The Greene County Board of Supervisors met Monday in regular session.

The Board approved the 28E agreement for the 2017 fiscal year tobacco enforcement grant, the federal aid agreement with the Iowa Department of Transportation for a surface transportation program project from County Road E-39 north to the Calhoun County line, a portable hotspot contract with Verizon Wireless as presented and the County Treasurer’s investment report of $4,826,697 for August and issuing 268 driver’s licenses last month.

The Board also approved to hire Thomas Laehn as county attorney assistant. His contract will be effective from June 1, 2017 to May 31, 2019 with a possible one-year automatic renewal. His starting salary will be $60,000. He was a summer intern with Judge William Oslund last year and Oslund and County Attorney Nick Martino indicated that Laehn would make a great assistant and possibly run for county attorney at the end of Martino’s current term, which ends in 2018. The title of assistant county attorney is contingent upon Laehn passing the bar exam.

County Engineer Wade Weiss said the Verdin Company will bring in a crane to lower nine of the 14 current bells from the Mahanay Bell Tower on Wednesday. He hopes to have the fabrication and maintenance work completed within a couple of weeks.

Greene County Chief Deputy Jack Williams addressed the Board. He said he is attending a conference on October 7th about Governor Terry Branstad’s proposal to merge dispatch units throughout the state. Williams pointed out that the Governor also wants local law enforcement to switch their communication equipment to 700-Megahertz radios so that they can communicate with the Iowa State Patrol, who uses the same frequency. Williams said just to convert their vehicles, the switch would cost about $90,000 and to do everything else would be between $1-2 million. He wanted to make the Supervisors aware in case the proposal goes through the legislature, they wouldn’t totally be shocked. Williams will be attending to voice his opposition to the proposal.

Finally, the Board canvassed the votes from last week’s special Greene County School District election. Only three additional absentee ballots were collected after Tuesday’s election, which did not change the overall outcome of Mike Dennhardt elected to the school board to fill a vacancy and the $19.4 million bond referendum failing to get a supermajority of at least 60 percent of the votes to pass.