Okay, I'm going to call the order of this meeting of the Committee on Council Processes for Tuesday,
March 24th. Yes, 26th. Let's just go around the table and say who's here. We'll start. Am I right? Council
Member Sittner-Zulik, District 6. And I'm Council Member Isabelle P. Mott-Sniff, District 1. Hope you
pass through District 3.
And then we have two members of the clerk staff here who are introduced to the show. Susan Stalin, Deputy
Clerk, Sylvia McGill, Chief Deputy Clerk. Thank you for being here. That's right. We have one member
of the public here. Okay. So first of all, take a look at the agenda. It looks a lot like the agenda
last month, because we didn't get through a lot of the agenda last month.
Is there any motion to exchange anything? I move to approve. All in favor say aye. Aye. Any opposed?
All right. So first let's talk about implementation
Through our online process, let's say you just don't need to buy it. Where, what would you describe
that? Yeah. What would you comment that may not be right? Yes. Are you not going to check it? Where
do you think it's going to go? It's all about the time. Oh, OK. So you expect to have a comment on items
not on the agenda? Oh, sure. OK, we'll try to leave room, but yeah. OK, but I can pick everybody in
whatever I do. There's no way around it. Yeah, no. I appreciate a question. I didn't add a general public comment.
Okay, so let's first talk about the process for discussion at first reading, which council passed in
February. There are links in the agenda to an updated document that kind of goes step by step. So I
was hoping to,
have a finalized document that we could report back to the Council on April 1st. I did reach out to
Council President Asare, but it was only yesterday, so I know he's been very busy, to see if he had
any feedback. I want to throw it to the committee members. Do you have any feedback on
what's written here, or on how it went, or we used this procedure on March 4th. What are we reading?
Wait, stop. Yes, it wasn't. It is linked in the agenda. What do we need to do? It should be linked.
It's that mirror that I wrote down with the packets. Yes. Yes, I opened it yesterday and I was like,
where is the packet?
So the assumption is we will always discuss something at first rate. I think we do need to have an assumption
there to make sure that the public and the staff knows that we will be presenting and discussing it.
So let's start there. I can't remember when we did this before, when there was the motion to discuss
the legislation, did we have to vote on that motion before we discussed it? I think we did.
It would be bad. So I think that that is a fair assumption, just so that we're generally going to have
a motion to discuss it, and people don't want to discuss it, but they can vote no on a motion to discuss.
It should be.
So that would be option two. Yeah, I much prefer option two, personally, because I appreciate that it
makes it clear that we're not adopting it in terms of our discussion around it. And I think that that's
because otherwise, yeah, I just think that that helps the public and also kinds of members to be able to
It's just the expectation. It sets up an expectation that we're going to talk about it, but not necessarily
verbatim. And once we've motioned it adopt, then if somebody called the question, for example, then
that would end up triggering a different email in terms of. That's true. I think, at least. But then
you have to have unanimous consent in order to do something unperturbed. So it feels like that gets messy.
Or it's just discussing it. It's like there's a mess attached to that. And I think that's what we did.
Yeah, we did. So motion to introduce the legislation. Work reads by title and synopsis. Motion to discuss
the legislation. Then the staff give a full presentation. So we talked last time about
At first reading, it can be a full presentation and then at the second reading, it would just be a follow-up
based on our questions. It works for me. I also like that we have the opportunity to get public questions
answered. So we might think about how we could afford to read that or like submitting questions. I think
that's in there somewhere, very good.
Well, just because the option to number six, it goes from public comment and then move out onto a second.
I don't think we need to even like put it in the procedure, but I just wanted to be aware of what's
the, what's the process to get someone's public question answered. Further down under the procedure
for second readings, it says to us in the Bergen House staff,
Well, it says the answers to previous questions could be put in writing and included in the council
packet for the second meeting. Yes. And so I would say that we should just to some degree formalize
the procedure of. Either staff or council members. Your staff or to staff at the only word. Yeah, so
I have staff should practically go. Okay. Right.
members of the public have this question, I'm going to address this question later in the written comments,
or council members can, you know, kind of take up that responsibility and go, okay, members of the public
asked this question, I'm going to ask this question of staff. I mean, it's my, it's my responsibility
for the vice president and parliamentarian to ensure that, like, all of the, if someone is taking a
hair of public questions, so we can say, like,
I'm happy to, um, to sort of try it out. It will be the responsibility of the vice president to. I don't
think we need to sum up that, but I mean, I, I would prefer personally, I would prefer staff who's presenting
it to take that responsibility and kind of go, okay, like, I'm receiving these questions, even if they
are questions of clarification from the public for them to make note of that. Yeah.
Yeah, just because I feel like that's, I mean, part of what city staff should be doing is responding
to the public. I mean, they respond to the public probably more than council members do in a lot of
ways. I guess my concern is like, where's council oversight to ensure those questions are asked? We
have members that was like responsible for keeping track of what questions were asked by the public,
even if like it is staff expectation, but they want to do the full work.
I just want to make sure that we're keeping track of questions. But we don't think so. Yeah, I just
don't know if that needs to be like one person all the time. You know what I mean? But maybe that connects
to the other thing that's like down farther in our agenda around council members having to co-sponsor
legislation that comes from staff. So then maybe that could be the responsibility if we do that of whoever
the council member is, who's supposed to be answering that legislation.
I like that. I just want to make sure that some of it is responsible. Yeah. Because I think that when
we spread it out over the nine of us, no specific person will get lost. So I just want to make sure
it works. Yeah. And I don't want to give that to the same person all the time. But that, yeah,
that could be, that could work out. Because if it's spread out, kind of naturally. I agree. And then,
you know, as a sponsor of the legislation, we know that you have a responsibility.
All right. All right. Cool. Okay, so we like option two. Both options council members should put in
writing the questions they didn't get to and submit those by the end of the following Friday. Yeah,
so maybe. The following Friday, does that mean two days later? Yes. Yes.
that did worse out of the immediate following climate. I just covered four emphasis. And maybe also
we're noting of the questions from the public thing, like questions, you know, encouraging,
CCP is encouraging some sort of reliable process around sessions that might be brought up to make sure
that those questions get in.
