By DAVE SCHULTZ
Wells County Coroner Hilarie Gaskill received permission from the County Council Tuesday night to rework her budget and purchase a van.
Gaskill said she was planning to put a new vehicle into her budget for next year, but she found this vehicle — a 2010 Ford E350 with 82,000 miles on it — in Huntington with a price of $16,900. The seller also offered to make the price $16,000 “out the door,” she said.
The coroner said she wanted the van to transport a body to a funeral home or for an inquest herself rather than wait for a funeral home to send a vehicle out. Area funeral homes have been generous with their assistance to her office, she said, but she didn’t really want that to continue.
“If I had a van, I could go there myself rather than wait for a funeral home,” she said.
She said of 25 calls she’s had this year, she could have used the van on 13 of them.
To make this happen, she wanted to transfer $17,000 from her office’s Autopsy Services line item and another $1,000 from the Toxicology line item to Repairs and Maintenance for the vehicle.
She admitted she did not know how much she would need throughout the remainder of 2023 in the two line items she was taking money from. That was something County Council members wondered about as well.
In the end, however, six of the seven council members — Seth Whicker, Todd Mahnensmith, Steve Huggins, Brian Lambert, Vicki Andrews, and Scott Elzey — approved the purchase. The seventh member, Brandon Harnish, abstained. He said Gaskill mentioned a relative of his in the discussion on the purchase and he felt he should not record a vote.
Among other items considered Tuesday night:
• Sheriff Scott Holliday had a request for an additional appropriation approved for overtime. The Wells County Police have been providing coverage for Ossian and the additional appropriation is how the reimbursement money from Ossian goes into the Sheriff’s Department coffers.
• Holliday said the jail had 56 total inmates and that the jail was “sitting at very good numbers.”
• Holliday also promoted the new sheriff’s app for smartphones. Citizens can look up information on jail prisoners, get weather updates, and activate a “where are you now” feature that would let drivers and passengers know their location if assistance is needed.
• Audry Dudley asked for the permission to appropriate $50,000 for the Wells County Tourism Commission even through the innkeeper’s tax has only generated $31,000 since it went into effect in February. Based on that, and based on historical data that hotels are busier during the summer and fall, she expected the amount to be raised this year to exceed $50,000. Her request was approved.
• Ginny Vogel, program director for Wells County’s first-ever court appointed special advocate, requested permission to add $2,019 into her budget that was provided to the county by a grant. That request was approved.
• Vogel also said she was looking for a new office as her former office in Bluffton’s City Hall was needed for a new employee. Karen Morris will be the city’s information systems director. The city did not charge the CASA program for use of the office. Vogel moved out of City Hall Monday.
• Mike Lautzenheiser, executive director of the Wells County Area Plan Commission, asked the council for an additional $4,300 for rural cleanup. The program has expanded and grown and went over its budget in Petroleum earlier this year. The additional funds were approved. Although no date has been set, it is likely the next cleanup effort would use the campus of Southern Wells schools as its dropoff point.
daves@news-banner.com