Commissioners have active committee schedules

YORK COUNTY – Each of the York County Commissioners sits on several committees/boards separate from the county board itself.

​Each represents the county board in different sectors of the community and the state.
This week’s committee reports reflected a very busy season of activity.
York County Commissioner Joe Burgess sits on the Blue Valley Community Action Board. He said that group met, taking the time to review their audit.
“Another interesting aspect is 88.5% of their finances go directly to client services which you don’t always see with other such organizations,” Burgess said, also noting the entity’s Head Start program which has individualized education assistance for kids who might need it.
Burgess also noted he and Commissioner Daniel Grotz met with the director of the Southeast Nebraska Development District, as Burgess will now be representing York County on the SENDD and Grotz will be stepping away from that membership.
Commissioner Andy Bowman had a busy couple of weeks, as all the others did, noting he fielded a few calls regarding road conditions, he attended the most recent meeting of the county’s planning/zoning board and he visited pheasant-growing facilities in the rural area of the county which have prompted some residents to ask zoning questions.
Bowman, along with Commissioner LeRoy Ott, attended the most recent meeting of the county’s veterans service board, noting the county’s service officer, Nick Wollenburg, is currently on active duty. “But it will be only 30 days, the services will be covered, there won’t be any shortage of services.”
Commissioner Ott added how several members of the veterans committee have agreed to keep serving – Commissioner Randy Obermier suggested those reappointments be brought before the county board as they are required to appoint those seats.
Ott said he sat in on several interviews with people who have applied for positions within the county’s new diversion programs.
“I also visited APACE, here in town, as well as with Lori (Byers, director of aging and transportation services),” Ott said. “I also had a meeting with Laura at Four Corners Health Department,” saying there is currently proposed legislation which would cut 42% of the health department’s budget if it were to become law.”
Commissioner Grotz attended a York County Development Corporation board meeting and noted the annual membership meeting is quickly approaching.
“Randy (Obermier) and I met with Davis Design about the plan for the installation of the jail sprinkler system,” Grotz said, “and Harvey (Keim, county highway superintendent) looked at some right-of-way issues. I also attended the meeting of the planning/zoning commission.”
Commissioner Obermier said he attended a meeting of the Four Corners Health Department board and encouraged the commissioners to contact McDougall to arrange a walk-through of the Four Corners offices to see the progress of the renovation project there.
He also explained how the general assistance work has been done by a person in the district court clerk’s office for a number of years, “but the office has down-sized by one and it is a busy office, plus the person in that office who is doing it now no longer wants to. So I’d like to have this on the next agenda, to have maybe more of a contract-type of arrangement with someone to do this work. You never know when someone will apply for general assistance, we sometimes go long periods of time without anyone making an application but then earlier this year we saw more applications for funds for cremations. I just want us to look at this further.”
He reiterated what Grotz said about them having a meeting with Davis Design, noting they did a walk-through of the jail and talked about how this project will take place.