Commission Briefs

Transportation panel vote prompts tense exchange

Tim Lincoln, Phil Wolff and Don Pogreba were reappointed to the seven-member Transportation Improvement Program Citizen Advisory Panel at Tuesday’s Mason County commissioners meeting.

According to the information packet, six members had terms that expired Aug. 1, and all six members submitted applications for another term. Recruitment for new members has not received any other applications and Public Works continues to seek two more volunteers to serve on the panel.

Lincoln and Wolff represent Mason County commissioner District 1, which is Randy Neatherlin’s district. Pogreba represents District 3, which is Sharon Trask’s district.

Commissioner Neatherlin pulled the action agenda item for a separate vote and stated before the vote that this panel was created “of taking politics out of our decisions for roads and infrastructure and stuff like that.”

“It was put in place to have the citizens be a direct line with the community and to go over each of these items to make sure that the commission didn’t just do it without their own political whims and the like,” Neatherlin said during the meeting. “Back in 2016, the year before that, when I ran for re-election, there was a young lady who was running against me, she filed a year early, she had made a mistake. So I knew she was running against me and she wanted to be appointed to the criminal justice committee, which I knew she would use it as a weapon against me, but I still appointed her to that committee because it was the right thing to do because she had knowledge in that area. To not appoint her to it would have been a political choice on my part and I decided not to do that.”

“I feel that we’re in a situation right now where we have two people who have served this community exceptionally well for seven years and even the chair of it and we’re not appointing them. Not only are we not appointing them, the way this thing was brought forward, we did not even have a discussion of what you want, because we’ve changed the structure, what you want representing your seat or your seat or mine. As I said during our briefing, it should have been handled that way to where we have the ability to bring forward who we thought should best represent our communities because that’s why this is in existence. It’s just sad to me that we are going to appoint people who are good people, I have no issue with that, but we’re going to leave out people who have done the work all these years and I’m afraid it’s for political purposes or personal, if not political, animosity’s when they’ve done a great job for seven years.”

Neatherlin stated that he was still voting in favor of the item because the people who were being appointed are worthy of being appointed.

Trask responded to Neatherlin’s comments, stating “I hope you’re not saying that this was a political move.”

“I know it’s a campaign year and believe me, nothing I do for this county is for political gain or for any political reasons, so I hope that’s not what you’re saying” Trask said. “The reason that I’m moving forward and I support this is there were four people from your (Neatherlin) district, two from mine and none from District 2. That bothered me a bit. I do think that it’s important that we keep all of our districts well represented and well balanced. Gosh, I really hope you’re not saying I’m doing this for political reasons because that is not where I am and I was hoping, well, most people understand that it’s not political for me, that it’s for Mason County.”

Commissioner Kevin Shutty spoke after Trask and said, “I think it’s really bizarre to try and make this a political or personal vote.”

“I think as you mentioned, commissioner Neatherlin, the people that we’re appointing here today are qualified, they’re experienced and honestly, what they have in common is they’ve been critical of me and some of my decisions and I think by reappointing people who are critical of the electeds that represent them, I think that’s healthy in a democracy like ours and a representative democracy like ours and that’s why I have no problem reappointing these three individuals. I think the argument could also be made that it was potentially highly politicized and personal when you look at the makeup of the previous TIP-CAP board, given how heavily weighted it was to your (Neatherlin’s) district, but none of us seemed to be able to make that argument because we didn’t think that that’s why you had those folks appointed. We thought you made a decision based on what you thought was in the best interests of the county at the time in order to revamp TIP-CAP and you know, at some point here, commissioner Neatherlin, it would be great to get that same courtesy in return for how and why I make decisions and so, your points are your points and you’ve had an opportunity to weigh in on these and other appointments and I think it’s time we rebalance TIP-CAP so we have a little bit more wide representation for all the districts. As you’ve always said, I’ve struggled to get representation from my district. We’re working on that, this is part of that, and so I wouldn’t have been critical of you for saying that folks that you were highly supportive of, politically, and that were supportive of you, politically, got appointed to that council. For those reasons, I think that you operated under what you thought was the best interests of the community and frankly, that’s why I’m voting for these three individuals so that we can have a core, so they can do that work, so they can advance a six-year and annual TIP for our consideration.”

All three commissioners voted to approve the appointments.

Hearing set for transportation

Mason County commissioners approved a public hearing for the 2023 annual construction program and the six-year Transportation Improvement Program for 9:15 a.m. Sept. 27.

According to the information packet, RCW 36.81.121 and 36.81.130 requires the preparation and annual updating of a six-year comprehensive transportation program. Mason County established a citizen advisory board for the purpose of increasing public involvement in developing transportation improvement recommendations. The Transportation Improvement Program-Citizen Advisory Panel (TIP-CAP) was presented the attached recommended programs in July.

