Board Information

Agenda

Board of Commissioners:  Frank Cardis, Denice Carpenter, Charles Freshour, Ben Gerrald, and Tim Hanke.

October 7, 2025

CALL TO ORDER

MINUTES  

TREASURER’S REPORT: As of 9/30/2025             Checkbook Balance - $ 123,318.38

CHIEF’S REPORT:

Motion to approve all reports

Old or Unfinished Business:       New Station  

                                                       Laura’s Back-up                 

                                                   Hydrotest SCBA bottles

New Business:                          Computer & Software

 SALEM FIRE DISTRICT COMMISSIONERS’ MEETING

September 2, 2025

Commissioners Present: Frank Cardis, Denice Carpenter, Ben Gerrald, and Tim Hanke.

Frank called the meeting to order at 7:00 pm. Frank stated that all Commissioners were present except for Charles Freshour.  He also stated that the minutes for the previous meeting had been distributed for review. Ben made a motion to waive the reading of the minutes. Denice was 2nd. Motion passed.

Treasurer’s Report – Tim stated that all monies in all accounts is $1,117,760.29 . He stated that we still have about $190,000 coming from dues, and $10-12,000 coming from miscellaneous. He said that will bring us to about $1.3 million minus any expenses.

Chief’s Report – Gil stated that we had 24 firefighters on the roster, and 1 in training. We had 78 man hours of training. Last month we had 76 runs. We are over halfway done with the SCBA hydrotesting.  Ben asked if that would be billed upon completion. Gil said yes.

Denice made a motion to approve all reports. Ben was 2nd. Motion passed.