Feel free to shorten that. Okay. That would give city staff or petitioners one week to answer their
questions before they place them in the packet. Well, one week before they're placed in the packet.
But that means that it's not the following Friday, two days later.
Yes, it's the next week. No, the answer is, questions are due two days later and the answers to those
questions get put in the packet the next morning. What would that work out with timing though? Because
if we have a first reading, say, where we discuss this. Usually we have two weeks between first year.
Oh, I suppose with students we have those deliberation sessions. Okay.
So then if we carry through with option two, in second reading, motion to introduce legislation, clerk
reads by title and synopsis, motion to adopt legislation. That's like how we do second reading. Yeah,
the usual. And then staff present any unique questions. Yeah, so the short presentations, potentially
remotely. Most member questions, public comment, most member discussions.
Now, the thing that we deployed with last time was whether to do a time limit for council member questions
at either the first reading or the second reading. I think second reading will make time make more sense
than first reading, just because I don't want to limit us when we're targeted all of the stuff that
I said earlier.
out of two weeks. Most of them should be answered. I agree with that, but I wonder if we can ask- Wait,
I'm sorry. I had a mind. You said it's 94 cents for second reading? Yes, that's a limited question.
Especially if we're going to have the staff person there in person for first reading, then it makes
a lot more sense being able to do that work while we have someone who's on the graph with us. Right,
and I agree with that, but I also wonder if it would be necessary.
They're all. We could. We could in our look for say, depending on. The issue at hand, the time limits
may be considered. Well, if it's like how it goes like, I mean, I just think that. I mean, it's not
like anybody.
to belabor things. We want like just to belabor them. I feel like the belaboring is more likely to happen
during the council member discussion slash. Or we already have time for some. Yes, which we already
have time for some. So I'm not sure that the question, I just don't know if it would be necessary.
And then for the moments that there might be something that say might be like big enough that it, that
we might want to have a third, you know, and like, like continue to talk about it just because of the
number of things get brought up. I didn't want to have to like have an extra motion to suspend the rules
to get rid of the time limits. Yeah. Um, so I guess I'll just leave that out then. And then if we, um,
have problems with it going forward, then we can add. We can also run around in like a six-month revisit
for CCD. Yeah. And say like after six months after effective baby. Yeah. CCD will reconsider this to
ensure that all processes are going smoothly. Yeah. That's great. OK. Anything else I should revise?
Most of them.
Do we need a vote on moving this into a memo as a recommendation for the full council? Move to recommend
the memo as updated in this meeting to the full council. All in favor say aye. Aye. Any opposed? I'm
thinking imaginary people in the room. Oh, wait a minute. Was I supposed to go?
I had seen now that it's not one packet. I get confused. I think I was supposed to go to public. Oh,
we know. We should have gotten public comment. Well, we've already voted. But is there public comment
on implementing the discussion at first reading? It says the very bad lines. I think, wait. No, it doesn't
look like it. OK. No, yeah, yeah. You can say your name for the record. Terry. I never read it.
Terry Amsler, my wife's not an English woman.
I went to look online for everything for this meeting, and the agenda's there, but there was no other
documents listed anywhere. Should there be grounds for this kind of stuff? I didn't look at everything,
but I looked at the readings thing, and I went to your webpage for the committee, and I went through
the agenda, I did a packet, but I didn't see anything. Well, to clarify, so the new process for council
and council committees, and also other
And that's, that's accessibility. Because of that changes and accessibility requirements.
easier to make things accessible in certain types of documents than others. So, yeah, yeah. It just
feels wrong to be of this way because we've been doing it the other way for like how many years now?
Sure, aesthetic sensibilities. No, they have. This is the only respond. OK. All right, so no other public.
Oh, Eric raised his hand. Here from him. Hi. I actually, since you mentioned the new format for documents,
and I believe, Hopi, you said that it's to make things easier, to make them accessible. I mean,
how does that?
How does that work? My understanding of Section 508 standards is that linking to other documents does
not relieve the requirement to make those other documents be accessible. So I'm curious as to how that
makes it easier. It's not that the link is linking to a document that's not accessible.
It's that it might be linked, say, to a Google Doc, and then it's easier to make a Google Doc, like,
fulfill the accessibility requirements versus a PDF. So, like, PDFs, I guess, just are really... I am
not the expert on this. I'm just repeating what Sava told me. Okay. Yeah. Like, this is, I think, the
recommendation from IT, just because of the links mean that not everything has to be, say, a PDF document.
And so then the PDSs have more complexity in making them accessible so they can link to another type
of document. Yeah. So I've looked into this a bit since various boards and commissioners have been doing
that. And I just want to make you as being on the council process as committee aware, I'm not so sure
that that's true. And there's accessibility for folks who are visually
have visual impairment or whatever. And then there's also just the general accessibility. And having
extra links, as opposed to a single unified PDF, makes them less accessible. And I think you can see
this if you tried to navigate some of these documents, like the Board of Public Works document, which
actually is of a few minutes ago. They still had not published a packet for the meeting today.
but you can look at the HPC, other redevelopment commission. And I think what you'll find is that they're
less accessible because you got to click back and forth. And I'm sure that that's probably going to
be true for folks who are using like screen readers and things like that. And in fact, the city has
a license for Grackle Docs, I believe.
that makes it quite straightforward to create a unified PDF. And I just, I'm hoping that maybe the council
can being, and you're the legislative body, you might, you look into this and see if this is not perhaps
making things less accessible and not relieving any burden of making things accessible in terms of section
508. But anyway, thanks for listening.
Um, I am concerned. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. We can check with our IT department about that.
All right. Next, we have the matter of consent agendas. And we have a draft legislation that was also
shared last month that I'd like us to review. And if it's okay with us, we can
Get that on the calendar to add a consent agenda. Yes. And then I had on our agenda for this meeting.
