April 11, 2023 Camden County Commission meeting at 10:00 a.m.

The Gadfly attended the April 11, 2023 Camden County Commission meeting at 10:00 a.m.

All commissioners were present.

This meeting was held in the conference room of the Commission Building.

The first agenda item was Dry Hollow Road Grant Closeout Review.

Joni Wansing from the Lake of the Ozarks Council of Local Governments presented this agenda item to the Commission. Construction started on Dry Hollow Road in March of 2022. The project raised and paved the road. It was funded by a Community Block Development Grant and work was completed on November 16, 2022. A public meeting was needed to officially close out the project and this Commission meeting would serve as that public forum.

Commissioner Skelton explained that these grant projects are very difficult to complete because it is difficult to process all of the required paperwork. He questioned whether some of these projects are worth the administrative burden they carry with them.

Wansing agreed that the paperwork is cumbersome. Even grant money that comes from Missouri has a federal origin and carries the same federal administrative requirements.

The Commission voted unanimously to close out the project.

The second agenda item was Order of Judgement of Road Vacations.

These were the actual road vacation orders from the road petitions that were approved at last Monday’s Commission meeting.

They were approved unanimously.

The third agenda item was a Wastewater Variance Board Appointment for Darian Decker.

Commissioner Gohagan said that Guy Winters had recommended Decker as his replacement on the board.

This appointment was approved unanimously.

The fourth agenda item was Capital Paving – Resurface Parking Lot in Front of Courthouse.

Commissioner Skelton explained that this agenda item was for the repaving of the parking lot that is directly in front of the county courthouse on the Camdenton square. The bid for repaving from Capital Paving was $34,000. The city of Camdenton can’t pay to repave the parking lot even though the parking lot is owned by the city. One citizen suggested that perhaps the city should deed the parking lot to Camden County if the city wasn’t willing to maintain it?

(It was later learned that Camdenton does not own the four parking lot quadrants around the square. They are actually owned by MODOT. I assume this is because they are adjacent to Highway 54.)

The Commission voted to table this matter so they could discuss it further with the city.

The fifth agenda item was Contracted Trucking Bid Awards.

The Road and Bridge Department recommended that the Commission accept all six of the trucking bids. All of the bids met the county’s updated insurance requirements. I did wonder if the bids were all similar in price and if the pricing would play a part in how the contracted trucks would be selected for county service?

The Commission accepted all of the bids unanimously.

In Old Business, the commissioners said they had received a significant amount of correspondence from taxpayers who have been charged late fees and penalties on their property tax. The Assessor and the Collector have no authority to waive these fees except for active duty military within 6 months of returning from active duty and cases where the county has made an error. They will forward other late fee complaints to the Commission for their review. It remains to be seen if the Commission will establish a policy for when they will consider waiving late fees and penalties for property taxes beyond the standards that are included in the statutes.

The final agenda item was a presentation by STLCOM.COM.

This was a long presentation for a Voice Over IP (VOIP) phone system for Camden County. I’ll summarize and spare you the details.

Camden County is unhappy with its current phone system and is looking for a new VOIP phone service. STLCOM will provide the phone equipment and the service/support for the system. The proposed agreement is a 60 month contract with locked-in pricing. The company has redundant phone service server locations in Dallas and Saint Louis so service will still be available even if one of their service sites goes down for some reason.

The service is a “Work From Anywhere” plan that can allow users to access their work phone lines on laptops or cell phones as long as they have an internet signal. There are no extra charges for service changes. The proposed bid is for 140 user sets and does not include the Sheriff’s Office. They came prepared with a pricing plan which I have included below. The system would be operable within 45-60 days after a contract was signed.

VOIP is a pretty mature technology and Camden County is considering several vendors. It really comes down to price, flexibility, and the quality of customer service the county will receive.

And that was that.