I'll call the April twenty seventh meeting to order.

If we could have our Pledge of Allegiance and Prayer, please.

Okay.

So for the record, I have Lori Casey, Cindy Purdue Dolan, Ray Lynn Brandle, Dan Denihy, Chad Silk, Cindy Shaw, and Mary McCormick.

Public comment on any item not on the agenda.

We don't have anybody in audience today.

So oh, excuse me.

Is there any public comment on any item in the agenda?

I didn't see him.

His head was down.

Okay.

Okay.

Any opposed?

Motion carries.

Thank you.

I don't have correspondence or study commission update.

Other than a little bit of information for all of you.

Denih and I will be meeting with Director Hassler this Thursday to go through some of those questions that folks were asking us regarding possible costs and um budget.

Mr.

Anruth.

Yes.

Chairman Brandle emailed me after that.

I did some additional research.

I emailed Director Hasler, but I have not heard back yet.

Based on my research, and uh after corresponding with uh Deputy County Attorney Sean Peterson, I do not believe you need to attach fiscal notes to anything you're doing because what you're doing is not having a direct fiscal uh a direct impact on no excuse me.

It does not directly uh affect anything financially, such as a levy or implementing a tax.

It could possibly have a back end financial or fiscal issue, but uh that's to be determined based on how the budget is dealt with.

So state law specifically states that um under the under the code that anything that our state legislature does that has you know that's gonna deal with something financially speaking, such as passing a levy or a new tax or something like that.

Yes, there needs to be a fiscal note attached.

Here, I can't find where it says anywhere that we would be responsible for doing that, so I just wanted that to be very clear with the council.

I did email director Hassler to see whether or not she or had been involved in anything in the past with regards to that, so we can get an answer from her too.

But as far as I am concerned, uh we're not responsible for providing fiscal notes legally speaking.

Now, outside of that, if the council wishes to provide them or have Director Hassler comment on them, I think that's perfectly fine too.

Thank you, Mr.

Anruth.

Um so the nature of our conversation that I reached out with Karen to discuss, or excuse me, Director Hassler was to discuss was some of those questions that people had.

You know, do we have budget for this?

Is there you know uh how much would this cost us?

Now we can't determine that because we do not set the budget, and I stated that very clearly with the council of commissioners, and I did have a follow-up conversation with Commissioner Thatcher, who you know called to clarify her questions regarding you know the fiscal note business.

And we discussed that it's not our authority to set budget, that it's her authority to set budget, and we could only conjecture as to how much it might cost.

Um but we have done our background research.

We know where the salary surveys are, we know about how much it costs for a commissioner, we know how much it costs approximately for a city manager.

Um and so I think it's fair to say we this is our pie in the sky estimate.

Um, but I don't know if we want to, you know, that's just for us to get information for our background pieces for this deliberations in our body.

Whether or not we want to bring that information forward, I think we need to have a conversation about that.

Um I feel very cautious because I do not want to overpromise or underdeliver to the voters.

And like I said, since this is not our budget authority, I I just feel cautious.

Mr.

Denehee.

Madam Chair, members of the commission.

We'll have a fairly good idea on Thursday with uh Ms.

Hassler's sort of um giving us a what she would think that the possible implications of what our options are going to be.

But again, um I'm 100% in agreement with the chair.

That is a guess that if we're not right.

We're really trying to, or if we're not right, people will think that we were trying to one way or the other not answer that question thoroughly and to the best of our ability, and we don't know.

We will have a better idea again on Thursday what it will be like or what the possible fiscal impacts of our decisions and the vote of the people will be.

Again, this is not our vote.

If people believe that the changes that we are recommending recommending to them is important, if they want to see a change, then they will see a change and they will either you know pay for it or not pay for it.

Um if the entire issues are let's do nothing because it costs too much, then that's their decision.