I had a few questions. I think we need to think through. My comments was the same, I think, as it was
the last time was the down the order of business.
like we have a consent agenda and then the approval of minutes if they were removed from our consent
agenda. And then two things later, approval of boards and commissions if they were removed from the
consent agenda. And I think that we need to scrap both of those and replace them with something right
after the consent agenda and something like consideration of items removed from the consent agenda.
What? If you look at the back of the bill, I know. I know. I am there. Yeah.
under 5A and I wasn't quite sure what that meant or where it should go. That was my note from last time.
Okay. So it would go after the reports. So do you think it should go after the reports or right after
the consent agenda? It doesn't matter to me. So what do you think? Like if we remove something from
the consent agenda, do you think it should be like, so we handle the consent agenda and then we handle
the thing that we removed right away?
or do you think that we should wait and then handle it? I think it might make sense to handle it immediately,
just because from a public's perspective, or we've already brought these things up, this is kind of
like semi-introduced, probably not what we discussed, but it is on the mind. Yeah. And so I think that
just for, well,
community members' ability to have a meeting, it might make more sense to put it immediately after.
So then it would become 3A. Would it become 3A or would it become a school? I'm just saying it would
go between three and four. It would go between three and the reports and the current approval finance
would distract.
Oh, that's because the approval of sense would go on to the consent agenda. And then six would be scrapped
because the appointment supports and commissions would go on the consent agenda. I think otherwise, I mean,
I personally thought that the list of things that we would put on the consent agenda made sense, and
the procedure for taking something off the consent agenda seems easy enough to accomplish if anybody
has concerns.
So if we put items of legislation on the consent agenda, should the staff assume that we might pull
it off and be present to present it? Talk about it. Yes. So the staff will always have a plan B at that
meeting. Which I think they will need. Which doesn't suggest they need it because they wouldn't expect it to be.
Well, what a nice treat to be able to go home after me. Especially like, I mean, especially some of
the ordinances that we got last year from the controller's office. Yeah. Yeah. Well, and they might,
and since they have to have two readings and we would have had questions that we're treating probably
enough to know, like, like that kind of stuff would maybe go on. It's not the agenda in terms of,
Are we allowed to put appropriation orders on consensus in this? I don't think so. Hold on, Ben.
I think also, oh, but we can vote on appropriations that are best in our theory. What? Any
vote on appropriations I have? It would be the same, I think, as voting at first reading, right? So
it would have to be unanimous consent and then two-thirds. Right.
I mean, some of the corporation ordinances are definitely like new money, but other ones are just kind
of moving money and then like we created funds last year to like, where to funnel things. I don't know
if there's a legal difference in terms of money. I think I was just saying some of those things are
not. Yeah, I agree in terms of legislation.
I can't imagine very much legislation being considered not controversial, to be honest. Okay, well,
AI tells me that yes, in Indiana City's appropriation ordinances typically require two separate readings
at different meetings as they are considered formal ordinances. Per count. Per count, well. Except that
that's not. Oh, the County Council can unanimously vote to suspend the rules to pass the single fee. Perfect.
So it's a very similar process. Right. But then if we put it on a consent agenda, we have to have unanimous
approval to vote on that. Yeah. So I don't think that we could. Yeah. That's true. So I think we would
only be able to put second rate side consent agenda. Yeah. But the other thing is, like, because one
council member can pull anything off a consent agenda, is that not already even in this quote? Like,
if nobody says anything.
I mean, yeah, yeah, I guess I would prefer to just kind of move forward with us in the beginning, not
putting legislation agenda and sticking with minutes and appointments and acceptance of reports, which
it doesn't seem like.
We don't usually have to vote on acceptance of reports, but we did a little bit last year because there
were, there were sometimes there were statutory deadlines about when we can receive reports.
And so we had to, yeah, specifically like say we received the thing, even though they couldn't present
the thing to us at the time. So, yeah, I think the other thing is like when we're talking about efficiency,
like we're trying to get to the legislation.
Well, that's the intent by which they can sign it. So I think it does make sense to do it. Everything
that's not legislation. Yeah. Anything that's not off it. It actually doesn't say in the description
that you made, Isabel, that legislation, you don't want to know. It says other non-controversial or
administrative actions designated by the Council President. This was written by one of our attorneys.
Yeah, I would say that legislation is not an administrative action. But.
I wanted to actually include some legislation, like we do the resolution for continuing our interlocal
agreement about the animal shelter once a year. We have done JAG grants in the past. We're just like,
yeah, we're getting this money. We're accepting it. We have done the building code authority extending
that another year. There are very routine,
resolutions and ordinances that could be on consent agenda, I think. And I thought that in the fall,
when we talked about consent agendas to start with, I thought that was, I'm looking at so many people.
Well, I certainly don't mind either way. But I think that in terms of clarity for the code, it might
make sense to leave legislation off until we at least understand
and have gone through the consent agenda process, it might be another thing that we'd bring up again
in six months. Okay. Do we know for sure that legislation doesn't need an administrative question? Because
I wouldn't necessarily assume that once you pass our attorneys back with your... No. So see, that's
like an attorney question to me. Didn't think that much, so... Yeah, and I would assume that it doesn't
include it. So we would need to have, I think, an attorney of us to define that term.
So maybe not bring this until we have legal counsel to review it. Maybe. Yeah, at least I mean to review
it and so so that we all know as counselors what type of things fall under administrative shows.
I mean, and maybe it does because, I mean, it's non-controversial or administrative action.
So a non-controversial action might be one of those resolutions that you talked about because they are
actions. But I would say that we definitely need to have a really clear understanding of that. And the
best person to get that from is the attorney that's looking at council's best interests. Okay. Well,
So we did clarify a few things. Consideration of items removed from the consent agenda. But it sounds
like the consensus is to hold this for a little longer until we can get it legal. That makes sense. Yeah.
Although you guys have discussed contract attorney at all. We did mention it. I think that's probably
in the works. Yeah. This could be something. I can go without checking the reading tab. And then this
note at the bottom about considering deleting the second period of protocol. That came from council
staff that is no longer with us.
