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district. It's not really just for the Council member; it's for the voice for the people in that district. Otherwise, what has happened in other counties in Hawaii and in other places is there is a certain progression, and the first thing is to reduce the number of committees and get them so that they are under your majority people, whoever they are, whatever the majority is. The next step is that the chairmen of those committees have to approve any bill that comes before it. I ask you to also look at this as not just important in terms of - - -It ensures that everyone from every district will be represented in each of these important areas that are discussed; whether it is Planning, or Finance, or Public Works. Just to clarify, as I see it, it is really on the committee level that everything is hashed out; the negotiating, and working, that where a lot of the thinking takes place. When it gets to the Council vote, it is more of a refining and final decision - making. So, the real deliberations happen on that level, so I would really encourage you to support that. On CA -19, which is Office of Council Services, I feel strongly about this, and I would encourage you to say the Council "shall" establish an Office of Council Services, rather than "may." When it gets into "may," then it's arguing, and should it happen in this case, and how much of a conflict will we see there, and how much finances. If you just set it up so it's separate and this is the person responsible, it works. Maybe this is from anthropology where structure helps to formulate good decision - making. I really see - -Tim Rees and I really agree on a lot, but I think this one he felt the other way - -that you are not really going to spend that much more. I see it that this means that you are going to have more input on decision making. You are going to have the Council members feeling that they have somebody loyal to them, thinking first in terms of legislation. If I was hired to represent the Council--just take the impact fee bills that have come up - -I would give them very different advice than if I was representing the Planning Director and going to court with Judge Ibarra. If I was representing the County in the Leslie case, where the Planning Director argued the word "shall" really is sort of discretionary, "may," and I just think let's keep things out of court. I just really believe in how can we structure things to prevent it from going way beyond by getting more input in decisions. I support this; I would encourage it just to say "shall." Maui does it, it means there is a commitment here to people. There is a different approach to legislation than there is to the executive branch. I know if I was working for the Mayor and we had to keep it all under our umbrella and everybody together, but I think it really hurts us. It certainly hurts when you look at the Hokulia case. I'd love to see how much money was spent there; and that case should never have happened. On the proposals for the energy and agriculture and the one for civil defense, I support these conceptually. What all of this is saying is that these are very important and haven't been treated the way it should be treated. Maybe by making this change it will bring this County up a century. I feel I very much like the director of research and development, and if he is able to convince you that they are going to make that level of commitment without making the change, I don't think any one would have a problem. What is our level of commitment? I'm on the Waimea Community Association board and I did a program last night for what is Waimea's emergency preparedness, and being more sustainable. We had 100 people and department heads from most every department, and business people and all of the non - profit organizations. We had 35 people speak who are working on this issue. It really became clear to me through all of this that the way for us to be more secure, more prepared and more 26