But again, we'll have a better idea after we talk to Karen uh on Thursday to give a report back to this commission on exactly what it could be and some options out there or some I wouldn't even call an option Karen's best uh available recommendations back to us regarding what this could mean in terms of fiscal impact for the for buttons of rebo.

So fiscal note, I absolutely agree with county attorney and Ruth that there's no fiscal note attached to this.

Um but it might be something we talk about and have something as part of uh being transparent that this could this could cost this amount of money.

But we better be clear on what that is.

I mean range it or whatever, but um to go outside that range would be I think uh not necessarily very good for us on our deliberation.

So thank you for uh thank you for uh listening.

I'll take Lori and then I'll take you, Cindy.

Um go ahead.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I would agree.

I think I think it's difficult for us to estimate what that is and what it overall impact it would have to the budget.

Because if the voters do approve these recommendations and go forth, there may be other ways to cut the budget that the council may look at and and the budget director.

And we're not privy to that, nor will we be, and so I think supplying a fiscal note to our report.

I think it's good to discuss and know, especially when we're still back and forth and discussing maybe how many commissioners and things like that, that it's good to have that information, but to supply a fiscal note, I think would be irresponsible of us because if the voters do want change, it will be up to the council to figure out how to do that change with the least amount of impact um through taxes, raising the taxes.

They may have to cut in other areas that we're not privy to.

Thank you, Ms.

Dolan.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Um, and I want to echo what Lori just said.

Um when we had our last listening session, I brought up that exact point that it's an idea, and we might have uh we might we actually will have fiscal impacts um to the Butte Silver Bow budget um with these potential changes that may or may not um be agreed to by the voters.

However, we have to look, and not us, but we as Butte Silver Bow and the Council of Commissioners and the Chief Executive have to look at the whole of government and how we are spending our money in the county.

And so if these changes are approved in any way, shape or form, to Lori's point, they have to look at the entire budget, and I don't um think that we should scare the voters by saying it's gonna taxes are gonna go up.

And so all of that um we don't know, and we don't know what that picture will look like.

And I hope that uh the folks that are in charge in Butte Silver Bow would take a whole of government look, and I think that's why Ben and I have been talking a lot um within the past year and a half about an audit um to look at where the money is being spent.

But that being said, it was probably beyond a likely um uh recommendations list um and hopefully encourage Butte Silverbow to do that um hard look at where we spend our money.

Thank you, Ms.

Dolan.

Any other comments or concerns with this particular piece?

I appreciate your diligence and I I feel confident that we were correct in our understanding and um I also feel very confident and correct with the way that we've been responding to public so far.

Um I just wanted to bring that conversation.

I think that when we bring back what information we have from Director Hasler, it will help inform us as we move forward.

Okay, so moving on to our new business, uh the public listening session feedback and recap.

And so this is just an open conversation of what we heard, uh, what kind of feedback we heard in person.

We do have our synopsis from Ms.

Adams to go through, and so I just open it up for conversation.

Ms.

Zhao.

Thank you, madam chair.

I think uh I made it to three of the open houses, and I I first of all I want to thank the public for uh coming and contributing with us, and I thought they had some great questions.

It helped us to, you know, kind of reanalyze some things uh on occasion.

But the uh I thought overall the attendance was was encouraging, and uh I really haven't had a chance to look at her uh Shanna's information just yet.

But uh yeah, I I felt like we all had something to contribute and the questions were good.

I of course the do-overs I'd probably have a microphone I could do brewery, but that's okay.

Okay, I think it worked out fine.

I I was just uh really pleased at the numbers of people.

They seem very concerned about certain things, but also the I we've gotten a lot of good positive feedback about what we've done so far.

And I will say that I am so impressed by our preliminary report.

Thank you all for what you did to do that.

Um and people are coming forward in with a little more trust and respect, I think, for what we're doing, because it looks like we're really we've done our homework and um trying to make this as understandable and then tr as transparent as possible.

So that's just my take on it.