Um, they were trying to suggest things that were short meetings and of course consented down that was
one of them. And then they also said, there's no reason really to have two periods of open public comment.
So we could cut one. Which is totally true. I don't really think it would make a big difference because
we hardly ever have anybody at that second period. Yeah.
Oh, I just looked for general, for general public comment. That would be, you know, we have, sometimes
Mr. M.G. even voices. Yeah. Just because, you know, he's the only one still there at that point. But
usually people speak at the beginning. So it was just, you know, I actually, when I, when I shared this
document with Michael, our intern to put it,
into a packet, I didn't realize my little notes would show up. So that's kind of a, just for some note
for myself. So we don't need to deal with that. I will say for the record though, that I do think that
sometimes having that additional period at the end, like something that we do during the meeting might
make somebody think of something.
And so it might not be somebody that was on the agenda side. So I don't have a problem keeping that.
I do feel like there's some potential purpose for it. I do wonder why it's 25 minutes in the first place.
It's not your full time. We don't usually run up against it. But I also feel like that's sort of a separate
issue from consent agendas.
and maybe what should require a different change. So going back to the agenda for today's meeting. Do
we need a whole comment? No. Let me finish. Hold on. The third item under consent agenda that I wanted
to talk about was how we would communicate with the public about this concept of consent agenda so that
they would know
If they have comment on something that's on our consent agenda, they probably aren't going to have about
too many to say anything, right? Or does consent agenda have comment? Sorry, I meant to watch a county
council meeting to see how they do it. Does anybody know? Please say, here's the consent agenda.
Any comment, public comments? Or do we just say, don't vote on it? I don't think there's public comment.
I'm not sure.
The interesting piece of that, though, is that if we just have, say, minutes and appointments to boards
and commissions on our consent agenda, which are our most frequent things that we would have on it,
we don't have public comment on that anyway. That's true. It is most of the things that we don't have
public comment on. So I would say, I would say no public comment, but the communication is,
If you are a member of the public very interested in making a public comment on one of these things,
then, you know, ask, get a council member to pull it off the consent agenda, because that would be the
way to actually discuss it, to pull it off the consent agenda. Yeah, that's true. Right, because if
we just say, but here's the consent agenda, and then go to public comment, probably something that somebody
says, to us to want to pull it off.
Right. So then, you know, so it's kind of like, okay, here's the consent agenda. Council member says,
I want to pull off the consent agenda because I heard from the public that they want to make a comment
on it. And then you pull it off, you're through to the consent agenda, you go on to the next, you know,
consideration of things, pull off the consent agenda. And then is there discussion? Is there public
comment? And then we go. Are any of these things, even things that we
I put public comments on it in the first place, only if we put legislation on it. But if we put legislation
on it, which I think it would be... Remains to be cut to not, but... Well, we can put a pin in that
too, since we're waiting for legal counsel to see it. They would recommend allowing us to put legislation
on it. Which, for me, that was the point.
Some of the legislation, I think, requires the public comment, like requires an opportunity for the
public hearing. Yes, if it's an item, I think appropriation ordinance is among them, that requires a
public hearing, then we would have to take public comment. It couldn't be on the consent agenda. Well,
and some reports also require a public hearing. I don't remember which ones anymore.
But I remember last year when I was president, there were several that I had to say, like, this is a
statutorily required public hearing for this thing, even if it wasn't. Like, it wasn't necessarily a
piece of legislation. But I think it was, yeah. It might be coordinated with an exemption clause and
be like, unless for a study by Indiana or something else. Unless legally required. There would be no
public comment unless legally required.
With whatever special words attorneys want to use for legally required because usually well. So we want,
or do we want to just say those items and not be on percentage. For example, you want those non controversial
appropriation ordinances or those resolutions on the consent agenda, but if you want to put legislation
on the consent agenda or leave that option.
and some of those things might, or even reports for that matter, like some of those reports that we
got last year, I would probably, if we wanna, because like there often wasn't public comment to those.
That's true, but we still have to author it. Right, yeah. I don't know, we're spending a lot of time
here to make our meeting shorter. So if we're legally required to have public comment, then of course we will.
Yeah. Either by not having the item on the subject of, or by allowing other comments on the consent
agenda. Or on specific items that are on the subject of that. All right. Well, I think we need to put
a pin in all of this. There's a chance of an error up there. OK.
prior to the meeting. So we have a comment via Zoom. When and how would the public request the agenda
change? Would that for prior to the meeting or during the meeting? So at this point we're not making
any final decisions on this but I think whoever recommended it would be prior to the meeting. I would
think so. Because when people come to the meetings they usually come to the meetings with a specific
kind of like
I'm coming to the meeting because of this thing. So there's something on our consent agenda that somebody
knows, like, that they have a question on, or they have a problem with, or they have a concern with.
They've probably done that. Yes. OK. Let us go to public comment on this item. And keep in mind that
we are not moving this forward as legislation at this time. We still need some legal guidance.
Anybody in the public want to comment? Yes. Briefly, I've been asking over 50 times. Please pull it.
I'm sorry, I'm doing multi-sharing today. I'm trying to speak for the last one or two. Anyway, briefly,
it's a very important thing. Thank you all for your work. Part of this goes, of course, to how you see
the value of public comment. We won't go into this moment, but I think this does inform what we're looking
for. We're looking for public comment or public comment or whatever.
What's the word? Instrumental issue is, I don't want to see the council to be tying itself up. We're
not able to respond to what's going on at the time. I like choice in a council meeting. You'd say, oh,
there's 73 people here. I'm exaggerating for a fact. It's not anything here you can talk about. What
is the protocol? What I think you're heading is what are the options you can do at the time?
where it might go here, it might go there. And I think it is generally for process, and I don't care
about the venue, having an ability to say, to make appropriate within the law, staff that's responsive
to the challenges of the moment, as opposed to saying, well, we can't do anything. So I like the idea
of this protocol for a choice, or what do people think. So you don't get the council member
people hating him or her right away just because the people are here and he can't or she can't do anything
about it. And, you know, so choice somehow in this, you know, some options to take stock of the moment
without meaning the moment should rule either balance at all things. But still, I'm thinking, I think
one thing I don't understand, you're only talking about it as my question is a public question.