Old Business – New Station – Ben said that he got in touch with Nick Walker. Ben stated that he had some concerns over Mr. Walker’s previous emails. Ben asked Mr. Walker if he would include MEP drawings, because it looked like there was an exclusion based on the wording of the email. Mr. Walker said that he can not do that; you have to have engineered drawings for mechanical, electrical, and plumbing. He said that he can’t even give us a ballpark figure to get those done. Mr. Walker usually works in tandem with Mr. Grisham to do that. Ben said that he doesn’t think that the drawings that Mr. Walker is offering will be any different than Amanda’s. Ben thought that what he would provide would be something that we could solicit bids off of, and it does not look like that is going to be the case. Ben said that he feels like that puts us back in that $160,000 ballpark again in order to get what we need to move forward, to get a good set of drawings that we can get bids from. Ben said that he can pursue this more with Mr. Walker, but he was not even willing to get us a ballpark figure, because Rip usually works off of what he does, and maybe they do negotiated bids with his. Gil asked Ben if they (electricians) have to get approval for their electrical drawings through the state. Ben said that on a typical commercial job, they have already been stamped. Gil asked if they (electrical company) get a commercial job with someone, do they have to do the drawing and get it approved. Ben said that they don’t; there is an electrical engineer who does the drawings, and they are stamped when they get them. Gil said that plumbers do and they have to take it to the state for approval. Ben asked if Gil actually did the drawings. Gil said that he did. Ben said that comes to them already drawn and stamped, and ready to go. Ben added that he doesn’t know about mechanical and plumbing, because even though they may reference them, that is not his area. Gil said that HVAC is like the plumbing, so he assumed electrical was the same. Ben asked, if we pursue that process, how do we go about getting those drawn up to submit to the state for approval, so we can solicit bids from other contractors. Gil said that you would have to hire a plumber first, and then they would draw up the plans. Gil said that he wouldn’t do the drawings until he was hired. He said that he has done a dozen in Benton in recent years. Ben said that is what Amanda was going to do for us; she was going to put it out to a mechanical engineer and an electrical engineer, and have those plans drawn up. Gil said that only plumbing has to be approved in the county; not electrical or HVAC. Ben agreed that you don’t have to get electrical inspections in the county, but you have to have something to put out to bid. When you put it out to the GCs, you have to have something, a standard to hold them to, so we are getting apples to apples bids. You can’t just give them a floor plan, and expect them to figure it out. Different contractors, different subs, may have different ideas than we do. Gil said that when he did Lake Norrell, that’s exactly what they did. He knew that he was going to do the plumbing, and had to get it approved. The building was engineered stamped. Gil said that he hired Ben to do the electrical, and they hired someone from Lake Norrell to do the HVAC. Ben said that they didn’t have HVAC in their first phase. Tim mentioned that we had an insurance expert in attendance, and asked him to introduce himself. The guest said that his name is Eugene Phillips with Grace Lee Insurance. Tim asked him, with the situation of property in the county that did not require an inspection, and they have insured it, what is the process if something does go wrong. Eugene said that each carrier will respond in a unique way. Generally, there is a 5 year statute of limitations for a construction defect. If something happens in the first 5 years, according to his understanding of Arkansas law, they can come back to the contractor. Each scenario can be different. Frank said with respect to putting that out to bid, he said it would be difficult to get bids without specifications that are clearly defined, when you are asking for submissions with very specific drawings vs. without those specific drawings. He stated that his concern is that you would not know what you are going to get, if we don’t have some specs that we would submit to different general contractors to get bids. Tim asked Stewart for his input. Stewart said that we can take the plans we have and build something, but what we end up with, who knows. He said that his expertise is bridges. You can do a bridge layout, showing the bridge in its natural setting, which is basically a floor plan. However, you don’t have any specific details about how things should be done; it’s open to interpretation. Ben said that the pre-engineered steel shell should be fairly clearcut, as far as getting the structure up, but it would still be up to us to spec the slab and the steel. Stewart agreed that you would have to have slab drawings, foundation drawings, etc. Gil said that all comes with an engineered building; they tell you how to lay the slab out. Gil said he has put up enough of them to know. Stewart said that the ones that he has dealt with show a slab, but not all of the slab details. He said that the complete, engineered contract drawings are needed. You need to have a set of plans that show where your light fixtures go, your outlets; you need wall details, how they are going to be laid out, as well as insulation. You need wall detail for the fireproof walls. Ben said that he has dealt with egress corridors recently that have that fire rating.  Stewart said that there’s new compliance regulations all of the time. Ben asked Frank, as a lawyer, about the law we learned about requiring anything over $50,000 requiring an architect, was it an architect’s supervision or architect’s advice, or how involved do they have to be in the process. Stewart said the word might simply be oversight. Frank checked his notes. Ben said we need to know if the architect involvement that we have had so far satisfies that requirement, or do we need to have the oversight of an architect’s involvement throughout the process. Frank said it mentions that there is a floor of $100,000, which we will be well above that. He does believe that we have to have an architect sign off on it. Even if we have Nick do the work, it will require an architect to sign off on it to approve his plans. Ben said that if we talked to these other architects about drawing up what Nick is talking about doing, without the MEP drawings, and without any supervision throughout the project, he believes it would be far less than the $160,000. Frank said that it states that, “If we have a political subdivision of the state, it indicates that they shall not engage in the capital improvement of the public works involving engineering or architecture, in which the plans and specifications have not been made by, the capital improvement executed under the observation of a professional engineer or architect in their respective areas of expertise.” Frank said that based on this, we would definitely have to have those folks involved in it. Ben said that in each area of expertise, we have the architect observing their area, and then we have 3 different engineers covering their area in the MEPs. Frank said that it doesn’t specify which type of engineers, but professional engineers. He agrees that engineers have specialties. Ben said that Nick’s proposal does not include any civil drawings, so that is another thing we will need to consider. Denice said that she sent the other board members all of his emails so they could see everything he sent. Ben said that he had read the email previously, but had not noticed that particular statement. When he read it again before talking to Nick, the wording was such that it seemed to exclude those things, and he wanted to clarify it with Nick when he talked to him.  