Nikole Babb
nbabb@cherryroad.com
At the Butler County Commission meeting on Tuesday, January 14, the Commissioners approved the purchase of an asphalt paver for the Public Works department that totaled over $500,000. They also approved County Clerk Tatum Stafford to change voting hours to match the rest of the state and voted in the new Commission Chair/Co-Chair.
As the new year began the Butler County Commissioners voted in a new Chair and Vice-Chair. Darren Jackson was voted to be Chair and Marc Murphy to be Vice-Chair. Tatum Stafford asked approval from the Commission to enact new voting hours for the county, changing the times from 6am-7pm to 7am-7pm. Butler County was the only county in Kansas with a 6am voting start time, which is allowed by Kansas Statute 25-106.
Stafford indicated to the Commission that she’s had a hard time finding poll workers due to the low pay rate and early start time with poll workers needing to report an hour or more before polls open to get machines and other materials ready for voters. Moving up the voting start time allows Butler County to have the same voting hours as all counties surrounding with minimal confusion. She also later came back to the meeting to let commissioners know there wasn’t a high number of voters coming to the polls before 7am anyway. The request was approved and takes effect immediately for a special election in May.
Instead of contracting with APAC to pave roads, the intent of Director of Public Works/County Engineer Curtis Mader is to train county staff to pave Butler County roads themselves in order to save money. That’s the reasoning he says is behind purchasing a road paver at the price of $599,666 from CAT. Mader stated that right now, to rent the machine and hire two personnel from APAC to pave 16 miles of road costs $112,000 for a 40-day job.
The purchase will require the Public Works Department to hire a roller employee who has the best skill set and train a group of employees on road paving, which Mader says he already has a group for. If the machine and group of employees can’t keep up with the work or Mader cannot sustain a crew to do the work, the machinery is able to be resold according to Butler County Administrator Will Johnson. Johnson says the machine has a high resell value, with the resell value in the green six years after initial purchase. The purchase was approved with Commissioner Kelly Herzet opposing the motion.
Lastly the Commission discussed hiring a firm to conduct a compensation study for the Butler County government. The idea stems from struggling to keep employees in certain areas of employment throughout county positions. To conduct the study could cost the county $60,000. The last study the county had done was in 2017, which they said they wanted to do every 10 years. This study would be implemented in 2026, just one year short of 10 years. The study would look at benefits, compensation, retainment, and restructuring job classifications while comparing Butler County to surrounding companies.
Commissioner Jeff Masterson opposed the study, stating it would be a waste of money. He indicated that if Johnson knew where the struggles to maintain personnel were, then he should give that area better compensation or allow employees to graduate into better jobs so the entry-level jobs can be filled by entry-level workers. The Commission approved to release a Request for Proposal for a compensation study with Masterson opposing.