I am still confused, and this is why I was hoping, Lord, that'd be simpler. Something I haven't done.
No? Crossly. Oh, no, not crossly. The president's here because I talked to her at this meeting, I want
to get my paperwork clear, what's happening with that whole process option for not just cross council
member deliberation, but public incentive, you know, that whole thing. So I don't understand to some extent
The choice-making around these things been in this larger, what I think, protocol established choice-making
for the council for where things go. And I'm not clear, tell me, and I'll try to clear it up, and then
go out and sit back there and quiet for a little bit. But there was a process. And I forget, I always
forget what it's called, because I do other things and teach and things, I get hearing, oh yeah, that stuff.
But there's that consensus process. We've had some meetings around what that says. I forget what the
title of that is. Deliberation sessions. It is deliberation sessions. Thank you. So this goes back to
the question, think about what's controversial or non-controversial or administrative or appropriate
for deliberation. Where, how, and who that's getting thought through.
I don't need to talk about it. I know there were communities, but I want to go on Sunday. So I'm just
saying, that's just confusing to me. Simply as a quasi-informed member of the public who pays some attention
when I can, that I admit I'm not paying all the attention all the time, even though I love this thing.
But I pay more attention when I've got nothing else to do. But so that's all. That's all. Those things,
I think, don't diminish the public engagement, obviously,
is trying to use it well and wisely. And it's a way, not only for informed participation, but to inform
decision makers. So we're trying, it's not just the same way I was concerned about the Novak report
being too instrumental in its what it was looking at and trying to solve. I hope you'll look at this
issue or public comment and relate it in its broadest sense of purposes and what it can do, and not
simply we never go home.
I mean, the council can never get out of Dodge because you never leave the room because they're there
forever. All real stuff. But I am concerned about how we make it look best over comments and processes
we can have. Thank you. Any other public comment? All right. Let us know. I have my hand raised.
I'm sorry. I did not see it.
Sorry, now. So in terms of the consentage, my name's Eric Oost and I want to express appreciation for
all your work because this is very important. The process is important. So the details of consent agenda
items will still be published in the packet, correct? Yes. And so if a member of the public reads
the packet, and you had suggested earlier is one possibility is that if they would like to have an agenda
item taken off the consent agenda, that they make that request before the meeting. So how would they
know to do so? And also, how would that request be communicated?
in a reliable way, to whom would it go? To any council member, to the council email address, phone call
to the council, staff, clerk, mayor. And then if somebody read the packet and saw an item on the consent
agenda and they were not aware of that protocol, and let's say there's 30 people in the room, how would
you determine
what those people are there for, and would that influence the decision to take things off the consent
agenda? I think understanding the desire for efficiency is important, and there are some things that
are perfunctory and probably could be handled in a consent agenda, but perfunctory things typically
can be handled
quickly anyway under the current process. But I think as Mr. Ansler was saying, you know, the opportunity
that we have here in Bloomington and in Monroe County government too, but to offer public comment, I
think is really incredibly valuable. And it helps the public feel like they have agency and are involved.
And I think it's important to maintain that while also
respecting the need for efficiency. So those are my questions, is what happens when 30 people show up,
and there's a Consent Agenda item that is of interest to them. How do you determine that? OK.
Thank you. I have noted your questions, and we can raise those when we get more legal feedback on this
item next time, hopefully next time.
Okay. Next item is whether we want to recommend to the full council that each item of legislation needs
a council sponsor. And this is a thing in some other cities. Actually, I talked with somebody from the
city court from Hattiesville today.
Um, and she said for resolutions, they need three council members as sponsors and for legislation or
ordinances, they need one. So I thought that was an interesting distinction. Um, but, uh, what, uh,
noted here on our agenda is, you know, what, how would this work logistically? Does the administration does,
reach out to a council member and ask them to sponsor something. Or do they bring items of legislation
to our council attorney or administrator and say, help me match this with somebody or county's referral.
So I guess I open it up to other committee members, whether you like the idea and then how it might
be implemented. I do like the idea. We could do it similar to bringing in the state house visit.
in which every legislator is allowed to bring so many resolutions and ordinances forward. It's not referred
to as ordinances at the State House, but whatever piece of legislation they have, each member of the
body is allowed to bring so many forward. And so that I know in one of our previous discussions, there
was concern that maybe one or two council members might be relied on to sponsor all of the legislation.
putting limits on, you know, putting some working stops at a bit of a year would circumvent that, but
I also acknowledge that they would probably raise some other issues. So we don't need to do it exactly
like the State House, but that is another, I guess, sponsoring form of government that we can come to
as an example of. It's a different line. I think that it's a good idea as well. I especially,
When I was thinking about this, I think it's, there have been many times I feel like where we've gotten
things from the administration and I've kind of been like, I have a really obvious question right now
that is confusing to me because I am not the professional in the field. And it's like, I didn't bother
with that. So I think that that's at least one valuable reason to have somebody who's not the professional
in the field, like get eyes on it just to be like, I want some understanding of this and from the perspective
of a legislator.
asking the questions. So I think that that's a good way to kind of preview for the department what they
need. So I like that. I appreciate that idea of trying to like spread around the responsibility. I'm
wondering if it could be done almost with like,
kind of aligning with what other appointments we have or like whenever you're going to be board of commission
kind of stuff in terms of thinking about like some of the brain commissions. So things related to video
planning would make sense to have me as the sponsor for that. And then the ROLO is on because so everything
that's sustainably ended maybe like it should go ahead and like, you know, like something like that,
of coincides them or, you know, in the same way that, like, we did the, um, the board mission, the interview
committee process, the liaison stuff, it's that kind of idea, like, okay, I'm, I'm liaisoning the Human
Rights Commission right now, so if they have something they want to bring forward, they should logically
come to me, right? And so a similar kind of process only with departments or, I don't know,
in terms of, like, first choice of
council member, because I also don't want it to get stalled on the administrative end because they can't.