Ben said that with Amanda, and the other architects, that 6% was going to include all of that: contract drawings, a working set of drawings, civil drawings, MEP, etc.; something we could give to contractors and expect to get a good bid on what this will cost us. Frank asked if there were any motions based on this information. He said that he has some questions about whether Mr. Walker’s plans would be sufficient, not so much for building the building, but for putting it out for public bid as a political subdivision. Ben asked if it’s the board’s desire to do like Gil suggested, and hire an HVAC contractor who will come up with a set of HVAC plans for us and get them stamped, and do the same thing with a plumber. Or do we want to take this to an architect and let them do that with the respective engineers. Denice asked what we are looking at cost wise; is that possibly a cheaper route. Ben said that he doesn’t know. Laura said that Gil said that he wouldn’t do it unless you hired him to be the plumber on the project; what’s to say that the other contractors wouldn’t be the same. Then you are not putting it out to bid, you are just selecting someone. Denice said that she thinks he would still submit a bid after getting notice of the job. Gil said that it would be a conflict of interest for him to be any part of this. Ben said that we are not talking about him specifically, but any plumber. Denice said that when there is a commercial job, they will send out a packet, and ask contractors to give a bid on the project. They would send it out to maybe 3 other plumbers, and they would all give a bid on it, then it will be at our discretion. Gil said that you can require that they submit stamped engineered plans. Ben asked who we are requiring to do that. Gil said the plumber, the HVAC guy, the electrician. You can require them to do it; that’s what he did. Ben asked if that was part of the bid process. Gil said yes; if they want the job, they will have to get the state approved plumbing.  Gil said that it would probably take him 12 hours to draw out that building. Gil said that the Board hasn’t even talked about the septic system yet; they at least need to figure out where it is going to go before the plumber can come in and say they are going to plumb it a certain way. Nobody does it the same; everybody is different. There are so many variations in the code. He said it is probably the same way with electrical. Ben said that set of prints he is given tells him how he is going to do it; there’s not a lot of leeway there between the code and the prints. Gil said that he lays it out the way he wants, and as long as it follows code, they will approve it. Gil said that he has had to sit in there with him to answer questions for a couple of hours. Frank said that if we are getting a bunch of subs to submit bids, and make it a requirement that the bid that they submit they agree to draw plans, are we becoming the general contractor at that point? If we are putting it out for bid for a general contractor to take care of, then we have a “cart and horse” kind of issue. We could hire a bunch of subs to draw up plans for a general contractor that doesn’t work with those subs.  Stewart said that the plans that we need to give to a contractor need to say, for example, there’s a toilet here, etc. A major commercial building is going to show you where a pipe goes, exactly what type of fitting to use, etc. The drawings that you go to contract with need to say that you have a shower here, and that shower is going to be this big; do we want fiberglass or tile. Then you take all of your bids once they come in. Stewart said that he thinks we are getting confused on plumbing layout, whether you bring this area of flow into this area, then carry your trunkline out. Same thing with electrical; everyone should be pretty close on electrical, unless you put your meter box somewhere obscure. The plans need to have some specifics, like paint vs. paneling, fixtures, etc. That stuff comes in when the contractors draw it out. If you don’t have specifics, they won’t provide the same things. Gil said that if you have a good general contractor, that won’t happen. The general contractor will come to us and ask what we want and where. Stewart said that if you put your electrical outlets on it, and put your light layout on it, then we are answering those questions up front. Then you have a bid package that someone can actually bid on. Tim asked if we have an actual contract with Nick Walker. Ben said that we do not yet, because he wanted the Board to figure out what they wanted to do before proceeding. Frank said that we previously made a motion to hire him at $1-$2 a square foot for a complete set of drawings so we could solicit bids from contractors. If he is not offering that for $1-$2 per square foot, then he doesn’t believe the motion made last month would authorize us to proceed.  Gil said that you have 2 options: you can spend the $200,000 and pay Polk, Stanley, Wilcox or whoever and get the complete set of drawings, or you can hire a general contractor that will come in and work with this fire department, with the set of plans that Mr. Walker gives you, and he gets the subs and gets with the building committee, and gets things laid out like they want. Gil said that is your 2 options. You can either spend $200,000, or you can get somebody to work with you. Gil said that it doesn’t matter to him. He added that he has been on the side where he was the general, and he worked hand in hand with the building committee; the last one was Lake Norrell. He said they built that building for $350,000 ten years ago. Ben asked if we can put this out to bid to at least 3 different contractors and get comparable pricing without having any drawings specifying what we are looking for. Frank said that we would need some specifics, so you have at least square footage, etc. Denice asked if what Nick plans to submit would provide that. Ben said that he doesn’t