DRAFT

The Executive Committee of the DeKalb County Board met on Tuesday, October 7, 2003 @ 7:00p.m. at the Legislative Center’s Freedom Room. Chairman Pritchard called the meeting to order.  Members present were Marlene Allen, Sue Leifheit, Jeff Metzger, Roger Steimel, Ruth Anne Tobias and Jim MacMurdo.  Mr. Wilson was absent.  Others present were Ray Bockman, Julia Fauci and Diane Strand.

APPROVAL OF THE MINUTES

          Moved by Mr. Steimel, seconded by Ms. Leifheit, and it was carried unanimously to accept the minutes of the September 2003 minutes.

APPROVAL OF THE AGENDA     

          Chairman Pritchard asked to have the agenda amended to reflect item #5b.) Discussion on Minutes.

          Moved by Mr. Metzger, seconded by Ms. Tobias, and it was carried unanimous to approve the amended agenda.

APPOINTMENTS

          Chairman Pritchard recommended the following appointments:

Housing Authority of

DeKalb County: Ging Palma Smith, reappointment, for a term of 5-years, until 11/02/2008.

Public Services Committee:       Jeffrey Metzger, appointment, until the end of his elected term.

          Moved by Mr. Steimel, seconded by Ms. Allen, and it was carried unanimously to recommend the appointments to the full board for consideration.

Chairman Pritchard said that he needs one more appointment for the Metropolitan Exposition Authority.  The following committees and boards will have appointments expiring next month: one position for the Workforce Investment Act Board, three positions for the Board of Health, four positions for the 911 Emergency Telephone Systems Board, three positions for the DeKalb County Nursing Home Foundation Board and two positions for the Community Mental Health Board.

NOVEMBER MEETING DATE

Chairman Pritchard said that next month the regular committee meeting falls on a holiday, therefore, he is suggesting that the Executive Committee meet on Monday, November 10, 2003. 

          Moved by Mr. Steimel, seconded by Ms. Allen, and it was carried unanimously to schedule the November Executive Committee Meeting Date for November 10, 2003. 

MINUTES DISCUSSION

Mr. MacMurdo, Vice-Chairman of the Public Infrastructure and Development Committee, approached the committee this evening to discuss three concerns that his committee has regarding the standing committee minutes.  One concern expressed by a couple of committee members is that there seems to be inconsistency amongst the various committees about what constitutes adequate or proper minutes for committee meetings.  There was a concern that perhaps some of the discussion on the tax abatement was not fully captured in the minutes.  Some of the members commented that on other committees that they serve on that those minutes were different than the Public Infrastructure and Development Committee’s minutes.  What is the adequate content for committee meeting minutes?

The second question was whether or not the County Board has guidelines for the committees to follow as far as the content for those minutes are concerned?  If those guidelines exist, what are they and are they shared with all committees?

The third question is, if there are not any guidelines to follow, would it be appropriate to establish some fundamental guidelines so that the minute’s tenor, contents, and format would have some similarities?

The suggestion from that committee was to bring these concerns to the Executive Committee for discussion, Mr. MacMurdo said.    

Chairman Pritchard said that, yes, we do have informal guidelines, that allow discretion of the note taker and therefore, minutes will appear different.  Our policy is that these are draft copies of our minutes until approved by the committee.  If any member of the committee feels the draft minutes do not adequately reflect their point of view they can file a minority report.  Finally, it has always been our policy that if any member, at any meeting, does not have all of their points reflected in the minutes, to let the board know that at the time that the board takes up that particular issue.

Mr. Bockman, County Administrator, passed out a memo explaining the background of the procedure to produce minutes and some suggestions.  He said that he was very fortunate to get the question before the meeting tonight so that he could prepare a more thoughtful response. 

First, the board rules are silent on minutes.  They do require that committees file written reports and that they be filed at least a week in advance of the board meeting.  We have always considered the draft minutes as the written reports, he said.  The rules also provide for the filing of minority reports and if they are delivered in writing, and unrestrained in their length, they are to be distributed in the same manner as the majority reports. 

There is no written policy with regard to the content of minutes, nor would he recommend one.  Minutes are to be summaries not transcripts and there seems to be general agreement on this.  At any given evening at any given committee meeting, you are going to have differences of opinions as to what should be put in the minutes and what should not. 

There is a staff-level agreement on format that has not, but should be redistributed each time a new minute taker comes on board.