You could put like a one, two, three. This is like council member Stoutford's first choice, but if she's
not available, council members will look at that next. I like what I've heard from both of you, but
what do you mean if
We go to this customer first if they're not really willing to distance well like departments, like for
example, planning and transportation. If that's number software is not available, or the other two councilors
they didn't contact for issues not responsible for the other options that they have because we don't
want to solve it because one number is willing to sponsor it.
Right, because I also have under the responsibilities of the sponsor while they should be able to support
the legislation. So it's like they go to the first choice and the first choice is like, I think that
I would vote no on that. But that doesn't mean, you know, if the majority vote no. Yeah, so I think
that having some options would preserve the council as a bodies economy while also allowing the individual
council members to be able to pick what they do or don't.
So yes, because I don't want you to feel like you have to sponsor every single piece of orchestration
about planning a transportation. But that doesn't mean that nobody else will be going to, so. Yeah,
I think that there are some types of ordinances where it's much more obvious what council member would
be the most appropriate. And we also, if there's something from utilities, it would be council member
Flaherty to ex officio on the utility service. That makes sense.
you know, what if we get something for radio ordinance, you know, a chair of the fiscal committee and
what I think the fiscal committee would need to identify something to sponsor that. Or maybe somebody
on the fiscal committee. Maybe it doesn't always have to be the chair. Maybe it's brought to the committee.
Right. Yeah, yeah. Interim committees assess legislation that is passed by boards of commissions, which
is very rare.
Which is very fair. We still have a process for it. We now theoretically have a process. I don't know
if we've had to do that yet. Yeah, and I mean, I guess I'm trying to think like what legislation would
I sponsor according to this kind of framework when I'm on the waste reduction board. So I guess sanitation
and recycling type thing.
Yeah, so when you were in council there, you might need if there's two people on like anything brought
out of turrets. Well, I don't know. Sanitation is public works. But there's like, there's an overlap.
Yeah, but it's like what else is under public works? So it's odd ideas. Right. And I'm not the liaison to
So there's seven sub-departments. It might make sense to divvy that amongst council members as well.
But I think it could be a similar structure to affiliate council members. So among council members,
we would develop a list. Yeah. Or like a broad framework. Like I don't want to...
I don't want to feel like we need to develop something so specific before we put it into place with
this, because, I mean, under the, how does the administration seek a sponsor? I wrote, we're gonna really
ask. Like, I mean, I think probably most of the time with most department heads, they're gonna be able
to pretty easily identify a council member that would make sense either with the legislation or somebody
who's already like,
Yeah, we're, you know, involved in one way or another. And so if we, I mean, what we're concerned that
we just don't want to be told to have the right to do all the work, essentially, like, is that the concern
that got brought up last fall? Well, or just like, that there are two, we're getting to the last numbers
that maybe like the administration would continue to go to the line of thousands of concerns that was
raised. And so to inspire more collaborations, I guess the body as a whole, it might be,
more productive to maybe say council is going to indicate interests in various departments, something
like that. Yeah. Yeah. There wasn't a concern that they just always go to the council president. Yeah.
That would make sense. Because then the council president always has to pass the gavel every time it's
president. That's true. It's true. Yeah. It's totally not worth going to the vice president. Yeah. I
think it would make a lot of sense to just
to be up somehow because what I don't want to see is frustrations between us because one of us is being
asked to sponsor a lot. And I don't want to see frustrations with staff who actually want to get stuff
done and accomplish things and then they get solidifying sponsors. So, you know, having a fallback in
there of, you know, contacting council staff to be like, hey, I'm having a hard time with this. Can
you help me? Or contacting the vice president or the president or whoever.
You know, in terms of that procedure, like if you're not finding. Yeah. Okay, let's go to public comment
and then we can talk about next steps. Okay. Is there any number of the public who would like to comment
Councilmember sponsorship of legislation.
So what do you think would be a good next step? I mean, I could draft a memo, I think that we would
have to change code to require a sponsor. If we're going to contact a lawyer about some contract work,
that might be another thing to ask about, which I will make a note to ask about that as well later at
the hiring.
maybe we should bring this to the full council for a vote before we work on legislation. What if a majority
of council says now we don't have to do this? Do we need to bring that before the rest of council as
part of our report from this committee? Yeah, I think it also might be worth presenting some of the
different options that we discussed just to get like a
I don't know, a little water test of how we strategize with people like. Right. Like in terms of about
how staff would contact council members. Yeah, yeah. Cause kind of, I mean, we basically discussed two
strategies, right? Like I've heard in Hopping and council members kind of have like sign up for what
departments or types of things that they want to be contacted with or like an automatic,
you play this role on this commission, therefore, you're the first person. I do think there's also the
question of, did we want to limit the amount of legislation that an individual cast member can sponsor?
That could be yearly, that could be monthly, that could be quarterly. It doesn't need to be like the
exact same as the state house does it. I'm not even advocating for that. I'm just putting it out there.
us a option that we have available. I don't know. I don't know that I would want to do that. Okay. Just
because I don't know. Like I don't want to stall legislation in there somewhere, right? So there's a
certain department or certain, you know, like category of things where just like there's a bunch of
legislation, you know, maybe it's all similar.
right, but there's still several different pieces. I don't want to cap on that. And I wouldn't want
to artificially make a department have to work with more than one council member if they were having
similar things. And I think probably because we all are for our time, I think that it's going to naturally
sort of distribute in some ways, especially if we have a list of
opt-ins or a list of first, second, thirds. I mean, it's natural in the fall, you know, like you were
going on vacation or two weeks or more on the day when all of the crap has to be in, you know. Yeah,
I was not put a limit on it. We could add that later if it seems like it's falling too hard.
