Palo Pinto commissioners OK budgeted staff additions
Dec. 28—PALO PINTO — County commissioners dipped into budget reserves on Tuesday to allow the county clerk and tax assessor/collector offices to take on personnel in their stretched offices.
"I need help," Tax Assessor/Collector Stacy Choate told the court, minutes after County Clerk Janette Green made the same declaration.
Choate moved her auto vehicle registration function from Palo Pinto to the new annex in September. It's been a popular move, she said.
"We are now back to where we're running three (auto registrars) there," Choate said, asking the court to fill a fourth position budgeted last summer in anticipation of the move east. "We just have more volume."
The new offices are not the only reason the officials sought to fill the budgeted slots. Green she has one clerk out on maternity leave, while Choate said one of hers will go out under that Family Medical Leave Act in March.
Green has two employees each in the Palo Pinto Courthouse and the annex. Choate said adding a staff member in Mineral Wells would give her four registrars there. She added that five would be a full staff.
Choate also said she is cross-training all her employees, which takes about a year.
Precinct 4 Commissioner Jeff Fry drew laughs from the gallery in between the two unanimous votes.
"I feel like the court's being ganged up on," he said.
Commissioners in Tuesday's end-of-the-year session also
—Thanked outgoing Treasurer Tanya Fallin and Precinct 3 Constable Mike Santifer, whose terms expire at the new year.
—Agreed to advertise for administrative and engineering services for an infrastructure upgrade for the Lake Palo Pinto Area Water Supply Corp.
The utility, which serves around Lone Camp and south of Lake Palo Pinto, is seeking a federal grant to lay bigger pipelines and buy a storage tank.
Chase Lerma, the water utility's general manager, previously won the court's OK to use the county's standing in seeking a federal Community Development Block Grant to fund the work. CDBG grants typically are issued to governments for large infrastructure projects in underfunded neighborhoods.
But commissioners agreed last fall to let the utility use the county's standing to qualify for the grant.
The funding has yet to be secured, and the engineering and administrative work are necessary for the application.
Lerma previously provided a loose estimate of up to $230,000. In lending its name to the application, the county does not take on any debt if the grant is awarded.
—Named Alan Sparkman to the Regional Aging Advisory Committee, a panel within the North Central Texas Council of Governments;
—Agreed to have a small, county owned tract next to the courthouse to be surveyed for sale. Commissioners decided to sell the former home to a now-closed cafe late last summer.
On Tuesday, Precinct 1 Commissioner Gary Glover said he and Precinct 3 Commissioner Mike Pierce had met with a architects who requested the survey be performed.
—Took no action on a burn ban, which remains lifted. Outdoor burning in unincorporated parts of the county is allowed.
The Texas Water Development Board's Water Weekly bulletin for last week listed the northern halves of Palo Pinto and Parker counties in moderate drought. The counties' southern halves were listed as abnormally dry, the lowest intensity on the drought map.