Thanks.

I'll note that uh Ms.

Adams sent the email that we had 10 participants in Melrose, 37 at Northwestern Energy, 18 at Ramsey and 50 in Butte Brewing.

Um and then we had 456 survey responses electronically, and then we do have a pile waiting for us that are yet to be analyzed that were paper copies.

So we we will probably c get close to over 500, I would suspect.

Mr.

Dunnehy.

Madam Chair, members of commission.

Um I'm looking at the memo that Shannon sent out to us today regarding the pie charts and some of the questions that were asked uh earlier on when our when we're starting to look at what opinions that the people might have, and uh these are in no shape or form comments in terms of where we're at, but I think something we should list or be thinking about in terms of the chief executive and city county manager.

I think what we need to be very clear on, if the chief executive, the people vote for the chief executive, then the mayor of the council is no longer.

And I don't think that's clear.

We haven't outlined that to the public.

So uh and I think we've heard several times that why do we need a chief executive and a mayor versus well we don't, because if this if the chief executive uh recommend recommendation prevails, then there won't be a mayor, and I'm not sure what the numbers of the commission might be, but five commissioners maybe, I don't know.

We we still those are the things that I've been thinking about.

So maybe we can tack on some notes to when we have our final discussions and decision making after the public hearing, these could be some of the items that we have to um vote on.

So one of those is city manager, if it's voted for, then we have a mayor.

If it's chief executive and that's voted for, we don't have a mayor.

And if we don't have a mayor, are we gonna have five commissioners or four commissioners and well, five commissioners, four at large, excuse me, five commissioners, five districts, and the council of commissioners will probably choose who that chair will be.

And uh so we have to run through this in our head, and I just did that, and so confusing.

But I mean these are the important points that we have to make sure that people understand when they are when Matt has the language for the ballot, that has to be there because if you if they're saying, well, chief executive wins, and we have a mayor, well, that's not really uh lowering government or lessening government or making government smaller, making it bigger bigger, and that's something I think we should talk about and make a final decision also.

And in terms of the structure and the size of the commission, we have to we have to make sure that we have that down too.

Are we gonna have three commissioners elected with three districts?

Are we gonna have five with five commissioners and five districts?

At the end of the day, we have to have pretty final eyes on on what that means.

So we we should be thinking about, you know, I I vacillated between five and I went four and one, and then at a meeting that we were in Ramsey, it's like let's have three.

Why do you need five?

We're not that big.

Uh let's have three commissioners and and have them elected by district.

So those things are going in my mind too, and we have to finalize that in our deliberations uh at the end of our public hearing.

So just just throwing these out for food for thought that there we have done such a great job, I think, in this preliminary prelim recommendations, but there are still some tightness that has to be pulled back on the reins to make sure that what we're giving to the voters are the are what we absolutely believe is important.

So uh at the end of the day, we have to make some important decisions too.

Um in terms of in terms of the uh option one and two, I think that was fairly clear uh in terms of those sorts of things, but uh one of the comments that are in the survey is you know that's still we're still out there in terms of what the fiscal impact of having volunteers uh stand alone or volunteers underneath the the um uh county government.

So we need to clarify some of those things too.

Um and what the structure would be.

I think the structure is clear uh in my mind.

I think most of the people understand the structure in option two, but again, something food for thought in terms of our uh latest deliberations and our final deliberations when we're we're rolling this out.

And and uh I know we're probably um it's preliminary for us to be talking about this because we have not made decisions, we won't make decisions until after the after the uh public hearing and some of the uh more information comes in for the surveys, but I think that's where they're gonna stand and I just want everybody to think about it like I have I got a headache and so some of those things and and the and charter changes regarding departments, I think that was pretty self-evident.

So uh just just the some of the things that I wanted to talk about or throw out to the to my colleagues today.

Okay, I I do have it on the agenda to go through the survey separately too, so thank you for bringing it on, but that's great.

