Hill County finalizing credit card policies

Hill County officials met Wednesday to discuss a number of internal issues at the county including spending limits for department credit cards, the use of American Rescue Plan Act funds and updates on department activities.

Hill County Commissioner Diane McLean said departments have submitted requests for how high they think the spending limits on their department credit cards need to be.

Hill County Commissioner Mark Peterson said he questions whether many need to be as high as they are.

Department heads for several years had asked that their departments be issued cards they could use on expenses instead of paying out-of-pocket and asking for reimbursement, especially for out-of-town travel.

The commissioners agreed in April to get one card for the county under the management of Hill County Auditor Kathy Olson, with the intention to eventually approve more.

Since then the commission has been setting up policies for more cards for each department.

Departments requested limits between $600 and $5,000 and Peterson said unless some of these requests are lowered the county will likely have to negotiate some terms with Independence Bank, so he asked that some departments lower their requests.

Hill County Auditor Kathy Olson said the county will also have a card with $50,000 on it connected to the general fund which can be used as well.

Mosquito District Supervisor and Weed District Coordinator Terry Turner, who requested $5,000 for both the departments he oversees, said it is very possible that he may not ever use the $5,000, but he’d like to have that ability, especially with costs going up.

“I’ve had up to 1,600 sitting on my credit card, and I don’t need that. My wife can come tell ya that,” he said.

McLean said her intention is to see the number approved so they can get departments their credit cards as soon as possible, since it’s clearly no longer viable to have employees make emergency purchases personally any more.

The group also discussed a request by Hill County Building Manager Joe Smith about the county’s problematically large surplus of paper.

McLean said Smith, who couldn’t be there due to an emergency, is getting increasingly irritated by the ever-growing stockpile of paper at the county, which is quickly becoming a storage issue he wants addressed.

Peterson said more and more work at the county is done digitally, but people are still ordering the same amount of paper as always out of habit, leading to this issue and he’d like to put a moratorium on purchasing paper until the stockpile is reduced to a more manageable level.

After some discussion and argument over the logistics of such a thing, Montana State University Hill County Extension Agent Kati Purkett said they should just set up a list where people record how much paper is taken from the stockpile to track how its being used.

“This shouldn’t be difficult,” Purkett said.

McLean said there have been some issues before with some objecting to departments using paper purchased by other departments, but at this point she thinks they need to put that aside and deal with the issue at hand.

County officials also heard an update from Hill County Attorney Lacey Lincoln about updates to their procedures for posting for jobs.

Lincoln said progress on the new policy is being made and asked that department give feedback on the policy.

Turner said he did have a concern about how the change would affect the application process for seasonal workers, who tend to leap at the first good opportunity for work, and aren’t always inclined to wait for a long hiring process.

Lincoln said conversations about that issue are going on and the solution might be as simple as posting the jobs earlier to get the process going quicker, but they can always meet and discuss the issue in more detail.

As for county activities, Peterson said work on the RSID 21 Lift Station is out to bid and construction will begin in fall, assuming they can get the parts in time.

He said the RSID 29 and 30 Lift Station should be going out to bid soon as well.

He also said the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers should be coming in September to inspect the Milk River Levee, but that is a tentative date.

McLean said the commission is also working on American Recovery Plan Act funding and getting final plans nailed down by September.

As for ARPA-funded projects, McLean said progress is being made on the Hill County Courthouse’s new HVAC system and they are hoping to get a final price for the project soon.

She also said they’ve received three applications for the position of Hill County Council on Aging director, and are hoping for more.

McLean also encouraged people to go to the open house at the Camp Kiwanis Beaver Lodge for an open house on Labor Day weekend about the state of the structure and its needs.

On this year’s general election ballot there will be a question about a levy to pay for the building’s replacement and McLean encouraged people to go and hear about the issue.

Turner said his department is working on finishing up eliminating phragmites in the county, and he’ll soon be going to Blaine County to help with theirs.

As for mosquitoes, he said numbers in Hill County are pretty low but Broadwater County recently got a case of equine encephalitis, which is pretty concerning.

Purkett said her department is currently fielding a lot of calls about the drought and its effects, and is doing nitrate tests around the county.

She said they’ve also gotten questions about flea beetles, which have become much more common in the area since the grasshoppers, one of their food sources, moved in.

She said they are also in the process of setting up community education classes in October.