The Greene County Board of Supervisors met Monday in regular session.
During open forum, Greene County Attorney Thomas Laehn addressed the Board. He received a notification from the Iowa Attorney’s Case Management that Greene County would no longer be able to use their server for the electronic court records system, Pro Law. Laehn said he and Informational Technology Administrator Michelle Fields tentatively wanted to move the County to a Cloud-based system for an upfront cost of $27,000, which could be reduced to $12,000. The other option is for the County to house the program on its own server. The Board has until the end of the current fiscal year to decide.
River Farms Recreation Owner Craig Flack then addressed the Board about the possible social host ordinance. He explained that he has no money to run his business at River Farms, which is why he said he needs to continue having large summer events. Flack told the Board his events bring in lots of money to the local economy, but that his insurance went up from $500 to $2,600 to have a one-day event. He referenced the issues that came about from his previous summer bash event in July, and after working with the Greene County Sheriff’s Office, the second day of the weekend event went smoother.
He said he is planning to rent his property to a Des Moines promotion company for an event on August 14th and 15th. Supervisor Chair John Muir said the social host ordinance was not related to Flack’s events, but for continuous house parties where young people are gathering and consuming alcohol underage. No action was taken by the Board following the discussion.
The Board then approved a letter of support for the organization, Why Not Us, to apply for a Main Street Iowa Challenge grant to help renovate the 100 East State Street property that was formerly Angie’s Tea Garden. Additionally, the Board approved the Sheriff’s quarterly report of fees for April-June of $47,630, an assessment rate of 97.5-percent for drainage district 14 and set a public hearing for classification on September 14th. The Board also approved two rezoning classifications as recommended by the County zoning planning commission, following public hearings on the requests. One was for Terry Ross for his property at 516 320th Street to go from residential to commercial to sell vehicles. The other was for New Cooperative for their feed mill site at 2272 N Avenue to go from agricultural to industrial.
Finally, the Board approved the Treasurer’s semi-annual report for January 1-June 30, the investment report for June of $6,920,629, issuing 286 driver’s licenses last month, and hiring Jessica Larson for $42,500 as a treasurer’s office clerk.