2000-03-25 Charter Commission Minutes

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minutes 03-25-00Page 30 of 34 uncovered some serious government corruption and have come close to bringing down some public officials and it’s just ordinary, untrained people, for the most part, who had the power to do this. And it’s ongoing. It’s not just when a problem comes up. They’re always there, so the politicians know that there’s always somebody looking at them. Thank you. HERKES: Maybe we could do a better job of electing some of them, first. CHRISTOPHER: Well, that would be my primary recommendation. Solve things by electing better officials, not more bureaucracy. Thank you. IRVINE: I forgot to ask. There’s been some rumor that the Green Party was supporting the 6-3 election business. Is that incorrect? CHRISTOPHER: Yes, that’s incorrect. IRVINE: Thank you. RAY: Thank you, Michael. Brenda Ford, followed by Patricia Dahlheimer. FORD: I’m Brenda Ford. I’m speaking for myself. I support non-partisan elections, and I do not support the three at-large seats, for all the reason previously discussed. I won’t even go into those. I’ve stated before that I believe all Commissions should be nine-member Boards, one member from each district as they exist today. And I do not think those should be appointed by any Mayor. I think they should be subject to a nomination process within the Council district, and the Council member can forward those recommendations to the full Council for selection of one for each one of the Commissions. I do like the Department of Environmental Services, but I think you should go one step further at this time, and add the non point source pollution to it. Get it done now. We’re going to have to do it later anyway, so it needs just to be added in. With the Planning Department functions, I would vote no on this one. Right now, it’s hard for me because myself and my neighbors are the victims of the Planning Commission, and the Planning Department, and the telecommunications tower company. That is illegal per the Supreme Court. The department which, with non-qualified individuals, are making decisions and issuing permits in special ag areas and SMA areas inappropriately. They are subjecting the County to additional lawsuits at this point in time. I don’t think that the Planning Department should be allowed to continue with these types of permitting processes, and so I would not want to incorporate into law what is already going on. In fact, I think some of these things should be stripped away from the department. I have one question for you regarding number 9, the Safety Coordinator. Do we have a Department of Emergency Services in this county? RAY: No. HERKES: It’s the State. FORD: In the County? HERKES: Well, the State runs one. FORD: It’s a State function, not a County function. It seems to me that we should have some type of Department of Emergency Services, and that would be an appropriate place for the Safety Coordinator to be. And that’s just a thought off the top. I know nobody’s done any investigation in that, so I know that something like that would never make it onto this next election. But I think we should think about that. Planning Commission. I agree that it should be an advisory Board only. It should be stripped of every possible power it has. I’ll just leave it at that. All Department Heads should be professional, qualified, certified, whatever requirement is for professional standing. The file://\\coh01\cohweb\council\charter_commission\minutes\minutes 03-25-00.html7/1/2011