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minutes 10-16-99Page 8 of 75
<br />Council basically hires a City Manager type who’s the Chief Executive Officer of the County, and so he
<br />falls under the control of the County Council. You have any personal feelings on that? Have you thought
<br />about that much?
<br />GRAHAM: No. The only thing that comes to me is that part of the idea is to break the political nature of
<br />the animal and to bring it to a more professional nature, I think. One obviously gets a skeptical feeling,
<br />like I’ll bet they can be turned into a political animal anyway, even though you structure like this and
<br />that. I don’t know that for sure. My only thing would be, as much as possible, try to look at where else
<br />it’s been done in the country, and where it’s broken down, and where it’s been successful, and what’s
<br />the differences.
<br />RAY: John, you had a comment?
<br />SANTANGELO: Just real quick, a quick comment. We came right down to that again. It’s beyond me,
<br />that if you have single member districts, why you only have, quote, one person to talk to. It takes nine
<br />votes. It takes five, and in some cases, six. Why aren’t we talking to those people? Because you don’t
<br />elect them, and that’s why this trophy thing. Again, I’m only talking about what I saw that was flawed in
<br />it. There’s a lot of good about being a servant leader within your community, and being able to be
<br />elected. The difference between a President and a Legislature, and even our Legislature, and it’s what I
<br />liked about the County Council because, I guess, I’m just a trench, get muddy, kind of jerk, but it’s close
<br />to the people, and you will see your Council member far more frequently than you will see a House, a
<br />Senate, a Governor, a President, or anyone else, and so, there is that, just trying to balance that. I worked
<br />with Laurel Decker on Solid Waste. We had many meetings up here that had to do with the County, and
<br />frankly, if someone in my district was talking about a Public Works thing, I sent them to Dominic
<br />because he was Chair of that. We should be working for the whole island, and as long as it works that
<br />way, I’m just saying I saw it break down a bit, and I’m curious, and I thank you for your input.
<br />GRAHAM: Well, I thank you all for all your dialogue and all this attention to my thoughts. I don’t want
<br />to hold you up too much.
<br />RAY: Okay, thanks Bill.
<br />HERKES: Go on the web.
<br />RAY: Virginia, are you ready to go ahead and segue into - We have representatives here from the
<br />League of Women Voters, and before you got here, I explained that we have a wide open agenda so
<br />everything’s fair game to talk about, as far as what’s agendized.
<br />ISBELL: Sit in the pit?
<br />RAY: If you’d like to sit on the other side, that’s fine, and the microphone to please use for recording
<br />purposes.
<br />ISBELL: No, no, I don’t mind sitting right in the firing line. Actually, this is better because I can hand
<br />you things that I have.
<br />RAY: Okay.
<br />ISBELL: For the Chairman, I actually made a different color.
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