WEBVTT

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Good morning, good morning, come
morning, and welcome, welcome, welcome.

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It's time now for our community connection
right here on K one, the

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One He Trusted is brought to you
by Tall Grass Motors and Arnold morn he

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Camp Funeral Home. And today we
have a Commissioner, Mitch Antel with us

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here from Washington County. First of
all, good morning, young man,

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Good morning, sir. How are
you. I'm doing great, you know,

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Mitch is one of the first people
that I got to got to know

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when I came into the town about
four years ago, and it's it's really

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been nice in knowing that you're representing
in as well here in Washington County.

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A lot of good things happening.
We're talking off here just a little bit

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ago about how blessed we are to
be in Washington County. Absolutely, I

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can't say enough about the community that
we live in and what we have as

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a community, and we're just hoping
to maintain that we're doing so far,

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so good. One thing when it
comes to bodies of government is that sometimes

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not there's not a whole lot of
communication, but it seems like everybody communicates

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quite well where we have to at
the county level. At the county level.

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Absolutely. I think that's a function
more than anything of our budget board,

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which is a specific way that we
budget here in Washington County. It's

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not common throughout the state, but
all AID elected officials sit around one table

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and have those conversations about our budgetary
concern and I think that has a has

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a provides for a space to tear
down silos, realize that we all have

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different functions in our offices and we
all do our jobs well and serve the

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community to our best. That's that's
where we as a county succeed well.

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We have a lot of good partnerships, not only with the people in our

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county, but also with the tribal
nations. The Cherenkey Nation has supplied us

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with some nice grants here lately.
We can't say enough about our tribal partnerships,

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not just well, specifically with the
Cherokee Nation. Obviously being a fourteen

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county region in essence, UM,
we've got our Circuit Engineering District which is

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eleven counties and most, if not
all, uh not all UH sit within

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the Cherokee Nation, but we also
have the Osage UH involved or we have

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some Creek involvement I mean, there's
there's there's a lot of tribal commitments within

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our within our Circuit Engineering district,
and we work as as partners and as

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people all working toward a common goal, which is a pretty good thing.

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Correct. I think legitimately we're all
Oklahoma's and I think legitimately, um all

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the tribes want to work together to
better their communities as well as all of

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our communities. So I again,
we're blessed and we get the opportunity to

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partners, specifically here in Washington County
with Cherokee Nation. Uh, and it's

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it's a great, great partnership.
I'm going to come at you from the

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field. Awesome, Okay, Because
water is a big topic around here.

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Of course, the lack of it
is even bigger topic presently. Certainly now

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the city has a lot to do
with this because a lot of their infrastructure

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provides water for our area. Correct, But where does the county have any

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kind of play or involvement in water
decisions? No, our goal is to

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stay out of the way now initially
probably rural water districts. Absolutely. That's

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one thing I've learned in the eight
plus years in the office at this point

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is trust those that you have in
positions to do and stay out of their

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way. You're simply a resource to
provide and ensure that they have what they

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need to complete the job that needs
to be done. But rural water districts

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were initially a function of county government
just by way of developing a mechanism by

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which it passed through us. We
have no governance over those rural water districts.

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We do not want governance over those
rural water districts. They're all run

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independently by their own boards. So
again it's just a matter of stay out

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of the way and be a resource
if necessary. Wow, good planning,

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Yes, those those that do do
those that do do well. Yes,

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alrighty. We were talking also before
hand. You know, when it comes

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to being a commissioner, we have
three correct, and I think every county

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has three, and these are divided
up into districts, and each district um

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when it comes to roads and other
parts of infrastructure or areas of concern.

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Uh, you have kind of like
your own your own little division of government

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right there to help people out and
describe what happens in your district as far

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as you know, roads, maintenance, bridges and other functions, so civics

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thing for folks who've heard what a
commissioner is, but they don't know what

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they do. So independently, each
county commissioner has a district, of course,

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which is broken down based on population. We try to be plus or

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minus five percent. That's our that's
the goal that we always shoot for in

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that redistricting. We're all the way
down at the bottom level of that tier,

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though, so you get up into
the legislative branch, for example,

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of your legislators in the state,
they're within two and a half percent.

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So at any rate, it's broken
up more or less equitably by population.

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Washington County is unique and that you've
got your core Bartlesville population, so each

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one of us have to kind of
tap into that population correct in order to

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make those population thresholds. So we
all have some implications here in town.

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Most people don't don't use their county
commissioner in town because the roads and bridges

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are a function of the city of
Bartlesville. In town, you get outside

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of the city limits of Bartlesville,
and that's where you really begin to see

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what work we do. So District
one, for example, has roughly one

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hundred and seventy miles of road that
we maintain. We collectively, with those

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on staff, can probably turn over
about ten miles a road a year.

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So you can see really quickly it's
gonna it's gonna take seventeen years to turn

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over an entire district. The prob
the likelihood of that's slim to none.

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But these farmer market roads are maintained
by us typically and that's that's the intent

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of them is they're just kind of
little feeders to get us into those major

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and minor collectors or minor collectors major
collectors to the highways UM. And it's

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a very difficult task. So a
road of a mile of road here in

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district ones roughly about thirty thousand dollars
for us to construct or RECONSTRUCTUM. We

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get five thousand miles or five thousand
dollars a year, uh for that mile.