So we'll start with Ms.

McCormick, then I'll go to Mr.

Soak and then I'll take you, Ms.

Casey.

Thank you, Madam Chair, and probably I should just wait till we go through the survey, but I wanted to say, you know, when Dan made the point that if if we have a do the chief executive, keep the chief executive but reduce this number of commissioners.

Wouldn't the chief executive be the presiding officer of the council and have the tie vote?

So Mr.

Enruth, do you have an initial opinion?

Chairman Brandle Council, it depends on how the commission sets themselves up.

So currently right now, obviously they have um Commissioner Morgan, who is a presiding officer, Chief Gallagher presides over it, he does have tie-breaking authority on under s under their certain rules that they have right now.

So yes, that can be true that he would have uh tie high breaking authority if you had four um council of commissioners elected at large.

But it also again can be they they're set up internally would depend on how those elected commissioners would want to.

Mr.

Enruth, wouldn't the existing charter language related to the chief executive be intact though, so everything that's under that CE would be applied?

That is correct, and that's what I was getting at is is the two separate questions are sorry, and I combined them.

One is yes, he would have the tie-breaking vote as the rules and everything are currently set up.

Um and then how they set up internally would depend on if they wanted to keep the current rules that are in place or reset their new or put new rules in place.

Okay, thank you.

Is that the rest of your is that the end of your questions, Ms.

McCormick?

Mr.

Silk.

Thanks.

Ms.

Ms.

Casey.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I was just gonna tag on to what Dan had said and what we were talking about with the mayor and the number of chief executives.

We also heard an idea that we didn't discuss at this council because we did discuss whether they should be full-time or part-time.

And one of the ideas that came out of um the Ramsey meeting was if you stayed if the voters stayed with the chief executive uh form of government, you may go to a reduced number of commissioners, but they may uh remain part-time.

Uh maybe at six, maybe at seven and remain part-time.

But if you went to a city manager form of government, maybe you need only three full-time commissioners.

And so there was the idea of the full-time and part-time in that discussion that I think we need to further look at.

I know this commission has talked about the full-time, part-time, what should we do?

But I that was one idea that was also thrown out that I don't really think we thought about in terms of if we stayed with the chief executive form of government, still reducing but allowing them to be part or recommending that they remain part-time.

Uh, Ms.

Casey, in that in that example, I'm trying to envision the ballot again.

So in that example, we wouldn't be having on the table that you could retain 12.

It would be a chief executive and a number of part-time, or a mayor and a number of full-time.

Um Madam Chair, I think that would be the question of how to do that, and I am not sure we can't give the voters the option to stay with 12 as is.

I I get that those are ballot questions that I don't know how would be because it seems to me you would have to allow the voters the chance to stay exactly how we are.

So would every okay so I I don't know I mean it was kind of an idea thrown out.

I don't know we I did see some examples of sub questions underneath ballot questions.

I don't know if it could be something like that.

I quite frankly I I don't know how that would propose but it was just an idea thrown out that I think's worth discussing.

Mr.

Danahy and then I'll go around the horn.

Thank you Madam Chair to Laurie's point is I think every one of the questions has to be in the affirmative and I'll have to ask our legal counsel about that.

But I would imagine that it has to be for continue continuing the existing government with twelve part-time commissioners.

That's that's would be one of the ballot issues.

And under that we have the merit of what we could do.

We are for changing the council commissioners to a five member commission part-time membership through districts or at large and I don't know how many bytes at the apple you could have I mean we by if you really bring this out there you could have seventeen different sort of ideas after keep it at the same right so we have to make sure as a commission we're pretty tight on what number we want and whether or not under the that number we will have for example five commissioners part time commissioners or full time we haven't discussed that but whatever the number is whether they're full time or part time we have to make that decision.

And then under that excuse me under that we could ask is it full time or is it there going to be part time and I don't know if there's there's another thing too yeah but full time part-time is paid I would imagine but it could happen you could ask that question.

