By Libby Cluett | lcluett@mineralwellsindex.com

PALO PINTO – Palo Pinto County Commissioners unanimously approved a motion at Monday’s meeting to begin requiring a type of building permit for new construction – homes and commercial – and new mobile homes in unincorporated areas of the county.

County Attorney Phil Garrett looked into the process after the court requested more information.

“It’s not so much about the building, but about where to locate it,” he said. “It’s mainly to register the building.”

“It’s about 911 addressing, septic and floodplain [issues],” added Public Works Director David McDonald, who said he recently caught another, new, house on a property with no permit requested for the septic.

Not only has he encountered buildings without septic permits, which are required by the county, McDonald’s office oversees 911 addressing, which helps emergency services and law enforcement find an address in an emergency situation.

Also in the past, people built properties in areas of the county that historically flood, and the building location permit would help alleviate this.

In 2007, unincorporated areas of the county, like Fairfield Acres subdivision, north of Mineral Wells, and Mountain River Estates, along the Brazos River near Parker County, experienced flooding in and around homes.

“I think we need to for emergency services,” Precinct 4 Commissioner Jeff Fryer said regarding instituting a permitting procedure.

Garrett will draft a permit and present it to commissioners for approval at a future meeting.

In other business Monday, commissioners also:

• Approved assisting the City of Mineral Wells and Mineral Wells ISD with its May 12 joint uniform election.

• Heard monthly reports, including what seems to be some good news from County Auditor Sharon Allen. Allen reported that, based on the last sales tax report, the county was “way up – 60 percent above what we got last year. Sometimes it’s because they have audit collection. That was not the case this time. It was all sales tax.”

    “This is considerably above anything we’ve gotten in the past several years,” Allen said of the recent amount, which comes from November sales, reported to the state in December.

    She informed commissioners that county revenues for the past month were $4.017 million and expenses were $3.067 million.

    Treasurer Tanya Fallin reported the total of all funds held by the treasurer’s office on Jan. 23 was $8.46 million.

    Sheriff Ira Mercer reported his department received 43 civil papers, issued 94 tickets and 41 warnings, made 539 calls for service and 51 arrests, drove 44,951 miles and booked 94 inmates. He told commissioners the new jail control board is operational and they have all the kinks worked out of it. In addition, Mercer said the new storage building is up and in use.

    For the year of 2011, the county public works department issued 75 septic permits, with 54 of those for new buildings and 20 for existing buildings, reported Director David McDonald. He added that in 2010 the county issued 90 permit, with 60 for new construction.

• Received the Palo Pinto County Emergency Services District 2011 financial report and 2010 audit report from Carl Blacksten.

    He explained the ESD was six months late on the 2010 audit “because of all the 2011 fires.”

    The auditors gave an unqualified opinion, the district presented fairly and the audit found no material weaknesses, he told commissioners.

    He shared some areas where the ESD must improve to comply with auditing standards. The ESD was overextended by $22,179 on its budget. Blacksten said, “A good part of that is distributions to fire departments, because it’s their money.”

    “If we have funds available, we’ll pay out to volunteer fire departments as much as we can,” he said, adding that the ESD distributed $616,000 to departments.

• Heard a delinquent tax attorney’s report. On March 6 the county will have a sale of real property, [including] a couple dozen properties [that will be up for purchase] to help raise tax revenue,” said Charles Brady, a partner with Purdue, Brandon, Fielder, Collins and Mott LLP. “All in all it’s looking pretty good. We’re collecting at 53 percent after six months. That’s pretty good. We’re having to do less site visits because folks are paying.”