Highland County Recorder Chad McConnaughey during the meeting.
Jacob Clary | The Times-Gazette
An increase in the base fee for documents at the Highland County Recorder’s Office was discussed at the weekly Wednesday morning meeting of the Highland County Board of Commissioners.
Chad McConnaughey, Highland County recorder, said Senate Bill 94 passed in May 2024. He said it “basically” required all county recorders to have its records online back to 1980 headed into 2026. He said Highland County’s office is already “ahead of the game” for that requirement.
However, McConnaughey also said that that requirement cut into the county recorder’s copy revenue due to people not having to come in for copies. He said Senate Bill 94 created a preservation surcharge, which allows his office to increase the base fee for each document from $34 to $39, with the extra $5 going entirely to the Highland County Recorder’s Office.
McConnaughey asked the board to set up a new revenue line item within the general fund for that extra money, saying he was a “little concerned” the money would get lost.
“I had no intention of doing it,” McConnaughey said. “You may raise it if you want. But all surrounding counties are doing it. So, I really felt like it made more sense for us to also do the surcharge so when people are working in our general area, the fee is the same.”
He said his goal for the beginning of this change was Jan. 1, 2025, if it is approved.
He also said that the move to online has been “killing” the revenue for some counties. However, he said he doesn’t operate his budget off copy revenue.
“This was COVID is what caused this whole conversation because basically, (the) recorder’s office like every other county office got shut down to a degree,” McConnaughey said. “They wanted the ability for people to access these documents outside of our building and their thought was it would reduce traffic. Yeah, it has definitely reduced traffic. We still have work, but it’s less people because they can sit in their office and do the research from their office as opposed to coming in.”
Dave Daniels, chairman of the board of commissioners, asked McConnaughey if he saw a situation, if he was approved for the change, where funds could be shared with Highland County Record Storage, with McConnaughey saying he could.
In other news, Carl Rayburn, FRS mobility manager, reported on new statistics he is seeing. He said more people have started to use the mobile app. He said 177 accounts were created and 158 trips were booked through the app in September. Then, Rayburn also said 19,475 trips were made last quarter.
The board of commissioners also announced that next week’s meeting would be moved to Tuesday, Oct. 22, at 9 a.m.
There were two resolutions approved by the board of commissioners, which are as follows:
*Res. No. 24-196 is an authorization for an additional appropriation from unappropriated funds within County General (1000) fund in the amount of $13,244.63.
*Res. No. 24-197 is an authorization for a budget modification within the County General (1000) fund in the amount of $1,000.
There were also three contracts approved by the board of commissioners, which are as follows:
*Contract 58 is between the board of commissioners, the Highland County Sheriff and Deborah Brunk for a contract for placement of keeping law enforcement K-9 kennel.
*Contract 59 is between the board of commissioners, Canon and Record Storage for Laserfiche Cloud Remote Implementation Servies.
*Contract 60 is between the board of commissioners and Greystone Systems, Inc. for a standard sale agreement for the Commissioners Office Relocation for $2,930.
Reach Jacob Clary at 937-402-2570.