And I guess the question that I have for Matt is can we have a mirror of different selections or different options under the main portion of the of the ballot issue.

Madam Chair Commission I actually started that email chain last week with the uh Secretary of State and their election process people and I got back present to us basically what you're looking at trying to do.

So I don't have an answer but because I knew we were starting up our uh commission meetings again and that we were getting close to that um I fired that conversation back up so then I can present that to them and and say can we do it this way?

And I and uh we do have to have option number one as leave it the same you know or five commissioners or this and so that's where do those add up under our amount of questions or not.

And so that's we're gonna have to lay those out and and see because those are technically changes to forum in government.

You know so we're we're modify we have to say five full time commissioner or four full-time commissioners and a mayor or can we say one, two, three, four and give them the options.

So that is a question that we're gonna get answered once you guys bring in a little bit more on what you're looking to do.

Madam oh I'm sorry I was just thinking maybe it's just a discussion here and then we affirmatively decide what we want to put on the ballot um but I I think it may be worth a discussion.

Absolutely I have Ms.

Shaw and then I'll come back to you Ms.

Duncan thank you madam chair call me crazy but I think we our first blush of all of our surveys and everything from beginning to now the people want to reduce the number of commissioners from twelve that I thought that was I just read it here again.

We asked if you want to reduce it and then you want it then the next question is how many so I I don't believe that we'd ever stick with the status quo of twelve on you know part-time commissioners I think we decided that the people want not us but the people want less commissioners that have more responsibility and more ability and and more desire to be a good commissioner with being paid so I I I thought we might be still sticking with uh what we have been hearing so far and uh you know as far as how many that the second question was let's see we look at the answer here uh for yeah and again the the mayor part was a little bit confusing I thought and uh although to me it's kind of clear but I remember being a chairman of council so I can I get the whole purpose of of that and uh and I think we were we also felt from the public that we were kind of steering away from a chief executive that breaks ties you know I just think that we're we're trying to make this more uh equitable as far as legislative and executive branch so I'm not sure if we even want to have a discussion about whether we're going to keep twelve paid by stipend.

And uh and I think we were we also felt from the public that we were kind of steering away from a chief executive that breaks ties.

You know, I just think that we're we're trying to make this more uh equitable as far as legislative and executive branch.

So I'm not sure if we even want to have a discussion about whether we're gonna keep 12 paid by stipend.

Ms.

Dolan.

Thank you, madam.

Oh, did you want to go county attorney first?

I was just gonna say we have to keep it on the ballot.

Okay.

You have to give them the option of keeping it the same.

Otherwise, the commission is essentially directing a new form of government, but you get to pick the new form.

You have to give them the option to uh maintain or retain, excuse me.

Ms.

Dolan.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Um couple things that I kept hearing too um over the listening sessions, and I too was so pleased with the turnout of the last one with I thought it was over 50 people, so that's just so great.

Um with regard to the mayor role, and that was the most confusing.

I think everybody felt that um trying to figure that out with the folks in the room, that maybe we change it and change the label to um if we put forth you know three or four, whatever the number is of full-time commissioners, and take the mayor name out, because that's confusing people, and say this is um and and it was a continued conversation of are they in the executive branch, are they in the legislative?

And I think Dan, you you um tried to handle that and did very well in explaining that to folks about you know, this is we're trying to make that create that balance back again with some more full-time people that can do the legislative business of the county.

So maybe it's the council chair at large um who also has a uh an addendum of roles with ribbon cutting and going to conferences and being that front face of butte, but to say they are in the council of commissioners.

They will chair that meeting and they will be um the um they will run that meeting and be in the legislative branch.

That might be a possible solution or an idea just from the the input that we've gotten from folks um across the county.

