MIN CHC 1999-09-08 - Laserfiche WebLink

Home

BALOG: 1 guess the second question is one thing that was discussed too, in some prior discussions, was the amount of proposals that go on the Charter and having people actually being able to understand them. You brought up a point already about City and County of Oahu where the Mayor has flexibility. Is that something that your department would rather see than having about six or seven proposals go on the Charter just for Planning, along with other departments? Or have you guys discussed that, like I guess, Executive Branch with Department heads? GOLDSTEIN: No, we haven't really discussed this other alternative but 1 think it is true that the more changes you have to a Charter, that the more difficult it becomes for the public to understand the why, unless you start getting at, first of all, some of the foundational kinds of questions first before you go piece meal, the amendments. And for example is the issue of whether there should be two Planning Commissions. I think before you even get to that question you need to ask the question and decide for yourselves, whether there ought to be one County government or two, because that's really basically what it really comes down to. If you say, yes, we should have two, then other things follow. That's what I think. BALOG: understand. I just wanted to ask as you're going now, early on, so I can RAY: But, Mr. Balog, your question was more in terms of the process, doing things through Charter Amendments vs. doing them administratively, and your question was, do we need to be, or we certainly need to be aware of it, but concerned over the number of Charter Amendments, and maybe there's a better way to do it, is that more - BALOG: Well, she raised the issue of how Oahu has it in theirs so 1 figured that'd be the person to ask, and since she's a current Department Head, I don't know if they hold meetings and they've discussed this as a group. GOLDSTEIN: We haven't discussed this. RAY: Okay, Mr. Martin. MARTIN: Several questions, one you've possibly answered already but you made mention, again as Kevin has indicated, about Oahu having this system already in place. How long ago was it implemented and is there any feedback as to how it's working? GOLDSTEIN: The switch and the consolidation of the two departments was done last year. It's not clear how well it's working. The present Planning Director now has staff of about 300+ and so, I know that that's quite overwhelming in itself, but how well 12