DeKalb County, Illinois
	Minutes of the Public Policy Committee February 26, 2001

The Public Policy Committee of the DeKalb County Board met on Monday, February 26, 2001 at 6:30p.m. in the Administration Building’s Conference Room East. Chairman Ruth Anne Tobias called the meeting to order. Members present were James Barr, Edward Brown, Eileen Dubin, Patricia LaVigne and Jeffrey Metzger. John Dlabal was absent. Others present were Ray Bockman and Greg Millburg.

Moved by Ms. LaVigne, seconded by Mr. Metzger, and it was voted unanimously to accept the minutes from the January 22, 2001 meeting.

Moved by Ms. Dubin, seconded by Mr. Barr, and it was voted unanimously that the agenda be approved.

Resolution in support of increased Medicaid reimbursements for nursing homes.

Chairman Tobias explained that there has been talk about reimbursement of Medicaid for county-owned nursing homes for a long time to be increased. It was part of our legislative package last fall that we sent to Springfield, she said. It is becoming more and more pressing and the Winnebago County Chairman has passed along a letter (on file in the county board office) asking for a resolution from each county board in support of the legislation. Ms. Dubin asked how are other nursing homes doing? Mr. Bockman said that the other county owned nursing homes, that he is familiar with, he thought that most of them were worse off than ours. He continued by stating that the residents in Winnebago County had a higher average of Medicaid residents, which is almost 100%. We have a better situation here because of the balance that we have with some private-pay and almost 70% of our residents are on Medicaid. He continued by stating that Metro Counties has established this item as one of their highest priorities. Moved by Mr. Barr, seconded by Mr. Metzger, and it was carried unanimously to recommend the support for increased Medicaid reimbursements for county-owned nursing homes and to forward it onto the full board for approval.

Chairman Tobias explained to the committee that a situation arose where some people were in an establishment after hours and it came to our attention. Therefore we are changing some of the language in the liquor ordinance to state "that will be unlawful for any person to enter or remain on the licensed premises, except the licensee, any employee of the licensee who is actually working and preparing to open or close the licensed premises and any law enforcement person present to enforce the provisions of this Article.". Moved by Ms. LaVigne, seconded by Mr. Barr, and it was carried unanimously to accept the recommended change to the Liquor Code and to forward it to the full board for approval.

Chairman Tobias then addressed the County Government Week during the month of April (4/22/01 - 4/28/01). She stated that she has contacted some of the libraries and will have information on display for that week on local county government. Mr. Metzger suggested that maybe we could do some visits at the local high schools where we could register people to vote or have different departments visit and explain what they do. Ms. Dubin said that we should also take the opportunity to educate all of the public as to what we do. Chairman Tobias said that we could do what we can for this year and focus on these other things for next year. She would like to emphasize the website and they could learn about DeKalb County from there. She also said that she would like to emphasize the G.I.S. technology that we have and possibly do demonstrations. Ms. Supple explained that in the Assessor’s office they do have school children from the junior high and have them observe the mapping department and that the County Clerk’s office has school children that come out to look at their elections department.

Ms. Tobias also told the committee that she will be doing an article in the MidWeek explaining county government to the public and hopefully other newspapers in the county. Mr. Millburg, from the Farm Bureau, informed the committee that every other year they work with the county employees and they conduct a government institute day. This year it is on March 5, 2001. They work with high school students that are in government classes and have various department heads, the county board chairman, the court services director, etc. speak to them about what they do. In the afternoon they bring them over to the courthouse to visit with Maureen Josh. The committee agreed to plan this over this next year so that they can get a good response from the public. Ms. Tobias said that we will be doing a proclamation in April at the County Board Meeting on this subject.

Chairman Tobias stated that there was a letter (on file in the county board office) to each county board member’s home from the Mental Health Association of Illinois. This letter was informing our board members that a group of legislators, mental health professionals and advocates have proposed a $48 million dollar increase in state spending on the mentally ill in Illinois for fiscal year 2002. This increase will provide more effective treatment and services for the mentally ill, and will reduce many of the problems associated with mental illness. This will, in turn, lead to reduced costs borne by counties in handling problems related to mental illness. They are asking us to support this legislation in a resolution form, Chairman Tobias continued. She said that they are also asking for individual letters from board members in support of this legislation. Moved by Mr. Metzger, seconded by Ms. Dubin, and it was carried unanimously to recommend the support resolution for the increase in state spending for the mentally ill and to forward it onto the full board for approval. The committee also said that they would like to have the statement encourage the board members to write individual letters to their local legislators in the resolution too.

Chairman Tobias stated that she would like to accomplish three goals over the next year. Those are: (1.) to begin the legislative agenda in the summer and deliver it to our legislators by November of this year; (2.) to have our meeting in the summer, held in another part of the county, in particular, the City of Sandwich; and (3.) to communicate and inform the public more on our website through a public policy page. Mr. Metzger will work with Chairman Tobias as to where to hold the meeting in Sandwich.

It was agreed by the committee to include on the agenda a public comment section and to place it on the agenda right after roll call.

Moved by Mr. Brown, seconded by Mr. Barr, and it was carried unanimously to adjourn the meeting.

Respectively submitted,

______________________________
Chairman Ruth Anne Tobias

______________________________
Mary C. Supple, Secretary

  | Home | Return to top | A-Z Index | Return to minutes |