Um the other thing I wanted to mention was um back at Ramsey um there was a discussion about, and I don't know if this was um misspoken or that it's a potential um that said with regard to fire service that well maybe option one or option two might not end up on the ballot.

And I was kind of shocked by that comment because we have spent and we had a subcommittee of fire services to go through and create options for volunteer and for paid to work through the language to try and make it as fair as possible to give folks in the county the options of would you like this or would you like this?

And i I wanted someone to correct me on the record if I misheard that um or if that is a potential because I don't think we would do a disservice to Butte Silver Bow again if we do not give folks options because they pay for everything.

They are the taxpayers, and every ten years they get to decide what happens in the county and whether or not folks like a certain option or not.

Um I just was kind of sh taken aback by that comment and Ramsey.

So I just wanted to get clarification.

Mr.

Didney?

Um Chair, I think I would made that comment.

Uh but it was more a holistic comment on a lot of things might change from this preliminary, not not specifically option one and uh uh option two.

My comment was regarding the entire recommendations, what you see tonight might not be the same what uh what you'll see after we hear public comment and after we hear uh the public hearing.

So I made that comment not specifically for the fire department options, but for the entire list of recommendations that those things might change given the input that we have from the public and given the input from the from the uh from the public hearing.

So if I I I didn't misspoke, but uh didn't misspeak, but I think it could have been a lot uh better explained.

So that's what I meant by that.

Mr.

Enro.

Uh Chairman Brandle and Commission, but it's also a correct statement.

You guys have to make a majority vote for anything that you put on.

So hypothetically speaking, you don't get a majority vote to remove the volunteers from the charter.

Um so the I mean those are technically two separate things from my understanding.

One of them is an option for removing, one of them is an option for bolstering uh uh the current fire department's authority over volunteers and correcting that language, those are two different options.

So you need majority votes to put both of them on the Mr.

Enro, thank you for that.

That was also my understanding that we would go through each, we'd have the language for each, and then we would vote to affirm or deny which is going forward to the ballot.

Ms.

Dallin.

Um thank you, Madam Chair, and thank you for those clarifications, Dan.

I just I was thinking that I had misheard that, so thank you.

Um I appreciate that.

And along those lines, I just wanted to make, and this is my two cent comment, you take it with a grain of salt if you'd like.

But I noticed, and I I blame myself because I've tried to be very meticulous and looking at all of our documentation and things that we've done and moving them out to the public.

Um with regard to the second survey, um, and you see um the survey results in, and I know this is later on the agenda, but I just wanted to make this comment.

Um the option one, option two for fire, and it's clearly 64 to 38 percent.

Um, but I just wanted to make this one comment.

We tried to make the language as clear and articulate as we can and fair, but I noticed that in the setup of the survey, even on the paper, and I don't know, I didn't look digitally, but I'm thinking it's probably the same digitally.

Um if you look at the paper copy of the survey under fire services, it says option one in red, option two in green.

And I was gonna let it go, but I thought I'd just make the comment on the record tonight that you know stop green red, green go.

And I just like subliminally probably could have used better colors for that.

Um, but I'm going to getting really in the weeds of um of documentation.

But I just thought I'd make that comment because I saw it and I thought I was kind of hmm, okay.

And I just want to put that on the record.

Thanks.

Ms.

McCormick.

Thank you, madam chair.

It seems like with fire services, like everything that we're putting forward on a ballot issue, we have two things that the voters can choose from.

It's an either-or situation.

So we have to have two things that the voters can vote for for fire services.

We can't just put um, you know, we're seeing an overwhelming thing for option two.

We just can't have option two on it.

But at the same time, we can't go back to the existing language in the charter because of the ambiguity.

I mean, that's what we're trying to solve.

So to me, we still need to have both option one and option two on the ballot.

Can you just give the voters a choice?

You get a choice.

You can't just vote on I think though um it's that you it's the affirmative, right?

So county attorney, there would be question like retain the chart existing charter language or retain, you know, vote for this option, blah blah blah, whichever one it is.