know how much more detailed his drawings are going to be than what we have already gotten from Amanda. Ben said that he presumes that he would have architectural and structural drawings, but he doesn’t know. Ben said that you normally have the architectural, structural, civil, MEPs, etc. Gil said that if we are using a metal, pre-fab building, that will come from them. Ben said that is just for the shell; that won’t include any build-out inside. You are going to have to have something for that, to specify wall cross sections, elevations, etc. Frank said that he would imagine that the rating for and amount of concrete would be different for a firetruck than it would be in a service station. He said that he doesn’t know if that would be included in what Mr. Walker would do, or not, but we need to find out. Denice said that she tried to pull up the examples that he sent. Tim said that he would hate to pay for something that we have already paid Amanda for, and we have let her go. Denice said that Amanda was way above the other firms we were looking at. Ben said that he thinks they were all in the 6.5% ballpark. Denice said that there was the one company that had the general contractor, and they could do all of it. Ben said that we would be getting into a situation where he doesn’t want to draw the plans, if they are not going to be guaranteed to get the work. We have to be able, per our purchasing agreement, to put this out for quote, and make sure we are getting apples to apples bids on it. Frank asked for any motions. Ben said that he would like to follow up with Mr. Walker a little more, find out what specific drawings he would be providing for that price. If it is a full set of architectural, including structural, elevation, cross-sections, etc., we still may come out ahead that way, as opposed to buying the entire package from one of the other architects. Ben said that he wants to pursue that with him, and he will keep the others updated on what he finds out. Frank asked if we could invite him to attend the October meeting. Gil and Denice did not think he would come from that far away. Denice suggested Zoom, as another option. Laura asked about the previous discussion of what kind of payment we can afford to do.  Frank said that we need to find out what the project amount is to get to that discussion, but it is still very much a consideration whether we can afford the building that we can get bids on. We don’t know if we can afford it until we get bids, and we don’t know what the bids are until we have some drawings to solicit the bids. Stewart asked what interest rates were. Tim said 6-7%. Ben asked Denice about the 5.5% for 20 years she used. Denice said that is what Barbara gave us when they were here, to get some general numbers at that time. Tim asked if we should go ahead and do the perc test, as a step forward. Gil said that you can get the perc test done right now, because that is the set of plans/drawings that we are going to use. We can hire a D.R., and he can lay it out and tell you what you need, where. Tim asked if that will tell us where the septic system should go. Gil said that is good for 1 year, but you can get it extended to 2 years. He said it is usually less than $1,000. Ben said with 10,000 square feet…Gil said 9,999…Ben asked if the 10,000 square foot applies to the entire envelope of building, or only the finished part. Gil said that applies to the entire building. If you hit 10,000, you have to sprinkle the entire building. Ben asked what the cost per square foot would be. Gil said that he did not know. Gil said that he went to one class, and is going to another, because no one in the state of Arkansas can install home sprinklers with this company. He said that when you have to run it in metal pipe, it gets expensive. Tim said that 15 years ago, it was $1 per square foot for new, and $1.50 for retro. Ben said that it should be more cost effective on new construction as opposed to reconstruction. Gil said that company that he has been talking to is doing it in pex, and that has been approved in Arkansas, and it is a lot cheaper. Gil said that if you cross that 10,000 square foot mark, then you have added more cost to your building, and there’s no reason for that. Tim asked if we need to put it out to bid for the perc test. Gil said that is up to the Board. Tim said that we should go ahead and get that done. Denice said that if the plans change any, that might make a difference. Ben said that he doesn’t think we are in a big enough hurry to pull the trigger on that yet, and put us on a timer. Gil said that the only thing that could change on that, is if we add more bedrooms; that is the only thing that the D.R. looks at. He doesn’t look at the square footage of the building, he just looks at the bedrooms. We don’t have a kitchen; we have a breakroom. Ben said he just looked it up, and they are saying $1.50 - $3 per square foot for a sprinkler system. Top end puts us at $30,000; on a $2-2.5 million project, that is not a make or break issue. Ben said that he feels like we may have shaved and whittled this plan down so much, that we aren’t getting what we want, and we are overpaying for it. He asked if we want to stick with that plan; he just wants to consider everything. Denice said that the firefighters have voted on it, and the Building Committee worked it up. Tim asked about sprinkling, not being in the city. Gil said that is code; there’s no way around that. Tim said that the rest of the building is not fireproof, but pretty fire resistant.  Adam Johnson asked what we paid for the plans we have. Laura said $9,000. Ben said that he thought it was $10,000, but Laura looked it up and verified it was $9,000. Gil said that all they did was squared it up, took out all of the angles, to save us some money on the metal building. Ben asked what the size of the training room would be. Laura gave him the drawing with outside dimensions. She also mentioned the problem in the middle where it appears to have rooms overlapping. Tim asked if we need to just table it. Ben said that he would like to get more information from Mr. Walker, to get specifics of what we can expect for that price. Denice suggested looking at the samples that he sent out with his email. She said that he sent 3 samples to give us an idea of what he has done before. Laura suggested getting the Building Committee together again to go over all of the information. Gil said that we have signed off on that plan. He said that the Board told them to cut the price, so that’s what they did; that’s why it is squared up. Gil added that when you have different angles on a building, the price is going up. Frank asked if we need to make a motion to table it until next month. Tim said that we shouldn’t need a motion for that. Denice asked if that would allow Ben to make contact with Nick, or does that need to be included in a motion. Frank said that we can just move on, without formally tabling it, and allow Ben to make his inquiries.