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Oh well, okay, so you
can see really quickly, it's not

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it's never enough to cover that mileage, but we do the best we can

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with what we have to accomplish.
About ten miles a year is what we

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try to turn over, UM every
year in every district. Bridges UM,

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there's different types of bridge structures and
obviously average daily traffic count, which is

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how many cars go up and down
that road, drive how we manage those

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bridges good. And then when severe
weather hits with the wintertime, people up

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north kind of joke they said,
well, what do you got down there?

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Like five snowplows? I said,
well, maybe right. But the

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thing is, when we do have
the bad weather, it's the commissioners are

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the first ones to get the hotline. It seems like, oh, how

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the wows the roads? You know, people people try to get out of

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their house, they try to get
back to those highways, and those major

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collectors, those are obviously that the
roads that we deal with first as we

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take a look at where's where's the
traffic volume? Att let's get those roads

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cleared first, So we hit those
those major collectors, minor collectors, and

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then we start working on those third
level tertiary roads that get people to those

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um and it is it's a challenge, it's it's a task. Every time

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snow snow. I would almost prefer
snow, I would do yeah, because

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I hang around a while. Snow
won't. Ice is difficult to work with.

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Regardless, UM there are some brining
operations that will put down brine at

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road intersections. Primarily they're the one. I'm thinking it was Rogers County.

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They do this with regularity, and
it's probably shooting from the hip, but

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I'm gonna say it's a fifty fifty
shot when you put brine down. If

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you get more rain that doesn't freeze, then you lose what you've already done.

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It gets washed off to the sight. So it's it's a real finicky

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operation. You almost have to have
perfect weather and the perfect application for that.

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UM. We've kind of explored it, but but have never really engaged

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it. All right, That's it's
good to know. But the thing is,

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I've not seen people snow bound for
you know, days and weeks,

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maybe a day and a half,
but you know, nothing like I've seen

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in other places where I've lived.
And we do with we got and we

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do it pretty darn well. We
do. UM Again, another one of

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those blessings of the community, if
you will. UM. We don't typically

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get these large impactful events. I
say that, of course, every community

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is going to get touched at some
point in time by some major event.

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Speaking of ice storms and things like
that. Recently, you were able to

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procure what a couple of generators so
that in case something bad happens, we

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are we are we are in the
process of doing that. Yes, we

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have the we have the funding in
place. UM, we're going to put

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that that funding forward. We're hoping
to get reimbursed for both of those.

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I don't know that we will.
We will probably get reimbursed for one,

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but that that that's just another hardening, if you will, of our infrastructure

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and our community. UM. Really, continuity of government's the biggest thing,

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you know, UM county government a
lot of people. You know, if

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you're transacting homes, for example,
all that information comes through your county government

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or does UM, and if that
shuts down for any length of time,

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that really kind of cripples operations within
the community as a whole on a lot

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of different levels. So continuity of
government is paramount and critical to us.

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UM. One of the one of
the processes we're building into our new EOC

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facility out on the east side of
town is to be able to basically,

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if if we lost our entire complex
administrative complex downtown just goes away, all

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we have to do is migrate out
to our EOC and we're back up and

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running in a matter of a half
a day's time, so we really don't

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impact the community. Our operations will
continue. Wow, and that is a

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that is a big thing that's going
on right now at the construction of that

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EOC. Yes, that that's on
Bison Road, correct, yep, just

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north of Noah. Now they were
over by what the DSR that build direct

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Attle he Betty like Cubby. Now
we need got to get him in their

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own proper plays And again you mentioned
earlier about four years in the community that

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was our Walmart when I was a
kid, That's what it was. That's

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what it was. So the back
end of that was the service a station

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sure for Walmart. So that that's
the space they've occupied, which has been

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graciously granted to us by way of
DSR. So we've not yes, they've

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partnered with us. They they saw
the need, they wanted it, and

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that's the most stable place we've been
as an emergency operations center in our community

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until this move. Well, congratulations
on getting the funding and everything put together.

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I know this didn't take a snap
of the finger. This one was

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probably years in the making, Yes, sir, Yes, or our current

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emergency operations manager, Miss Cox has
been with us for well over twenty five

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years, and this has been a
goal of his since day one. Um,

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and you know, this was something
I wanted to seek them to fruition.

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But you know it's just a matter
of timing. Organic development is much

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better than forced. And we're talking
with Commissioner Mitch Antel here with Washington County.

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We got just a few minutes left. Is there anything you'd like to

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tell folks about the county government or
about your district in particular that we didn't

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touch on. Nothing I can think
of off the top of my head.

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Tom. We were always available.
We're always accessible. Our website hosts all

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of our information for meetings. We
encourage public participation. We enjoy it.

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So we're here to serve the community. We are beholden to the community,

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and as servants, we ask that
you hold us accountable. Very good,

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he thinks, Mitch appreciate you've been
with us today, Absolutely, sir,

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All right, you've been listening and
watching Our community connection brought to you in

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part by Arnold mooreton Nicamp Funeral Home
and Tall Grass Motors on K one