The Lincoln County Commission met Tuesday, May 7 in the Lincoln County Boardroom. With all five commissioners in the room once again, they heard agenda items including welcoming back Chairman Jim Jibben, annual reports and bid approval.
Commissioner Jim Schmidt opened the meeting with black hats for the commission to wear as an effort to support Chairman Jibben through his treatment.
“I want to thank you and it really feels good to be back, particularly to be back physically, as you know I’ve streamlines most of the meetings the last two months and to be here with fellow commissioners and others that are a part of Lincoln County government is a tremendous feeling. We do an admirable task, and we really do a lot for our counties and we sometimes need to be given a little pat on the back for what we do and we sometimes hear the other part of it more than the good part. I would like to thank all of you for doing maybe more than what you had to do in my absence, and I appreciate that and most of all I know I wouldn’t be here without the love and support of my family and my wife who made all the difference in the world. I am anxious to continue to serve, the stem cell transplant so far has been very successful and so I’m looking forward to moving on,” Jibben said.
Assistant Commission Administrative Officer, Paul Anderson along with the Assistant Director of Human Services from Minnehaha County, Lori Montis, gave an annual report on the work the two have done together over the year.
“I just wanted to take a few minutes this morning to kind of highlight some of the numbers to show what is happening with County welfare in Minnehaha and Lincoln Counties. In 2023 there were 2,592 applications for poor relief that our caseworkers dealt with. This was up from 1,800 applications in 2022,” Montis said.
The program is scheduled to provide services through September of 2025.
“Applications for Lincoln County residents were at 98 in 2023, that too was an increase from 2022 in which there were 62 applications. Lincoln County applications were approved for six funerals, seven rents and three utilities,” she said.
Airport Manager, David Meyers joined the meeting to give a report on all that is happening at the airport.
“As we move forward with the capital improvement plan at the airport, there’s been an opportunity for a Federal grant of close to $33 million that we’re going to apply to. I don’t know how much we’ll get, but we applied for that. The reason for this is because the development of the 20 acres that the county purchased a few years ago and that’s going to be for the development of future hangers, taxiways, and things like that. So trying to keep ahead of the game, we’re considering the South ramp in the next couple weeks the bids are coming in but we just want to keep the momentum going that the county has approved to do and this is just part of that. It’s a 90-day turn, so we applied already and we should know if we’re going to get any type of money for the expansion of the 20 acres in probably 90 days and as we move forward with the Senate Bill 144, that’s the money that has been appropriated through the State of South Dakota airports for terminals so hopefully we’ll get our hand in the cookie jar for that also,” he said.
Meyers also requested board action to approve payments to Helms & Associates in the amount of $118,733.94.
“This is just through the construction of the North ramp and so forth, the final touches of payments,” he said. All the expenses will be reimbursed through grants. Motion approved.
Highway Superintendent, Terry Fluit joined the meeting for board action to approve and award the 2024 crushed surface gravel bid.
“We had two bidders, Rechnagel Construction for $4.25 per ton and the second bid was from LG Everest and that was for $12 per ton. The Rechnagel one was at a pit just South of Fairview and LG was up at Rowena,” Fluit said.
Fluit recommended Rechnagel Construction be awarded the bid. Motion approved.
Comments