Returning to the Present

By James Middleton

 
Monday December 1, 2014 was a day when the
swearing-in newly elected officials in Boone County
occurred. In addition, members of the County Board
selected their leaders for the new Board. The ceremonies
began early on Monday at the Boone County Courthouse
where the returning county clerk, county treasurer and
the assistant treasurer were swore-in to serve. Perhaps
the most newsworthy event Monday morning was the
investiture of the new Boone County Sheriff, David Ernest.
Sheriff Ernest is the first new Sheriff to serve the county in
36 years.
Monday night, the action moved to the Boone County
Administrative Center on Logan Avenue for the searingin
of seven newly elected County representatives. Two
of those sworn-in were returning representatives that had
been reelected while the other five were newly elected to
serve in the county.
Those representatives that were returning included Ken
Freeman (District #3) who will serve a two-year term and
Karl Johnson (District #2) who was elected to serve a fouryear
term. Those that were newly elected to the County
Board included Sherry Branson (District #3), Brad Stark
(District #3), Sherry Giesecke (District #1), Raymond
Larson (District 2) and Jeffrey Carlisle (District #2).
The Boone County clerk, Mary Steurer served as the
chairman of the meeting as the representative that had been
the chairman was no longer serving in that capacity as a new
chairman would be chosen. She opened the meeting and
managed the agenda through the swearing-in ceremony.
After the newly elected representatives were sworn-in,
Ms. Steurer presided over the approval of the agenda and
then moved to asking for nominations for chairman of the
County Board.
With that, representative Karl Johnson nominated Bob
Walberg (District #1) the former chairman to be reelected.
Ken Freeman then moved to nominate Craig Schultz
(District #3) to be chosen as chairman. The nominations
were then closed as no other nominations arose.
In a roll-call vote, Mr. Walberg was reelected to serve as
chairman of the County Board. The vote was 9 members
favoring Mr. Walberg and 3 members that were opposed.
Mr. Walberg was elected to serve another term.
The next item on the agenda was for the County Board
to select a vice chairman of the County Board. One
representative was nominated and that was Paul Larson
(District #2) with no other nominees that followed. In a
roll-call vote Mr, Larson was unanimously elected to serve
as vice chairman of the County Board.
The county administrator, Ken Terrinoni then took the
floor to enumerate how the county committee meetings
would run for December. In that the chairman and vice
chairman had just been selected and the roster of members

on the various county committees had not been set, the

December meetings were delayed one week.
The meetings will move forward through December
as follows: the administrative and legislative meeting
will occur on December 8 followed by the Public
Safety committee. On December 9, Roads and Capital
Improvements will be held followed by the finance and
employment committee. On December 10, the building,
planning and zoning committee will occur followed by the
city and county coordinating meeting. The final county
committee meeting, health and human services, will be
held on December 11.
At the conclusion of the meeting dates, Mr. Terrinoni
added, “In January we will go back to our normal schedule
of committee meetings.”
Mr. Larson then announced, “For all of the new
members, the December 11 meeting of the roads and
capital improvements committee will be very important
if we are to get bids for construction of the new animal
control shelter building before the end of the year.” He
said that time was growing short and the previous County
Board had wanted to begin the process before the end of
2014.
“We are planning,” Mr. Larson continued, “a new
building that would be on the highway department property
near the Maple Crest facilities. We expect to use an existing
well and we plan to attach to the city sewer line that is used
by Maple Crest. We need to be aware of some inspections
that had trouble with in the jail construction and we need
to correct some errors that we found in the construction
project for the Administrative Center, this very building.”
Mr. Larson emphasized that the new County Board must
make these decisions to reach that end of 2014 goal to
begin the process.
In the November General Elections, Boone County
voters approved to allow the Boone County Board to incur
debt to the extent of $800,000 to construct a new animal
control shelter. Pressure has been applied by some current
and former members of the County Board and some
residents that live within and outside the county have also
applied pressure to build a new shelter.
Mr. Larson concluded by emphasizing what the new
County Board must do on that matter and the meeting was
adjourned.
Mr. Walberg made only one comment following the
meeting regarding his reelection as the chairman of the
County Board. He said that one area he wants to emphasize
for county consideration in 2015 is to expand and enhance
economic development in the county. One element that
was emphasized that the county needs during the Fiscal
Year 2015 budget negotiations was how the county needs to
obtain more revenue from sales tax collections. Expansion
of sales tax collection by obtaining greater retail economic
development opportunities could be one area of interest for
the newly elected County Board chairman in 2015.