done right now is not good. Let’s put aside the grant addiction and get some real, important work done.)
Knappe was up again in New Business re another grant. This time for a “mitigation concept” effort for a fed grant called AIM to support mitigation efforts. Knappe tells the Commissioners all about the county’s fire dangers and the need to reduce the “fuel load”. She now wants a full time “mitigation specialist” for us to pay for. (Folks, if you look at the size of Custer County, and the extremely small citizen cadre wishing to do mitigation, the results of all this spending –$100k for a chipper, a full-time employee costing $60 to $70k a year, plus all the other expenses– the result would be TRIVIAL and non-consequential. Total waste of money.)
Canda is not happy about this. He said, “We are not in the business of competing with contractors who do this for a living”. Epp is also a little skeptical about this with the added drain on HR and Finance. The Commissioners pass the motion to have a concept paper prepared for the AIM grant. (Suggestion from a Taxpayer: Having a year-round mitigation employee is a total waste of money. So is the $100k for a chipper that can eat a truck. Take this grant money, get some bids from local mitigation companies, select the best one, and PAY OUR LOCAL WORKERS to do the job. Pay them by the hour to chip the slash. That way you can see the demand from the public, and if it is huge, then you might be able to make a case for a full-time employee and a big capital expenditure. Instead of HURTING our local working citizens, you would be helping them. We have hard times coming Commissioners, we need a lean, efficient government. Not a bloated one.)
The big magilla was next: Canda’s Agenda Item on firing the current County Attorney Dan Slater. (Background: As you will see below, there is a personnel issue with Slater and the county. Because it is a personnel issue, it cannot be revealed, so the Commissioners dance around the subject in the discussion.) Canda moves to change the County Attorney. Epp says you can’t do that until you have a replacement. Canda said he had an “interim candidate in mind”. Epp seconds the motion.
Day immediately signals he wants to keep Slater: “We have a situation that has arisen. I am of the opinion that it can be resolved. I move we retain Dan’s services and move forward to get another attorney to service DHS (our Department of Human Services). (Background: Apparently, we have three contracts with Slater, all hourly. This is due to the regulatory situation re DHS and HR. There is one contract with the county/BOCC in general, one with DHS and one with Human Resources. This is the normal setup due to regulatory and statutory law. Day’s comment suggests the personnel issue is with Slater and DHS and that if they get another attorney just to cover that legal contract, everything will be ok and Slater could retain the county and HR contracts. The question is, does that DHS issue poison Slater to the point where we don’t want him around anymore?)
The Commissioners dance for a while. Slater then gets his say: “the issue we are not discussing does not mean improper conduct by me. At least as I view it. Whatever issues exist can easily be fixed by splitting up the departments. It will be difficult to find somebody with the experience that I have with all three contracts.” He went on for a bit more.
After Slater’s plea was done, Canda said, “We do have concerns. Stuff we can’t get into publicly right now.” Day then said, “I won’t support it.” Day then asks for the debate to end and vote on it. Canda and Epp vote to change the County Attorney. Day voted to keep him. Slater is bye bye.
Another day in Happy Valley….