Old Business – Laura’s Back-up – Frank asked if there was any new information there. Laura said no.

Hydrotest of SCBA bottles – Frank said that Chief mentioned that in his report, that they are about halfway finished. Ben asked if they have given him any reports about how many need to be repaired. Gil said that Chance called him and said that the 2nd batch had a few. He added that we knew that some have been leaking off in the trucks. Gil said that he didn’t know how many.

Denice asked to go back to Laura’s back-up. She asked if there are other options out there that we can consider, because we really need to have someone to back her up. She said that if something were to happen to her between here and Oklahoma, what would the fire department do at that point. Denice said that this is something that we need to seriously think about. She added that it is nothing against Laura, but somebody needs to be familiar with her systems, so we are protected as a fire district. Frank said that any business needs to have a continuity plan for key employees. With the Chief, we have the Assistant Chief; with the Assistant Chief, we have other Officers. From the Operations standpoint, we have that in place, but from the Administrative and bookkeeping standpoint, we don’t. Frank said that we have tried to find that person; if you know of other options out there, then we can consider them. Ben joked that the first thing we need to do is get a sizeable insurance policy on Laura, with him as the beneficiary. Eugene said that he could help with that. Denice said that still doesn’t help the department with the administrative stuff. Ben said that if you all are trying to kill her off, he wants a good insurance plan. Denice said that is definitely not what she is looking for. Frank said that whoever is in that position, there needs to be a backup. The fact that we don’t have a backup for Laura is not her fault. Denice said that somebody needs to know the system. Laura said that she has had 3 backups that she has gone through the trouble of training, getting them the information that they need to know. For each of them, it was not enough hours, not enough pay. They each needed a full-time job somewhere else. Ben said that even if they were not the backup, but the one in her place, it is still not enough hours or pay to replace a full-time job. Denice said that she understands that, but maybe we can hire a bookkeeper. Laura said that then you are opening it up to where someone outside of the department has access to the funds of the department. Gil said that they would be insured. Stewart said that we could do a part-time bookkeeper, and transition all of our payroll and all of our bookkeeping. Denice said that at least that much of the department would be taken care of. She said that her concern is, that if something happened to Laura, the department is in trouble. Denice said that it is going to be hard to know passwords to systems, contacts she has made through the years. Laura explained that she currently has an “Office For Dummies” book that she has put together over the years that she has worked here. It includes step by step instructions for everything that has to be done, because some things are daily, some weekly, some monthly, some quarterly, and some annually. Laura said that as she has trained these different people, she has had them follow the instructions in the book, to see if they are clear enough for anyone to follow, and it has been tweaked over the years. Laura added that Frank has the password for the computer, in case something was to happen, but he doesn’t have a key to the office. Laura added that we don’t want just anyone having access to this stuff. Denice said that she just wants to make sure that the department is protected if something were to happen. Laura said that she has asked many people; it’s not as if she is not trying. Denice said that we would just be lost if something happened. Frank agreed, but also stated that it was not solely Laura’s responsibility. Maybe we need to consider hiring a service, since we haven’t been able to find an individual. He said that maybe there are options out there that can be brought to the Board to be looked at. Tim said that our accounting firm has been very good to us over the years; we should ask them if they could recommend anyone.  Laura said that they would definitely be able to help out if something happened, because they are familiar with our finances. Ben asked if they do payroll services there; if they don’t, maybe they can point us in the right direction. Laura said that as far as payroll is concerned, we could set up an app like Jobber. The employees log in and out on the app, then the information is given to Quickbooks, then their paychecks would be direct deposited; there would be no interruption there. Tim asked Laura to call the accountant on Thursday, and explain to him our situation. Denice agreed with Laura that there are systems out there that can be put in place for payroll and such, but it’s not just that; it is the reports, the whole big picture. Ben said that he thought the Officers already have access to the reporting software, so they can run reports. Laura said they don’t have access to Firehouse anymore because it has been phased out, but they could if they wanted to learn the new system. Tim asked Laura, before we had payroll, did she still just work 2 days a week. She said yes. Tim asked how much Laura’s load increased. Laura said that she doesn’t really know; she just juggles things around and make sure everything gets done. Tim clarified that she was able to work the same amount. Laura said that she occasionally has to put in extra hours. Laura added that her most recent backup assistant, Jessica Hinkle, works just down the street. Laura believes that if the department was in a bind, that she might be willing to help out. Stewart said that if the accountant doesn’t do payroll, Janice Brandon in Little Rock does East End, and a few other county fire departments. He said that he talked to her when we first started, and he believes it was $25,000, for the payroll and bookkeeping service. He asked Laura to verify that. Laura said that the department can pay her that; that’s not anywhere near what she makes. Ben agreed that she is about half of that salary, to do payroll and everything else she does. Stewart suggested asking our newest recruit; she might be available. Ben said that he doesn’t know her, but he said that this is not something that is going to be right for just anybody. Denice said we just need to keep this in the back of our mind, and take it seriously. Laura said that is why we have left it on the agenda.  Denice restated that we never know when something might happen; we are all getting older, and anything is possible. Frank said that something could happen to anyone, any age; tragedy can come at any time. Denice agreed, and said we just need to take it a step further, and see what other options there are, to protect the department in general. Frank said that he is open to proposals for consideration regarding this.