Chairman Brandle Commissioners, that is correct.

It starts out with retain or this or this, and again, you have to have a majority vote to put each one of those on.

Also, if it is retained and kept the same, um, a declaratory judgment action would need to be filed and have a court to determine if that language is specific enough or not, because that's the only thing that's going to override the attorney general opinion.

So, yes, there is an actual third option that is not part of any any of this.

So if the voters chose to do nothing, they would be up to the county at that point to determine how they would like how it would like to proceed forward.

But yeah, you it's it's the same as changing the form of government.

You can't force, in my opinion, you can't force the voters into two new options.

You have to give them the right to retain the first one.

I think that was a rather robust discussion that we had about maintaining status quo in this meeting, and then we talked about we are not affirming status quo.

We'd like one or two options, like option one or option two.

We have a choice.

We want there to be a change, but there was the possibility that the voters could say we are just staying with status quo, as I recall the conversation.

I'm getting some headshakes, that's not how we recall.

Well, thank you, madam chair.

I don't I thought when we were discussing that is that when we were talking about the powers, the structure, the structure of government that we had to make we had to maintain the state status quo.

We had to have one voter option is maintaining the status quo, and then another voter option is to change.

But when we got down to the other things that weren't part of structure, I thought I heard, and and I and I'm it I could be very well wrong, and I probably on, and it's really not that important that we could not present the status quo and just have these two options for fire services.

That's what I understood, but I'm I could be wrong, very well wrong.

And in the whole scheme of things, I just want to make sure we do things right.

That's what I care about most.

But um Yeah, I I think we have to have even if it's a um just a grammatical revision, they can choose to reject that revision.

Is how I this I'm just going all the way back to our first meeting with Dan Clark.

Um so that is uh Chairman Morandall Commissioners, that is how I understand the legal obligation, yes, is that you have to allow the voters to retain the right to keep uh I was like that's gonna hit the ground.

You have to give the voters the option to keep their charter the way it currently reads, whether we or as a commission believe that that is correct or incorrect.

Um so hypothetically speaking, you could get for fire services the option of keeping it the same or removing the volunteers.

You might not even get the third option of bolstering the language, or you can get the reverse, keeping it and adding or adding the additional language as the two options.

Those options that go on the ballot all depend on how this council votes and what comes out as a majority.

Thank you for for bringing that up for so we can get some clarity.

Mr.

Swoke, you have a question.

All right.

Um so uh do we want to move through the Ms.

Um Casey brought up you know some suggestions that came forward.

Were there any other suggestions in open houses or meetings that we might want to think about that haven't been addressed?

Mr.

Denny?

Madam Chair, I've just not only are we tormenting.

But I did say it.

Not only are we have to really think about what we're doing, but even in the survey, four commissioners and one mayor, that that received 53.3 percent.

And then 34.8% said they weren't sure.

And then only a fraction, 12% said would they like three commissioners.

So, you know, as as we are struggling with that number, I think the community is too.

So just uh, you know shore up that we're not the only ones that are still talking about this or thinking about it.

Mr.

Dunnehy, I appreciate that that comment.

And I think loud and clear, we also heard that people want deeper education.

Like they were asking us if we were going to be publishing some sort of voter information guide.

They wanted to know where they could find out more information about the different forms.

So this commission has a little bit of work to do once we've decided which which initiatives we're bringing forward.

So there's there's that as well.

So if we want to, we can move on to the survey results and look at these now.

Um go ahead, Ms.

Dillon.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Just from what you just said, I just have a question.

Um for us uh as study commissioners, once we put out the information and it gets solidified and put on the ballot, um, that being likely July, am I right in that?

Okay, so in July.

Then going forward, what is our role?

Our is our role to, I mean, I don't think our role is to get behind a certain item and say push that.

We came up with this array of facts and data and information, give it to the public, and say this is going to be on the ballot for you to choose from.

