2010-10-22 Cost of Government Commission Minutes

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out what they do, that we want to do something with it to help them to do their work better. MS. NICHOLSON: Any other discussion relating to our speakers we just had about procurement? MS. O’HARA: Just a point that they brought up when I asked them about whether they were incorporating green pricing language into their contracts and they said that’s a policy issue that the county has not pressed that policy. If we look at this in context of working with the energy team, it’s something that maybe the county should be looking at more. There are models from the other counties to do this, the various types of contracts that they’re pursuing annually. So, departments could identify what green pricing affects them specifically, whether it be in fuels or vehicles or different areas of construction. And whether that’s a policy that the county should be pursuing. MS. WONG : I was very pleased to find out that it is a centralized process. I think that really helps. I was surprised that not all the County Council people had gone through the process of understanding this. And I think it’s an important process to understand when you’re in a leadership position. But when you’re making policies as the County Council people do, they make policies, this will impact through the departments perhaps. And they don’t know how difficult it is to process it down the lines. We might consider if it’s the flavor what we got today that we recommend or suggest that all County Council be required to go through at least an introduction of the procurement process. I’m not recommending that as of yet. I’m just saying we might consider that. I don’t know if that’s really necessary. MS. NICHOLSON: It might be better for them after they’ve actually been sitting on the County Council for a little bit of time so they can see how better it might liken them. MS. WONG : And I know what I went through with my training, when I read the documents, not a clue. When someone was actually showing me how the paper process went, I thought, oh my goodness, this is so long, and I kept trying to figure out ways to cut down the process. Cannot do. There’s the state law. So you have to go by the state law. MS. NICHOLSON: Anything else on that topic? If not we will go, now back up and go to Correspondence. CORRESPONDENCE MS. NICHOLSON: I have a motion to accept and file correspondence A through L, which means we still have an opportunity to talk about those particular things when we get to our subcommittee reports so it’s putting it off the table but just to accept and file A through L? MOTION:MR. MATSUDA: So moved. MS. O’HARA: Second. 27