October 13, 2022 Camden County Commission meeting at 10:00 a.m.

I attended the October 13, 2022 Camden County Commission meeting at 10:00 a.m.

All three commissioners were present.

The meeting was held in the Commission Annex conference room. There were approximately fifteen people present besides the Camden County employees who normally attend. Representatives from the city of Osage Beach and the Osage Beach Special Road District were also present.

(As a side note, it’s pretty interesting that the Commission was so afraid of Nathan Rinne that they banned him from county property and installed a metal detector in the courthouse, but now they sit about 10 feet from him at the same table with no metal detectors in sight.)

At the previous Commission meeting, we learned that Camden County had been charging the special road districts a 20% administrative fee on their 11 cent property tax levy. During Public Comment at this October 13 meeting, Nathan Rinne now asked the Commission how they had determined the 20% administrative fee percentage? The earlier explanation from Commissioner Hasty had been that it was established by statute.

Unfortunately, an examination of Missouri Statute 50.515 appears to show that the administrative fee should be a maximum of 3%!

Rinne read the relevant portion of the statute aloud to them. Nobody could explain where the 20% number came from. The only explanation was that they had simply always charged that amount.

And so we moved on.

Commissioner Gohagan added the revised Request For Quote for a Forensic Auditor to the agenda. The revised RFQ was approved unanimously by the Commission.

The second agenda item was September Tax Abatements. They were approved unanimously.

The third agenda item was Amended 2022 Holiday Schedule. This was approved unanimously.

The fourth agenda item was the CERF Annual Contribution.

The amount that Camden County contributes to the CERF pension plan will remain the same. This was approved unanimously.

The fifth agenda item was Requests for Surplus Tax.

There were two requests and they were both approved unanimously.

The sixth agenda item was Treasurer CD Investment.

A local bank branch recently closed and the Treasurer wanted to move some of Camden County’s money to a CD from a different bank that still operates in Camden County.

There was some discussion about which banks might have the best interest rates for CD’s.

The Commission approved this unanimously.

The final agenda item was a review of the County Admin Fee for Osage Beach and the Osage Beach Special Road District. It seems that Osage Beach has also been charged the 20% fee. The Commission voted unanimously to waive the administrative fee until a forensic audit of the Collector’s Office is complete.

And that was that.

It is pretty amazing that nobody seems to know why the road districts have been charged a 20% admin fee for years. Apparently, all it took was a few Camden County gadflies reading a Missouri statute or two to solve the mystery?

It isn’t the first time I’ve seen this conversation occur:

Gadfly: “Why are we doing it like that?”

Camden County: “It’s required by Missouri statute.”

Gadfly: “What statute?”

Camden County: “Statute 12345.789.”

Gadfly (reads statute): “That statute doesn’t say that at all!”

Camden County: “…..”

Gadfly: “So why are we doing it that way again?”

Camden County: “Umm, we’ve always done it that way.”

Gadfly (face palms): “Sheesh!”

As soon as you figure out the answer to How?, you learn you need to figure out the answer to Why?