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Robinson elected board chair for 2004By MaryHelen Swanson Rush City resident and 5th District commissioner Mike Robinson will take the helm of the Chisago County Board for the year 2004. He was elected chairman early Tuesday morning following a tradition that the vice-chairman is moved into the chair position the following year. Commissioner Lora Walker was elected to the vice-chairmanís position. Robinson himself had nominated Commissioner Bob Gustafson for chairman and Commissioner Ben Montzka, who is moving out of the 2003 chair position, nominated Commissioner Rick Olseen. Both Gustafson and Olseen withdrew their names from the ballot. In an impromptu speech Robinson said his goal for the year was to ěget the train back on the track here and move ahead.î He said the board has to get some things solved and referred to the Green Acres nursing home proposal as one of the issues to be solved. And he said the board would have to work on better behavior at meetings, including himself. The board adopted the latest edition of Roberts Rules for meeting protocol and agreed to the same meeting schedule for the new year: 6:30 p.m. on the first and third Wednesdays and 9 a.m. on the fourth Wednesday of the month. The Post Review was awarded the designation of official newspaper, it having submitted the low bid of three legally submitted bids. The board also designated the county Web site as the official publication for highway project bid advertising. Annually, the board sets the bounty on beavers at this organizational meeting, and it was agreed to keep the bounty at $30. This amount is paid for each beaver taken from a county ditch up to a maximum of $700. In other business, the board adopted a meal reimbursement policy for 2004 for employees and elected officials. They are expected to submit expense claims with attached receipts. Out-of county meal reimbursements (but in the state) are paid as follows: $8 for breakfast, $9 for lunch and $16 for dinner. Individuals traveling out of the state are eligible for up to $40 meal reimbursement for each day of travel instead of using the above schedule. Mileage reimbursement was set at the federal rate. Committee assignments also were approved. Commissioner Montzka asked if Robinson wanted to remain on the planning commission as he had served two years already. Montzka volunteered to serve as the board representative on the PC as he felt Robinson had been expressing dissatisfaction with being on the commission. Robinson said he wanted to stay on one more year. But he also suggested that the commissioner assigned to the planning commission should be in a position of advisory member only and not a voting member. It would be less political, Robinson said. He also suggested that by removing the commissioner from the voting position, it would make way for a second at-large position. He had a recommendation for a person to fill that position. County Administrator John Moosey reminded the board that such changes regarding the planning commission would have to come about by resolutions as the planning commission bylaws include the assigned commissioner as a voting member. Another resolution would need to be adopted to change the at-large number. Moosey said staff could prepare resolutions for the changes for a later meeting. The board, upon recommendation of administrator Moosey, moved to grant the Board of Social Ministry another lease waiver, this time for four months and for approximately $60,000. Moosey said extending the deadline to BSM, operators of the county-owned Green Acres Country Care Center, would relieve a continuing financial deficit and give the county an opportunity to examine the requests for proposals that have been received. Moosey said there have been four RFPs received for operation of the new Green Acres Project. It is the intent of the resolution to have the county review the financial condition and future plans related to Green Aces at the end of this lease waiver. The board also moved to ban parking on the north side of County Road 83, also known as Chisago Boulevard, from a point 830 feet east of the intersection of CR 83 and Maxwell Road to a point 550 feet west of the intersection of CR 83 and Lyman Lane. ©ECM Post Review |