Logan County Board Building and Grounds Committee discusses HVAC hiccups, phones and hears an update on the courthouse restoration

 

[February 13, 2025] 

On Monday, February 10th, the Building and Grounds Committee of the Logan County Board met for their monthly meeting. This meeting, which began at 5:30 p.m., was held in the Blue Room at the Logan County Safety Complex. Like with the other committees, one additional member was added from January to February, bringing the total number of board members on this committee from four to five.

The idea behind this was to increase the likelihood that the board would be able to achieve a quorum, the minimum number of members that must be present for official business to be conducted. On a committee of four, the quorum is three, but the quorum is also three on a committee of five. All five committee members were present for this meeting, which includes Chairman Dale Nelson, Vice Chairman Gil Turner, Hannah Fitzpatrick, Jim Wessbecher, and newest member Lance Conahan.

The committee began with old business, the first item of which was deciding whether or not to purchase new phones for the Logan County Courthouse. Last month, the committee discussed this under new business and came to the conclusion that each department could purchase new phones, if they so choose, out of their own budgets. The county had not budgeted for the cost of these phones ($16,175), nor had they heard anyone asking for new phones. The committee’s opinion had not changed going into February, and they ultimately decided to remove this item from old business.

The next item on old business was the use of grounds request for Logan County Pride Fest, to be held on June 7th this year. Last month, the board discussed that any group hosting a large event like this was going to need to start submitting proof of insurance before the board will allow them to hold the event. As of this month, no proof of insurance had been submitted for this event. The committee discussed this a bit further, stating that, in the past, groups had told the board they did have liability insurance when they actually did not. Nelson stated that he would reach out to this group and make sure they were aware that they had to have their proof of insurance submitted to the board.

It was further discussed that no vendors would be allowed to set up on the lawn of the courthouse. Wessbecher stated that it has never been done before, and if one group is allowed to, everyone will want to. The vendors can instead set up along the streets of the Square. Nelson stated that he would make sure the group was aware of this as well.

The committee then moved on to new business, starting with an update on the courthouse restoration. The heating issue that was discussed in the January meeting has been fully addressed, according to Chris Wilson, an employee of the courthouse who was in attendance at the meeting. Conahan then stated that he was in Kim Turner’s office this last week and it was cold. Wilson stated that a reason for this could either be a fault with the thermostat (which is run via Bluetooth), or her space heater could be too close to the thermostat. Conahan asked if Wilson could follow up with her this week, to which he stated he could.

The committee talked about the lights at the courthouse, and how they tend to turn on randomly. Wilson also attributed this to Bluetooth being used for the lights. It was also mentioned that Judge Workman’s courtroom renovation is going to begin this week.

The committee also mentioned moving people’s offices in the courthouse around, with it being decided that some people will have their offices moved either upstairs or downstairs. The public defender is going to have an office downstairs, the representative of Sojourn Outreach will be moved to the third floor, and Kati Newman will be moved to the first floor.

[Matt Boutcher]