The marble inside the Ellsworth County courthouse is getting cleaned.

At Monday’s meeting of the Ellsworth County commissioners, approval was given to have JMH Cleaning Service of Salina clean the marble on the main floor of the courthouse for a cost not to exceed $2,000. The commissioners will then decide if the basement and third floors will be cleaned as well.

In other business:

• Doug McKinney of the North Central Regional Planning Commission in Beloit reviewed the Unmanned Aircraft Corridor Study with commissioners. The corridor extends from Fort Riley to the Smoky Hill Bombing Range in Saline County and then into the northeastern corner of Ellsworth County. McKinney said the county is being asked to consider doing several suggestions advocated by Fort Riley. These include developing a comprehensive plan to put policies in place, creating planning documents that would include overlays of the Unmanned Aircraft System corridor, developing procedures for areas of concern such as what the county’s response would be in case one of the unmanned drones would crash in the county, and communications.

McKinney said he would come back on Jan. 6 to further update commissioners on the program.

• Jeremiah Brown, county EMS director, asked county clerk Shelly Vopat if county employees were going to have medical insurance coverage for 2020. Vopat said she had not received any quotes yet, but was expecting them any time.

• Paul Westerman discussed the condition of a road near his farm. He said the new motor grader operator is going a good job, but has brought the shoulders of the road up causing a peak in the road. Vehicles are having difficulty maneuvering on the road because of the slopes.

Commissioner Steven Dlabal said he will let Dale Houston, the county superintendent of roads and bridges, know about the situation.

• Commissioner Dennis Rolfs called Krista Mann of Invenergy to check on the status of the proposed wind farm in southern Ellsworth County. She told Rolfs the project is still on hold because of concerns raised by the Kansas Air National Guard.

“A lot of people have questions about the wind farm,” Rolfs said.

Mann said she would email Rolfs with updated information on the matter.

• Commissioners are still searching for someone they can appoint as the Ellsworth County representative to the North Central Flint Hills Area Agency on Aging board of directors.

From Nov. 25:

• Discussion on what to do with the Wilson river bridge south of Wilson was undertaken by the commissioners and Jon Halbgewachs of Kirkham Michael and Associates.

Halbgewachs said the deck of the bridge, which was built in 1957, is in bad shape as are the ends of the rebar in the bridge. The deterioration is caused by decades of wear and tear and salt damage.

He said the estimated cost of sandblasting and painting the beams of the bridge is $400,000. However, when added to the cost of repairing the deck, the estimated price jumps to $1.2 million.

Halbgewachs said it will cost between $1.6 million and $1.9 million to replace the bridge. He will look at other options for the bridge as well as options to possibly keep the bridge open during construction and report back.

“It will give you guys a little more information to go off of,” he said.

In other business:

• Vopat said the new boiler has been installed at the courthouse but the burners are still on order.

“We’ll just hope they get here between Thanksgiving and Christmas,” said Dlabal.

• Commissioners signed settlement paperwork related to the county’s recent purchase of the former Ellsworth Ready-Mix property on West 13th Street in Ellsworth. As part of that process, they approved $1,054.19 in closing costs for the purchase of the property. That amount will be taken from the county building fund.

• Andrew Bair, chief executive officer at Ellsworth County Medical Center, said officials with the Ellsworth County Health Care Foundation requested he ask the commissioners to consider moving the county EMS service to the ECMC administration building.

Commissioners Dlabal and Rolfs did not comment on the request since Commissioner Kermit Rush was absent from the meeting for the Thanksgiving holiday. Later on in the meeting, Dlabal and Rolfs brought the subject up with Brown.

Brown said Bair approached him with the request, but he told Blair that was for the commissioners to decide.

• Brown said the Ellsworth VFW has been storing equipment and other materials, such as boxes of Christmas wreaths, at the EMS headquarters building. He noted, however, that space in the building is becoming limited and is starting to get cluttered again.

“I’m trying to see if we have a better solution to help those guys,” Brown said.

He invited commissioners to visit the EMS headquarters building and see the limited space for themselves.

• Staff from the Midway Extension District, Clinton Laflin, Jessica Kootz, Marcia Gier and Craig Dinkel, gave a quarterly update on activities at the Midway Extension District. Those activities included Kids Ag Day, Medicare open enrollment, mental health first aid training, possible changes to the 4-H Fair Book, receipt of a $4,694 grant for robotic materials so the district can start developing 4-H youth programing with robotics, planning a meeting with representatives from the commissioners, 4-H, the Fair Board and the Saddle Club to review who is responsible for what, development of a spring wheat tour, looking for farmers to provide ground for the district’s milo plot and working with local producers on livestock nutrition questions.

“We’re looking for more program ideas to host across the district,” Laflin said.

• Theresa Shute, supervisor of the county landfill, noxious weed department and the county recycling program, was asked to get a written estimate to replace a window damaged in a hail storm last June. Shute said the county’s insurance carrier has paid the county $1,192.27 for damage to the recycling building. However, it only will give the county $1,200 to replace the window. She noted the window cost an estimated $2,500 to purchase and install when new.

The next meeting of the Ellsworth County commissioners will be at 9 a.m. Monday, Dec. 9, at the county courthouse.