With regards to the website, Mr. Bockman continued, there was a lengthy debate on whether or not it was appropriate to put draft minutes out there.  In the end it was decided that most people would be better off in understanding the issues and discussion before the board if they had access to draft minutes. 

Mr. Bockman said rarely are draft minutes amended at the subsequent committee meeting, and when they are it generally relates to a member’s comments rather than a substantive point. 

The pitfalls of minute taking usually occur, when a member or two who feels very passionate about an issue, who may go on in length and then they are subsequently voted down.  Should the minute taker then fill up several pages of minutes with their comments?  Generally note takers seek to provide brief minutes that others will take the time to read.   Having said that, once the draft minutes come back to the committee, if the committee wants to expand for the record, comments about any discussion, they may. 

Finally, he suggests to stamp the minutes “draft” before they are put on the website and while they are being circulated.  He also wanted to suggest that if any member had a comment that they want included in the minutes that was not included, that they should just ask for it and say so.  He feels that it is really helpful for a minute taker. 

With regards to recording votes in the minutes, he assumes that not everyone wants their names associated with every vote that is taken.  We use voice votes not only as a matter of convenience but also as a matter of political covering.  Members can always ask for a roll call if they want it.  Members could state, for this vote I want the record to show that I voted against it, and it will be done. 

The members also have an opportunity at the board meetings, to clarify or amplify draft minutes.  As you leave the committee meeting, as another suggestion, if you want to make sure that your comments are preserved in writing, then write a minority report and make sure that you get it to us by the time that this committee meets and it will be included in the packet.

Finally, with regards to the length of minutes, he doesn’t feel that he could draft a policy that’s going to accomplish something that 24 different board members have a different view on. The difficulty of minute taking is like reporting, you go to a meeting that lasts two hours - no one is going to read two hours of minutes.  What to put in and what to keep out is the dilemma of a good minute taker, Mr. Bockman said, they are trying to put enough in to capture the spirit of the debate, but stopping short of redundancy so that you don’t lose readership.    We want people to read these minutes, we want them to be truly reflective of the debate.  One suggestion that he would make to minute takers is where there has been a heated debate to state it. 

Mr. MacMurdo said that an additional concern was that we ask the board to act on the minutes before the committees have reviewed them and approved them. Mr. MacMurdo also said that there are a variety of ways to accomplish this if we want to act on approved minutes.  Mr. Bockman said if you hold them over and consider those minutes at the next meeting and then you have minutes of that meeting, and it could go on and on.  Mr. MacMurdo said that the real question is whether or not we want the board to act on minutes that haven’t been approved?

Ms. Leifheit said that she agrees with Mr. Bockman that these minutes are just a summary of the meeting of what went on.  The board acts on the issue not the minutes. 

Chairman Pritchard said, is this an incident that occurred or is it happening in all of our committees?  Mr. Steimel said that Planning and Regulations Committee minutes are very good.  He feels that it is the responsibility of committee members to review the minutes that are in the packet.  If there is a problem then raise it at the board meeting if it is centered on discussion taking place at the board meeting. 

One other point, said Ms. Fauci, is the issue of policy.  There are minutes of other committees that are very good.  Chairman Pritchard said that one of the things that we have to be careful of is that minutes take a long time to compile.  How much time does the minute taker contribute to agonize over what they should and should not include in the minutes?  Mr. Steimel suggested maybe going back to the committee and ask, how do you want the voting handled?  Mr. Bockman said that we will do it anyway you want it. 

Mr. Bockman said that there are also some stylistic items that we approved and try to follow (attached to his memo 

Chairman Pritchard asked each member to take this discussion back to their individual committees and that we will discuss it next month at the Executive Committee Meeting.   He also suggested that if the committee minutes have not been approved prior to the County Board Meeting to stamp the minutes “draft”. 

APPROVAL OF THE COUNTY BOARD AGENDA

          Mr. Bockman, County Administrator, reviewed the county board agenda for the board meeting to be held on October 15, 2003.  He cautioned the committee that if the public services item number (b.) that refers to the jail project does not recommend the resolution, then this item will be stricken from the agenda. 

          Mr. MacMurdo said that with regards to the Public Infrastructure and Development Committee items that item #1 was voted on as a resolution, #2 is an ordinance and #3 is a resolution.  Ms. Supple said that she would check with Mr. Lorence tomorrow morning on the correct order. 

Moved by Mr. MacMurdo, seconded by Mr. Steimel, and it was a carried unanimously to accept the county board agenda as presented. 