I just wanted to bring it up. You know, it's interesting. Okay, so I work on a memo. Maybe I'll put
it all in the same memo. Thank you so much. Yeah, probably that would be. So should we ask this full
council to also vote on the idea of consent agendas? I think I think we have a decent amount of support for that.
We have mentioned it, I think, in level four. I think so. Or number four. And there were some questions,
but I don't think there was any strong opposition. I remember having some serious concerns that have
been alleviated based on the list of things. That's why I remember. Which we have not quite clarified yet. No.
legal council, so. Right, yeah. Okay, so we don't need to go on that. I can draft a memo and send it
to each committee member individually to see if we have feedback prior to putting it in the packet.
Okay. So for April 1st, I'd have to do that. Based on that, well, there is a chance that we don't have
a meeting on April 1st, because we're not saying
unless like something's supposed to fall off when it's dead. But it is likely, well, I don't want to
say it's likely. We don't have a lot of stuff just that's going to be running for April 1st, especially
because it's one week after our most recent meeting. So there's a chance that we will not be having
a regular scheduled session. It's going to work into something else. But I just want you to be aware
of that so that we're not, like you don't need to struggle. It's all in our hands. I appreciate that.
All right, we already did public comment on this. So let us go to agenda item five, allowing non-city
residents to serve on boards and commissions. So just going in the order that's on the agenda. And this
is something that we started in 2025. So council member Flaherty did report back to me on
the Environmental Commission where we find his name. So just for some background, so this came about
largely because the Bloomington Arts Commission had a member who was within city limits but then moved
outside of city limits and then thus was removed from the commission because that was a requirement
to live within city limits.
And this kind of opened the question as to, is it really necessary for people serving on some of our
commissions to live with good signals? And some of the commissions already allow people that are outside
city limits. Sorry, I'm trying to find it. Here it is, okay. So, from Councilman O'Flaherty,
the environmental commission is generally agnostic, maybe with a slight meaning in favor of allowing
the county seat to reopen.
Number one, environmental boundaries are different than city boundaries. Number two, the Monroe County
Environmental Commission has largely retooled focus on resilience, meaning there may be less focus on
other environmental issues via county commission for now. So that is the feedback from them. So we might
consider letting one seat on the Environmental Commission, be somebody who lives outside city limits.
The transportation commission, I think, I'm trying to remember, that was also Matt and he serves on
it. I think the main reason that we put that mission on the list is that they have one seat that says
we would like to have somebody from MCCST on here, the school district.
And the person recommended by the school district did not leave the city limits. I think, but I think
that detail was lost when he talked to the transportation commissioner. So he was going to talk to them
again. Well, with the transportation commissioner in particular, with, you know, ET, there are routes
that go outside of city limits and, you know, county does work with ET to fund those routes. So I do
think that it would be
worth having one person and that's not even saying this has to be reserved for a county resident but
to say up to this many seats can be county especially because transportation is truly an accessibility
issue and like there are quite a lot of people who live in the county you can't afford to live in city
don't this but that doesn't mean that their dedication for investment is willing to this future is any
less they just
when we got half the same tax rate, which, awesome. I would argue that the transportation commission
doesn't really care. Okay, I think like, because I don't think that that's, I would have to go back
to the language. But if we created it as a joining of parking and traffic and bike pen, and BT is a
separate. Yeah, that's fair. It was just an example, but I do think that
You know, when we talk about transportation, like that doesn't stop when we get to city limits, especially
since we have, I think the number is 16,000 people who live outside of the rural county but work inside
of it. And so I do think that it would be fruitful to have other representation. As you recall, the thing
question that guided our thoughts on this last fall was, does this commission make funding decisions
or advise on funding, city funding for projects? And the transportation commission does. And so the
mayor's position is if they deal with city money, they need to live in the city. Just to remind us all.
Well, I guess my question would be, when we think about the county,
Are we considering them a partner or an adversary? And I would like to say partner. And I do think that
the residents of Monroe County, I would hope they would like to say partner as well, but it's pretty
hard to be like a partner if you're shut out of all of it. So thank you. Okay, moving on with my recording.
The Farmer's Market Advisory Commission
already has county membership. It is actually a commission that is not in our city code. So the general
rule about having to be a city resident doesn't apply to them anyway. The NLK birthday commission. I
spoke with Dr. Gloria Howland who has a really good accessibility issue and there are a lot of people
who are invested in that specific
Commission who live outside of city limits, but would still like to participate. I have not had a chance
to actually go to the commission, but Dr. Howell, I believe, is the chair. So she would be in favor
of allowing somebody outside city limits. I would say it was more like diagnostic, but definitely there
was not any opposition.
then the Digital Underground Advisory Commission was also fine, but I haven't gotten a chance to visit
them, so I instead might send their chair and staff liaison a meeting. Okay. The CAS Commission has
had trouble having a forum to meet. I have
gone to their meetings several times in the last year and they're really still just trying to get their
bearings because they had a lot of turnover. So I have not asked them. I personally from observing them
think they would benefit from having more dedicated members and if there was somebody who was otherwise
qualified,
who interviewed or who applied. I personally would be inclined to let them serve. You know, police also,
it's just part of public safety and it's, you know, it doesn't change when you leave there sitting on
us, whether you are, you feel safe or, what's word for jurisdictions, at least, yeah, in this county.
Now, Cindy and I are on the same interview committee. I hope he's on a different one. Have any of you
seen applicants in recent weeks that were from outside city limits that you were disappointed you couldn't
consider or any feedback on that? Well, we had a post call with someone who applied for Historic Preservation
Commission.
who's had a decent application but did not specify their address. But we followed up with Berth, and
I say again Berth, across the week. But we, she reached out to, we gave a great role who confirmed that
they did limit city limits. But if she had not, that would have contributed to our inability to afford.
We are drastically short on applicants for not voting.
So what should we do next? And I'm trying to remember where
The Arts Commission was left off this list, not because we wouldn't consider them, but because we already
heard from them that they weren't included. Somebody outside said, is that right? Yes. And I will just
raise that there are liaisoners off. Not a field position right now. The city is still hiring for a
couple of council. Oh, the staff liaison. And who's the council liaison? I'll be honest.
