The Hardin County Fiscal Court met for their first meeting of the year Tuesday.
Hardin County Jailer Josh Lindblom provided an update on medical billing for inmates at the Hardin County Detention Center. Lindblom said as part of the sale of Hardin Memorial Hospital $150,000 annually is supposed to go towards medical bills for the jail. Bills were not being adjusted to the Medicaid rate for inmates in the hospital for more than 24 hours, and Lindblom said after discussions the hospital acknowledged the county is right.
“The good thing about it is going forward now every bill we have for the hospital worth $150,000 will be repriced, so what that means is over the next 15 years that we have it left there will be about $750,000 in savings at least,” Lindblom said.
Lindblom presented a check for $50,383.53 from an audit of 2025 billing, and said audits will be conducted for the other four years after the sale.
The court approved resolutions assigning the county’s solid waste franchise agreement to Unified Disposal Partners Holdings LLC. Judge/Executive Keith Taul said UDP plans to buy the Kentucky and Tennessee assets of Platform Waste, the current solid waste provider for the county. The court also approved a resolution assigning the county’s intergovernmental support agreement to UDP, which covers solid waste service to Fort Knox. The county says curbside pickups and scheduled routes will continue uninterrupted, and residents should continue to use their orange cans.
The court held a second vote on a resolution approving the hiring of a full-time GIS coordinator. County Attorney Jenny Oldham said under Kentucky law if the vote on a resolution for the hiring of personnel remains tied for 15 days, the judge/executive has authority to make the hiring decision. E.G. Thompson, who abstained from the original vote, said given the existing contract with the Lincoln Trail Area Development District he was not ready to move ahead with the resolution.
“We have looked at cost savings and I’ve not heard that it’s inadequate,” Thompson said. “I do believe it’ll be a cost savings and in my mind it’s worth giving a good close look at to see if we can operate this way, and then if we can’t we need to go back and look at it again.”
Taul said he believed the more fiscally responsible choice was to hire a staffer rather than contract out the work. He also expressed frustration with the magistrates intervening in the hiring process.
“We do not know of any time in the last 20 years that the fiscal court has ever denied hiring an employee in an approved budgeted position,” Taul said. “I’ll say this: this negatively affected the morale of employees whenever this happened last month.”
The resolution was voted down 5 to 4.
In other meeting news, Hardin County Planning and Development Director Adam King said in 2025, 94 plats and 189 lots were recorded, 480 total building permits were issued, and 91 new single-family dwellings were approved. Hardin County Public Works Director Stephanie Givens said 937 bags were collected from 866 visitors during the county’s free shredding days in 2025, and 302 tons of products were collected from the county’s recycling trailers.
The Hardin County Fiscal Court will next meet January 27. The next Hardin County town hall forum will be held in the fiscal courtroom on January 26.