The public is invited to review the annual and transportation improvement program through Sept. 27. TIP-CAP will make its recommendations Sept. 14 before the public hearing and adoption of the plan.

Annual 2022 expenditures are planned to be $12 million. $2.76 million will come from the road fund and $9.2 million is coming from outside sources. County forces will be used to construct approximately $1,010,500 of the annual construction program. This is under the computer limit of $1.27 million.

Some of the projects on the annual construction program for 2023 include Mason Lake Road Improvement Project No. 2, Belfair Connector Log Yard Road E. and Old Belfair Highway Improvement Project.

Court employees receive raise

The positions of Mason County district court judge pro tempore and district court commissioner received a raise to $90 an hour beginning Jan. 1 after approval by the Mason County commissioners.

According to the information packet, the current hourly rate is $75 an hour. The district court states reasons for increasing the hourly rate, including a cost-of-living increase, average of the comparable counties for judge pro tempore is currently $85.52 an hour as of June and the superior court judge pro-tem is paid 1/250th of the superior court judge’s salary per RCW 2.08.180. As of Sept. 1, the district court judge’s salary will be $193,447 and 1/250th would be $96.72 an hour.

County contributes more to risk pool

Mason County will be contributing an optional $5 million excess to participate in the liability, property, cyber and crime programs that include significant rate increases.

According to the information packet, the Washington Counties Risk Pool board of directors approved the fiscal year 2022-23 coverages and rates that includes increases. Approval to participate in the optional

$5 million excess of a $20 million policy that increases Mason County’s liability program coverage to $25 million.

The optional excess $5 million is expected to increase by 26% from the previous year’s premium and is budgeted as non-departmental.

Public Works enters service contract

Mason County Public Works entered into a three-year service contract with Huber Technology for the annual maintenance of the Huber Fine

ROTAMAT screens used at the Belfair Reclamation Facility.

According to the information packet, proper screening ahead of the Belfair Reclaimed Water Facility membrane filters is important for membrane lie and reducing the chance to foul or plug. Public Works proposed entering into a service agreement to perform annual inspection and maintenance services and Huber Screens is the sole-source provider to work on their screens to assure they are performing as designed.

The service contract is for three years with a total cost of $13,500 or $4,500 per year. The charge for a one-time service visit is $7,627 without contract.

Repairs for Belfair Facility approved

Mason County commissioners approved parts and repair services for the Belfair Reclamation Facility Turbo Blower at the Aug. 30 meeting.

According to the information packet, one of the turbo blowers needed repairs at the Belfair Reclamation Facility. Blowers are crucial to the wastewater process as they supply dissolved oxygen to the microorganisms. This encourages a healthy environment and biomass that is needed to treat the wastewater to stay within permit requirements. K Turbo is based out of Batavia, Illinois, and are the sole-source supplier for high-speed turbo blower parts and technical service. The inoperable blower was sent to them for diagnosis and rebuilding the compressor motor will cost $11,997.

The money is coming out of the repair and maintenance budget.

Crossroads provided additional money

Mason County commissioners approved more money to be allocated to Crossroads Housing from the consolidated homeless grant.

According to the information packet, the money from the grant is subcontracted to Crossroads Housing to support the centralized rapid rehousing program and supportive services aimed at reducing and preventing homelessness.

The grant provides $98,098 from through June 30, 2023.

County administrator to negotiate contract

County Administrator Mark Neary has been approved by the county commissioners to negotiate the Lessor of the Belfair Landing Commercial Complex and Mason County attorney to implement a 16-month extension on the Mason County Sheriff’s North Precinct.

According to the information packet, the current lease for the Sheriff’s Office North Precinct expired Tuesday. The facilities team is in the process of negotiating a new lease with North Mason Regional Fire Authority’s old administration building as a location to provide Mason County services to our residents living in North Mason. The first phase of remodeling associated with the move would be to relocate the sheriff’s north precinct into this location.

The relocation could take six to 12 months to complete and maintaining a presence in the north end of the county is important to the Sheriff’s Office.

The owner of the building, John Byerly, gave the county some options. Option 1 is the county would extend the lease for 16 months following the same increases associated with the existing contract, an increase of 4% to the base rent portion of the lease. Byerly could start advertising the space for lease and if the county completes the new space before the 16 months and Byerly had another renter wanting to move in, the lease could be terminated early.

Option 2 is the current lease agreement and the county could lease the building on a month to month basis at 150% of the base lease cost plus expenses.

Both options require the county to bring the building back to its original condition at the termination of the lease and the county will work with Byerly and the new tenant on any modifications needed at the end of the lease.

Shutty tests positive for COVID-19

Mason County commissioner Kevin Shutty said he tested positive for COVID-19 before Tuesday’s commissioner meeting.

“Earlier today, I tested positive for COVID, so I’m going to be working from home for the remainder of this week and catching some of my meetings on Zoom,” Shutty said.