All right, good morning, everyone.

I have nine o'clock.

It's time to call to order our county council budget received meeting for April 1st, 2026.

We will start this off with the invocation and the pledge.

If I can get everybody to please stand.

Dear Lord, thank you for another opportunity for us to come together and do the county's business.

We ask for guidance and patience and courage as we go through this budget.

We ask that you help us check our egos at the door and make sure that we understand that what we're doing here is looking for the best interest of our constituents.

We asked for all the blessings that we asked that you continue those for us, especially those that put themselves in harm by their own mission and the service of our county.

We ask for knowledge of your will and the power to carry it out.

We ask for all these blessings in your name.

Amen.

Attention to the flag.

I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands.

One nation under God, indivisible with liberty and justice for all.

Thank you.

Please be seated.

I just want to go over the traditional chairman's introduction before we turn it over to the administrator for a more detailed overview of what we're going to be doing today.

First of all, I'd like to congratulate Mr.

Spivey and the entire staff of Ory County government for all the hard work they've done.

This is a tremendous project they're presenting to us, and uh it's it's had a lot of work go into it, as my mother would say.

There's a lot of loving in this project today, and uh we're grateful for what they've done.

I'd like to remind council um we're gonna be here as long as it takes.

And uh if you've got questions, please ask them.

But I've found that it's probably better to ask the questions after the presenters finishes because so many times I've seen myself included, ask the question, and the speaker's very next sentence answered that question.

So let's give them a chance to to do they've worked hard on this presentation, let them do the presentation, then we'll ask the questions.

And finally, I'd like to remind everybody about this wonderful um microphone system we've got.

Please use it, it does two things.

Number one, the little light up here lets the speaker know that you have a question, so he'll call on you, she'll call on you.

And number two, we can't hear you without the microphone on.

So the people at home want to hear you.

So those are the two things I've got.

And with that, I'll turn it over to the administrator.

Well, good morning, and thank you, Chairman.

You mentioned about there being a lot of love in this package.

I would say there's a few little bit of sweat and some tears.

Um, as with anything we put together, uh, we are not getting everything that we want.

We understand that as we started this process this year that we were looking at as close to a flat budget as we could to hopefully propel us into some decisions today that will affect us for the future in that regard.

Uh I'm grateful to say that this is the 15th budget opportunity I've had to work with Ory County.

And when we started 15 years ago, our budget was just over 300 million dollars.

Today, we will present to you for the very first time a budget of exceeding one billion dollars.

Uh, there is a number of projects in that budget, and that's one of the drivers that are bringing that to a higher number than we would typically expect in that regard.

Um go ahead and advance that.

Um it is an informal meeting.

We want this to be a discussion.

We want this to be a process where we're all engaged in that regard.

What you will see today is a number of large topics that will, as I mentioned earlier, kind of set the stage as we move forward on a lot of big items for us as an organization.

Um we do have our solid waste authority here with us today, uh, who will be presenting about their budget as well as the landfill expansion project.

Uh, we do have our consultants and team as it relates to the J.

Ruman Long Detention Center, the study and recommendation uh that you will see.

Um we don't expect we will have a decision point today on that issue.

I think hopefully we will bring out all the questions that we have so that we can bring it back to council with a good discussion and a recommendation at that point in time.

But for our budget purposes, there is six million dollars in planning that is in our budget, and that won't be impacted by whatever that decision is or the timing of that decision.

Um but we we will be spending a decent amount of time on that issue.

We have our impact fee continuation.

Um, and that's the term we will use.

We've had that now in place for almost five years.

And this point in time we do have to vote to adopt a new study to continue that uh collection of those uh items, and we will show you how it has been used and how impactful it has been to our organization and community.

We will talk about local option sales tax, or if we will term it today local option.

Um that's not a new subject, be quite honest.