Tulare County supervisors will recommend consolidating office space used by county agencies and seek alternative funding if they want to try to preserve short-term rail lines and improved traffic markers around a rural school. These are some of the responses they have to recommendations made by the Tulare County Grand Jury in a series of reports issued earlier this year.
On Tuesday, the board is expected to approve formal responses to some of the Grand Jury's reports on the following topics:
ª The Tulare County Association of Government's proposal to use $3 million in money raised through the Measure R sales tax to preserve the East Side Rail Line.
ª A review of the county Resource Management Agency's practices.
ª The safety of roadways and intersections near rural schools in the county.
ª Possible financial waste by the county leasing office and storage space.
ª A look at Tulare County jails and detention facilities.
The Grand Jury reviews the activities of county and city agencies, along with special districts, based on suggestions or requests for investigations from the public. Its members — all volunteers — also can initiate the reviews.
Those agencies reviewed can formally respond to the findings and recommendations of the Grand Jury. Here are some of the county's responses:
ª The Grand Jury suggested that some high-yield crops raised by county jail inmates be traded for other high-yield crops raised by jail farming programs in other counties. County officials said that they haven't found similar programs with which to trade. Still, the supervisors say they'll review the matter.
ª Tulare County should negotiate more favorable leases on office space and consolidate agencies to use less office space and reduce costs.
The county already negotiates lease prices based on the median price for comparable properties, the supervisors respond.
In addition, they state that they have a long-term goal to consolidate and they've set guidelines that agencies receiving county general fund money should be in county-owned buildings.
If a decision is made to preserve short-rail lines, the Tulare County Association of Governments and its members agencies should obtain funding other than Measure R dollars to purchase and repair those lines, the Grand Jury suggested.
Representatives from the county and TCAG are working with the San Joaquin Valley Air Pollution Control District, rail companies, shippers, and federal and state government agencies to seek such funding, the supervisors respond.
ª The supervisors will not follow the Grand Jury's recommendation to separate the county's code compliance division from its zoning and building inspection division.
"The RMA [Resource Management Agency] maintains and continues to recommend that a separate code compliance division is not practical due to current economic conditions," according to the board's response.
Board members also will not follow the Grand Jury's suggestion to form an independent task force with the county chief administrative officer to monitor RMA's performance. A task force isn't warranted, they say, because RMA's director provides regular updates on his department's performance.
ª School crossings where "SLOW SCHOOL CROSSING" painted on the pavement and crosswalk lines are fading and hard to see by drivers will be repainted within the next six months.
RMA also will review unmarked crossings to see if pavement markers should be added and check around rural schools to determine if school pedestrian signs are missing.
http://www.visaliatimesdelta.com/article/20110912/NEWS01/109120304
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