Bellwether Principal Education Claims Not able To Be Verified As Of Today

Jersey County Board Again Attempting To Raise Fees With Fee Study

Tuesday, June 12, 2018 - 17:41

JERSEYVILLE - The Jersey County board is just minutes away from possibly taking a vote to hire Bellwether, LLC to conduct a fee study that would allow fees paid by residents for various transaction

s to be raised.

Significant effort was required to obtain the Bellwether proposal in advance of the meeting tonight where the board may vote to accept the Bellwether proposal. Great Rivers Media was told that the only way to obtain the attachments contained in the meeting agenda was to pick them up before the office was closed at 4 PM. This was after making the initial request earlier in the morning and State's Attorney Goetten advising that the attachments should be provided. The initial response what that the information was on their website but finally at 3 PM an email was received stating the documents could be picked up or made available at the meeting.

Bruce DeLashmit is the principal of Bellwether, LLC. DeLashmit's various websites list his various educational background which includes the US Navy War College and George Washington University. At the time of this writing his education has not been able to be verified with either institution. The question asked the Naval War College was "verification that Bruce DeLashmit completed classes at your institution that would have resulted in transfer credits applying to a degree at George Washington University or would have been applied to a degree at the Navy War College as is inferred by his website."

DeLashmit also claims via his online presence, "...held positions in leadership onboard surface warfare units; in hospitals and clinics as both an administrator and health care provider and as staff on congressional sub-committees and US State Department initiatives." DeLashmit has posted on another website that he retired as a Senior chief hospital corpsman and spent five years on the guided missile destroyer USS Chandler (DDG 996).

Significant issues can result from utilizing a fee study to justify higher fees if there is no investigation into best methods of providing the services that the fees are to be charged for. In essence, a department could be exceptionally inefficient or mismanaged with no oversight and be entitled to increases in fees because of their inefficiency.

The Bellwether County Government website page content is shown below:

This page contains all of the services that Bellwether provides for counties. If you would like to jump straight to the section that pertains to you, feel free to use the menu on the left to select your position or topic of interest.

Improve Non-Property Tax Revenue by ensuring that all fees for services appropriately cover the cost of the service. “Fees are intended to bring the cost of a requested service as close as possible to the individual benefiting from the service” Improper fees result in the tax payers of your county subsidizing services.” Typical Areas for fee services include:

Fee Review for County Clerk / Recorder
Fee Review for Sheriff Departments
Fee Review for Court Security
Fee Review for Animal Control
Fee Review for Environmental Health
Fee Review for Adult Immunizations
Fee Review for Coroner Services
Fee Review for Highway Department

Staffing Models and Staff Impact Analysis

Bellwether used leading practices in Lean Operations to define the exact level of staffing necessary to provide quality, timely services.
Bellwether translates state inspection results such as the Illinois Department of Corrections Inspection criteria into objective minimum staffing for jails.
Bellwether evaluates internal processes and criteria to help define minimum staffing levels for critical services such as public safety and highway maintenance / snow removal.

Labor Negotiation Tools

Analysis to support scenarios and live discussions with bargaining units.
Models calculate the exact expense of every possible option in negotiations.

Operations Review

Complete a review of all departments to assess the following
Appropriate Fees
Impact of staffing changes
Opportunities for efficiencies

Budget Services

Bellwether can streamline your budget process and provide tracking and reporting throughout the year.
Budgets begin with an analysis of the prior two years department claims.
Departments are interviewed to identify potential upward or downward changes in expenses
Draft budgets with levy impacts are presented to the board for review
Bellwether works with the board to establish a levy strategy
Budgets are returned to the departments for revisions to meet levy strategies
Budget drafts are presented to the board for public viewing
Final revisions are prepared
Supporting documentation is provided

Retained County Administration

Bellwether becomes the contract administrator
Action plans are defined to improve revenue and manage expense
Actions are taken to manage labor / benefits costs
Includes fee review services
Includes budget services
Includes advisor role for departments
Includes advisor role for board

Tax Processes

Bellwether works closely with the Supervisor of Assessment, the County Clerk and the Treasurer to develop a smooth tax process that allows a smooth assessment, billing and collection process aimed at accuracy and prompt collections.

Cost of Service (Fee Review)

The county clerk services :

Vital Records: These services are intended to be 100% funded from transactions fees. This ensures your staff is safe from budget pressures from the general fund.
Tax Redemption: These services are intended to be 100% funded from transactions fees. This ensures your staff is safe from budget pressures from the general fund.

The County Clerks fees include special funds for automation that should fully fund the necessary technology and equipment needed to do the job.

Budget Services: Quite often the County Clerk ends up holding the bag on the constructing the county budget. (insert wording on budget from County Board – modified as needed)

Tax Processes

Cost of Service (Fee Review)

The Recorder services :

Land Records: These services are intended to be 100% funded from transactions fees. This ensures your staff is safe from budget pressures from the general fund.

UCC / Non Land Records: These services are intended to be 100% funded from transactions fees. This ensures your staff is safe from budget pressures from the general fund.

The Recorder’s fees include special funds for automation and document storage that should fully fund the necessary technology and equipment needed to do the job.

Fee Review

The Circuit Clerk may raise fees within a range defined by state statute. Bellwether offers free tools to assist in evaluating your current tools.
Services are available to assist in this review.

Debt Collection

Circuit Clerks spend most of their time ensuring the courts operating as planned.
Debt collection firms provide services that often cost the county too much in a percentage of colleciton
Bellwether evaluates the debt collection process, negotiates with providers and provides ongoing analysis aimed at increasing and accelerating collections.

Budget Services

Quite often the Treasurer ends up holding the bag on the constructing the county budget. (insert wording on budget from County Board – modified as needed)

Tax Processes

Sheriff Fees

Process Service fees, Civil Standby fees, Jail fees

Court Security Fee

Labor, equipment, training and physical security

Staffing Models

Translates the workforce necessary to meet the minimum standards of the IDOC Inspection Criteria.

Dispatch Cost Sharing

Analysis of calls and responses can indicate which departments benefit from dispatch and translate that services into an expense formula for use in Inter-governmental agreements.

Labor Negotiation Tools