The Hancock-Henderson Quill, Inc.
Hancock County renewed insurance for employees with Mutual Medical Insurance.
At the regular board meeting Tuesday, October. 21, the board discussed the possibility that each employee’s cost of insurance would raise from $60 to $80 per month to cover an increase in the cost.
“The premium that the county pays per employee is $946. We are asking the employee to pay $80, which is about 8.5 percent of that premium,” said Wayne Bollin, chairman of the Finance Committee. “Our insurance cost will raise 5 to 6 percent. We have about 94 employees on the insurance. We are asking the employees to pay a part of that increase with the county paying the rest.”
Keith Krohe from Mutual Medical explained: “The fund continues to have a good balance, but with inflationary pressures we are seeing in medical costs, the plan doesn’t want to get behind the 8-ball and have to increase by 10 to 15 percent down the road.”
Bollin said the board will vote on question of increasing the employee insurance payment at the November meeting, since it deals with details in the contracts with Sheriff’s Office and EMS employees.
The county received two bids for property and casualty insurance that covers the county buildings, liability and Workman’s compensation. The board approved the bid from Bliss McKnight as the specialized insurance provider at $340,789.
At the beginning of the meeting, Julie Weber addressed the board, thanking them for listening and acting on concerns she and her neighbors had about dogs running loose.
Building permits were approved for three solar projects, Highway 94 Sun, Highway 96 Sun, and CR900 Sun.
A motion was approved to retain Jeff Dedey as a part time information technology coordinator, at a salary of $40,000.
The board discussed audio taping the regular, public board meetings, which has been done since around 2020, a time of limited access to meetings due to the Covid pandemic. It is not a requirement to record open meetings, only closed session meetings.
Board president Mark Menn said, “We could not find anything in the records giving an indicating we are required to audio tape meetings.”
It is up to the board to decide if they want to continue, Menn said, or whether they want to simply stop recording, as a matter of procedure.
“We have always had minutes that are made public,” Menn said. “The meetings are open to the public, and anyone can tape the meetings if they want.”
The board approved deeds for the sale of 16 properties, sold in a sealed bid auction by the Hancock County Taxing District trustee.
Richard Zollinger was appointed as a temporary trustee for the Hunt-Lima Drainage and Levee District.