But yes, I have had extensive conversations with multiple commission members about this, and they are
in favor. And the mayor's office was opposed because they do recommend funding. I believe they also
said they'll administer it further. Yeah, I couldn't understand that. They did.
So thoughts on, where are we going from here? That seems to be probably a muscle-asshole discussion
before we write down the dissociation. Yeah, let's have, so how are we going to have, I think it should
be a recommendation from this committee. Okay. Is it recommended and then,
or say conditional on the approval of the whole body. And that now, yeah, we won't recommend the allowing
of counties to be taught exercising emissions. Yeah, so. So I guess consider the environmental commission,
arts commission, the arts commission.
I mean, I would limit in each case, I would limit it to one seat. Sure. Transportation Commission, I
would personally limit it to the seat that CCSE is asked to fill. So I actually just like read through
that again, and it says two members shall be appointed, one by the mayor and one by the council. Preference
for appointments will be given to board members and board members or other formal volunteers within CCS.
So it's just preference. Right. It's not a requirement. And I'm reading through the rest of this. I'm
probably pretty uncomfortable with it being generally open to counting. Or just the transportation.
Just having like reading through the responsibilities and thinking about how they're
what they're potentially weighing in on, which is essentially city plans and city master plans. And
I can absolutely appreciate wanting to be a partner with the county, but I mean, you kind of said it.
So if you live within city limits, you're paying a few more taxes and shouldn't you be getting something
more for that? I think that you should be. And so I guess I'm kind of to some degree in alignment with
the administration line, like if you're handling a lot of city resources, then you should be a city
resident doing that. And I don't think the Transportation Commission is necessarily approving dollar
amount funding than the way that Arts Commission is. Though they may have some small grants in there
somewhere, but they're potentially approving plans.
like street plans and design plans, and then that impacts staffing and staff time. And so I think that
that's also kind of like having an impact on city resources. And I have a conflict about having somebody
in the county, I mean, our commissioners as well are part of the financial thing, but also it's not
as though there's a shortage of qualified candidates for those seats.
Because there are lots and lots of qualified candidates for those seats that live within the city limits.
And so once again, especially since they're dealing with some measure of, because don't they have, don't
they make decisions also about public art projects and things like that? Isn't that also, they don't
just give those grants, but they also do public art projects, especially because we have that funding.
One is for public art, one is for grants. One percent of the, at least to the convention center, I know
that has a different body to kind of govern that, but I don't know the answer to that, which time you
were getting. I do want to know three or nine minutes until our next meeting. You have to be downstairs
on the road for that. Yeah, anyway, that's my general view on that.
Okay, well, let's, um, I don't know, but we're almost to the open public comment. So, um, I will try
to get the cast commission and see what they think. Um, and hopefully we will have, uh, our fourth committee
member here at our next meeting, and then we can, um, decide how to move forward on this item.
So now let us move to a period of open general comments on the work of the Committee on House of Processes.
And I think everybody here. Very briefly, I'm not going to keep you from anything. Just on this, I will
briefly say it because there was one here. On the non-city residence question, that's a very bifurcated
view. You just narrowed this whole question, which goes to a much larger issue.
about city-county cross-jurisdictional stuff to solve and address issues that are issues that affect
people across jurisdictions. There are other ways. Think about this beyond just either non-city residents
out of border conditions. I encourage the committee to think about this. Open it up a little bit at
some point and think about, well, there's such things as they're designed for a little bit of parallel
architecture. There's non-official members.
that's official members kind of thing. There's different ways you can do things that may fit something
without getting into some of the real problem of the money thing, if I may say, you know, there's a
real stuff like that. So I think that could be a little bigger. The only other thing, the non item I
was going to mention as I made, is I understand, I've tracked for 10 years, I've looked here, the public
engagement stuff, including the public engagement director roles, which have been infused, talking with
Larry Catherine,
and I tracked the job descriptions thereof throughout. And interestingly, since I couldn't meet with
a new person because they were on board for a while, and then when I asked, finally, I thought they
weren't there anymore. And I understand from Bruce's conversation, there is no plan to retire. So this
is interesting to me, having watched this a little bit over time, and it just only comments here because
you're such an interesting commitment in terms of, I think,
the reach for good governance, if you will, and public engagement, if you will, and trust in governance,
if you will, that circulates about what you're supposed to do. I think NUSA takes stock a little bit.
Okay, what's happening with the city's attention? It doesn't underlay, to this whole question of even
public comment.
and how you inform people about what's going on. That's what I think a lot of people know. Some of them
are all the same, get to the root of it. I just think, take a look at this maybe sometime, because somehow
somebody should, it doesn't fit just in administration, it doesn't fit just in legislation, the little,
one of those big stuff things. And I think it might be time, if indeed I'm right on, what do I know?
I just talked random things, that there's no immediate higher thing that works.
That's for the public engagement director. I don't know why the person is there, nor do I need to know
or take your time, but all I know is there isn't a human. And the position as I read the job description
has never been fully attentive to the job description by anybody. And I know some of them, right? No,
not big time, close to nothing, but I know that they have had pretty good conversations and because
they clicked, different administration, right? So anyway, any kind of religious
You live to trust in government. There's a lot of money to be raised by the city. If you ever want to
pay attention to that side of it. Thank you. Thank you. Any other public comment? Okay. All right. Well,
we are next meeting the third Thursday at four.
Is that already posted? I don't see all of those on there. Yes, it's on the 16th. It's already posted
then? Yes. All right. Maybe I didn't get an official invite to it. So you are blocked out. You're on
it? Yes. I'm sorry, not April 16th? Yes. Oh, that is not third Tuesdays. Third Thursdays. Oh my gosh.
I didn't even register. That's a Thursday. I saw the T and it's Tuesday today. Am I carrying on? Seven
days of relief. And there's only like four Starbursts. We've got to spread it out. All right. So we
will reconvene on April 16th. In the meantime, I will work on the memo. All right. We're adjourned.
Thank you.