Umatilla County is getting a new service coordinator position for the county’s developmental disabilities program.

The county board of commissioner at its meeting Aug. 17 approved the new position, which is to create consistency with monitoring requirements of foster and residential homes and employment sites. The county estimated the annual costs of the position is about $110,000, and carryover dollars from the 2021-22 developmental disabilities budget will cover that.

The expenditure was one of several the county board approved at the meeting.

The board gave the OK for a new concrete vault toilet for Harris Park. The cost of delivering the unit in 2023 to Harris Park comes to $30,355.20.

Commissioner John Shafer serves on the Wildhorse Foundation board. A grant from the foundation is to pay $14,000 of the cost, leaving a remainder of $16,355.20. The county applied for an Oregon Parks and Recreation Department grant to cover some or all of that amount. If that grant were to fail, the county’s public works department still has money in the budget to cover the tab.

The board also authorized public works to buy a new power broom from Papé Machinery, Pasco, for $62,397. This 2021 broom is to replace an older model in the fleet, which the department planned on selling at auction later this year.

The board gave the sheriff’s office the go-ahead to buy new restraint systems by Safe Restraints Inc. for patrol vehicles. The cost of four WRAP systems and 20 associated ankle straps is $7,602.37. Federal program funds will cover the expense.

County commissioners also approved the reclassification of a medical assistant to an office assistant II position to work almost full time in Pendleton’s school-based health centers.

Umatilla County Health sponsors and staffs the centers. Alisha Lundgren, the heath department’s deputy director, in a memo to the board explained the county for more than a year has tried to fill a vacant medical assistant position while the nurse practitioner and two counselors in the centers need office assistant support rather than medical assistant support.

In other business, the county board presented the first reading to update the county department organization ordinance and organizational chart and set a second reading for its next meeting. And the board approved contracting with Michael Bergstrom of AgriNorthwest, Kennewick, as a consultant on the central pipeline project.