GENERAL DISCUSSION

          Ms. Leifheit, Chairman of the Administrative Services Committee, said that her committee has the resolution coming forward to place the budget on file for FY2004. She also said that the with regards to the credit card item, that it now broadens the scope of the credit card policy. She explained that the final item would be placing the referendum on the March 16^th 2004 ballot for the public safety sales tax.  It’s not that you agree with the referendum or the jail project, it is just the sales tax issue.  Ms. Leifheit also said that Mr. Campbell approached the committee about the stain glass window in the courthouse that needs to be replaced as an emergency item and it was pushed into this year’s budget.

          Mr. Tobias, Chairman of the Public Policy Committee, said that she was appointed to the NACO Community and Development Steering Committee.  Her committee is moving their November meeting to November 4^th because of a conflict on November 6^th.  They also have continued discussing the legislative agenda items.

          Ms. Allen, Chairman of the Public Services Committee, said that they haven’t met yet.  Chairman Pritchard said that with regards to questions that have been raised on the jail project issue, they felt that it as very important to have both of the consultants present to address those questions and that is why the meeting date was changed.  Monday was a religious holiday for one of the senior consultants and we really needed him to be present at our meeting to answer most of the questions.  Because of this we rescheduled the meeting to Wednesday, October 8, 2003.  The consultants will have answers prepared for tomorrow evening. 

Chairman Pritchard also wanted to say that the Ad Hoc Jail Study Committee did a lot of research.  He further stated that they take the place of a regular standing committee and that they can forward a recommendation to the full board.  He said that he is a little concerned that there are some board members that say these issues haven’t been discussed.  The committee did their research and forwarded their recommendation to the full board for approval.  He said that we do have a timeline that we need to bring this item forward. He would have thought that over the last ten months of discussion that any board member that has a question that it would have been brought forward by now.  We need to ask, to what degree are we going to look for even more options that have already been considered or are we going to take the best thoughts, bring them forward, and make some rational decisions on them.

Mr. Steimel, Chairman of the Planning and Regulations Committee, said that he hates to take issues back to a hearing officer but that there is a situation they have that they need to “tweak” their notification policy a little bit better on the hearings notice.  He further said that they published a legal notice on the gun club that has 100 members.  They placed the proper signage on the roads and notified adjacent property owners.  The neighbors that live one-quarter of a mile or more did not get notified.  All notices sent out were legally sent out.  His committee is considering if they need to expand the number of notices sent out.  Mr. Bockman asked him who was going to pay for the extra hearing?  Mr. Steimel said that the County is. 

Chairman Pritchard said that he felt that it is a good discussion point for the committee to review their policy because this is a good delaying tactic by saying, what is a legitimate notice; and we are looking at the objector’s point of view. However, you also need to look at the petitioner’s point of view and time is of the essence in many projects.  Mr. Bockman said that if we didn’t follow legal steps then we should take the issue back, however, on this issue we did follow all the legal steps. 

Mr. Metzger, Chairman of the Forest Preserve Committee, said that they have rescheduled their meeting for October 15, 2003 @ 7:00p.m.  He also reminded the committee members about the dedication invitation for Potawattomi Woods Forest Preserve on October 12, 2003.

Mr. Metzger asked to have his following statement included in the minutes.  He wanted to encourage all board members to go back and review their County Board Rules with regards to the Open Meetings Act and to make sure that everyone is specific and careful that they don’t make any violations to it. 

Mr. MacMurdo, Vice-Chairman of the Public Infrastructure and Development Committee, informed the committee that the board will be seeing three bridge projects over the next few months.  The next bridge to be fixed is the Kirkland Road Bridge and the Irene Bridge.  He also said that Sycamore Police Department requested a speed study to be done on Peace Road.  Mr. Lorence conducted two studies on this issue.

Chairman Pritchard said that the Regional Plan Commission discussed two issues. The first issue dealt with the Shabbona Casino project.  It was agreed that the County should take the lead and try to find out more information about it.

He said that the other issue that the Commission discussed was the Land Use plans being reviewed and adopted.  One of the issues that certainly has long-term effects is the designation and protection of major road collectors.  Communities have been asked to look at the major collectors and limit the number of curb cuts along them.

ADJOURNMENT

          Moved by Ms. Leifheit, seconded by Mr. Metzger, and it was carried unanimously to adjourn.

                                                Respectfully submitted, 

                                                ____________________________________
                                                Robert W. Pritchard, Chairman                                                   

____________________________________
Mary C. Supple, Secretary