Ben asked Gil if they take minutes in the Building Committee meetings. Gil said that they haven’t because they just sat down and drew it out. They made a list of what they wanted, and presented it to the Board; that’s how they came up with that plan. Adam Johnson asked if they documented their meeting days when they met. Gil said that he didn’t think so. Denice said that’s been 2 or 3 years ago. Laura said that Holly took minutes of the meeting that Frank called together. Adam said that has been several years ago. Denice said that she believes it has been several years since they have actually had a true meeting.

Tim reminded the Board that there was a guest present, and asked him to present anything that he wanted to say. Eugene said that he appreciates the department’s transparency. He stated that a building project for a family is tough, and he offered his help if there was anything he could do. He added that he appreciated the opportunity to sit in on the meeting to see what we do; it gives him a greater understanding of his client base. Eugene said that the department does a great job, and the community reflects that. He said that he was going to leave some information for us to look at, and he would be preparing an insurance quote for us. Frank said that McNeil may offer different coverages offered by different carriers; they might have something that we haven’t considered before. Frank encouraged Eugene to not only look at our current declarations page to give us a price, but also recommend other coverages that we may not have considered. Eugene said that McNeil has a strong risk management program, providing CE training for the firefighters at no cost. He said that he feels like McNeil could do a better job for us, if we have a good agent. The pricing is competitive. Tim said that we often wait too late to request bids for this. Eugene said that he hopes to have his to Laura by October 1st, and she can share it with you. He said that he does a comparison summary between what your policy has, and what McNeil is offering. If VFIS is better in a category, he shows us that they are better. If McNeil is better in a category, he shows that. He said that he always wants to do the best job for his customers, so he tries to make sure he always puts the truth out there. Ben asked if he could provide information about clients that have made the switch from VFIS to McNeil, because he would be interested in talking to them. Eugene said that he will see what he can do, but he doesn’t think he has any close. He added that he will talk to another agent that may have clients closer to home for us to talk to, and there are some who represent both entities.

Denice made a motion to adjourn at 8:00. Ben was 2nd. Motion passed.