At their Monday meeting, the Wright County Board of Supervisors discussed filing an application to move from the Mental Health County Social Services (CSS) Region to the Central Iowa Community Services (CICS) Region. The state mandates that counties be part of these regions to manage mental health tax levies for the counties. Supervisor Karl Helgevold, who sits on the board of the CSS region, explained that Wright County and other surrounding counties might soon be cut off from the more eastern counties in the region as Cerro Gordo County is seeking to leave the region. Cerro Gordo is trying to join the CICS region to the south.
In the end, the board passed a motion to apply to that region as well, contingent upon if Cerro Gordo is accepted into it. Jen Sheehan, Director of Wright County Social Services, explained that changing regions would not lead to patients having to change providers or changes in services. She added that they are just trying to be proactive and transparent as changes may be required in the future.
A conference call was held with Franklin County regarding work on Joint Drainage District #118-4. They discuss the finding of Engineer Lee Gallentine who reported that part of the open ditch has silted in a half-foot to foot from the elevations when the project was first discussed. The boards authorized Gallentine to do an investigation as to what the cost of clean-up will be.
The board appointed Doug Struyk and Nick Mauro as legal counsel for a lawsuit that has gone to litigation involving drainage district #125-49-1 in Pleasant Township. The board as drainage trustees and the drainage clerk are named in the lawsuit against Cramer-Mennenga. The lawsuit regards work done to two blowouts where work was completed beyond what the board approved with Cramer-Mennenga seeking more compensation than they have received.
Sandy McGrath gave an update from the Emergency Operations Center on COVID-19 in Wright County. She said that they have been pretty busy with cases and contact tracing since there has been 43 new positive cases in the county since the beginning of September. She noted that about a third of those are from one large family group. The positivity rate for the county’s testing is 8.7% as of the beginning of the week with 563 total cases.
In other business, the board:
-Approved the continued agreement with the City of Dows for the provision of law enforcement services through the next year.
-Moved the administration of Planning & Zoning to the Secondary Roads department, with Jeremy Abbas taking over that position from Sandy McGrath.
-Approved the submittal of a grant application for replacing the bridge on C-70 west of Woolstock. Engineer Adam Clemons noted that the amount requested was $2.3 million. Without the grant, he added that the project won’t be able to be completed for a long time.
-Signed an agreement with Iowa DOT for a detour during the Hwy 69 bridge construction north of Belmond that will be taking place next year.
