2014-10-16 Cost of Government Commission Minutes

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Ms. Garson clarified the HELCO bill issue and stated that the Office of the Corporation Counsel is located in the Hilo Lagoon Centre and she believes the electricity is included in their association fees. Ms. Maddox asked for a progress check from the Commissioners on where they might be in scheduling meetings. Mr. Espejo stated that he and Ms. Kelly will be reporting at the next meeting on the departments they have together. He will also be contacting the County Clerk’s office and might have it ready for the next meeting. Mr. Espejo and Mr. Perry have not had a chance to schedule a meeting with the Planning Department. Ms. Maddox stated the Commission has six more meetings before the report is due to the County Council. It was agreed at the last meeting that those who shared a department with Mr. Matsuda would schedule directly with the department to move things along. Mr. Mitchell stated he contacted Ms. Santos at Parks and Recreation and will be sending her the questions to guide and prepare them for the October 27, 2014 meeting. He will contract Public Works close to Thanksgiving. Ms. Maddox encouraged everyone to move things forward as they can and if they are unable to get a response back from a particular department, then to look back at the correspondence received from that particular department. Ms. Kierkiewicz stated she and Mr. Mitchell have Housing to meet with. 6. DISCUSSION/ACTION REGARDING FORMAT AND CONTENTS OF FINAL REPORT Ms. Maddox took Ms. Garson’s suggestion from the last meeting to pull some recommendations out of the various communications received in response to the letters the Commission sent out. Ms. Maddox made a spreadsheet listing all the correspondences received from various departments for reference. She asked the commissioners to review the list for possible recommendations and to contact Ms. Kualii to have them placed on the agenda for the next meeting as well as any recommendations they might have from their interviews. Mr. Mitchell has five recommendations he will get to Ms. Kualii to be agendized. Ms. Maddox stated all potential recommendations need to be submitted to Ms. Kualii by October 29, 2014 to be placed on the next agenda. Ms. Maddox asked the Commissioners if they are willing and able to meet longer at the next meeting, if required, as opposed to scheduling additional meetings. All commissioners agreed to have longer meetings. Ms. Maddox stated that a couple meetings ago, she shared a basic framework of the final report and hoped that would give the Commissioners a bit of a jump start. She will continue to work on the framework and will bring it to the next meeting for the Commissioners’ feedback and input. She is willing to share this duty with others and thinks this would help keep them on track for the January 20, 2015 submission of the report. 4