My thought is it's incumbent upon those in effects, be it commissioners, chief executive, fire, be it uh paid or volunteer, and the folks that work in the different departments that are affected, if those things all go through.

It's incumbent upon them to do that education and make the argument for A or B or C or D.

I don't think that's our role, but please let me know what our role is after we present this all to the folks in July.

Um Ms.

Dillon, I can take a crack at that, and then I'll I'll pass it off to Ms.

Shaw, who can probably talk about her lived experience.

So you are correct, we're not lobbying an issue, we're not supporting one or the other.

We've presented them.

We've done our analysis.

We present the final report, which has all of the information in it based on our evaluation of those options.

And then um Mr.

Willerly had stopped by and given some cards that were uh voter information cards for people to look things up as they you know could look back into the preliminary report, they could go back into now they can go back to our YouTube meetings or other sources, but educating the public as to you know the ups and upsides and downsides is is certainly in our our um purview.

Um but it isn't lobbying.

It's rather here's the options, here's the possible outcomes of those options.

And especially I think you know, answering the questions like we did the other night, like why do we need a mayor?

I mean, those are good things to answer, you know, in that situation.

Ms.

Shah, do you have anything to add?

Well, I don't remember what he did yesterday, much less 20 years ago, but I'm just kidding.

No, we we that was the same thing that we had come against, not against us, but you know, we we were concerned we we're here to review and recommend, and the recommendations are based on what we got from the public.

And that's basically it.

And if we keep that in mind, I mean I'm sure people ask us questions, and we can I believe we can answer questions just as far as the uh the meat, the meat on the bone of what we're doing.

But and it's tempting sometimes to want to project our own opinion.

I always say you're one on one vote, you know, and and we're depending on the public.

But no, you you hit the nail on the head, that's exactly what it was.

And I think we as a study commission, we probably were thinking ahead to maybe some transition things or or just you know, things that could occur that have nothing to do with the voters' uh decisions on anything, but just the path that we had to take to get this to the end.

And everything we recommended, all six items were overwhelmingly agreed on, so there was work to be done after that in a transition mode, but that's that's basically it.

I mean, we're not washing our hands of it, but I I still have people come up to me and ask me questions.

And uh, there's no harm in that, but it's a fine line between that and trying to push an agenda or anything, not saying that we'd ever do that, but I wouldn't want to even have the uh the whiff of any kind of impropriety in that regard.

Ms.

Gacy.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Just looking back to the local government review study information that they gave us, they specifically say the report summary should include the most concise, convincing arguments for the commission's recommendations.

Then you publish that in a local newspaper.

So I think that's as far as we probably go is to refer people to the final report that has whether we're recommending a chief or a city manager because of the these things that have are pretty much outlined right now in the preliminary report, but then it does say that you re you publish that in a newspaper, or if it's too long, then there's some other ways to do that.

But I think that's probably as far as we take it to remain unbiased on the recommendations that we're making.

Ms.

Dillon.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I just add too um that maybe as we move forward um and uh get to July with our work to really reiterate to folks that the the decisions they make in November and what will ultimately be on the ballot and why we're we are pleading with people to come to the public hearing next week is the fact that these decisions will be in place for at least 10 years.

And I think a lot of people were learning that at the listening sessions.

Oh, that's right.

It's 10 years.

And so uh to Cindy Shaw's point all the time, what do what is it gonna look like 10 years from now, or even 20, because it's been 20 since we did our last study commission in Butte.

So these are very consequential because we don't know the future.

Future's gonna change.

Things are gonna really change, hopefully, um uh positively, but just to let folks know we don't get another crack at it for 10 more years.

All right, folks, any other comments to that end with the education?

Mr.

Dennehy?

Sorry.

Uh Madam Chair, members of council.

I I think what we did 40 years ago when I was the ex official.

And yeah, absolutely everyone, yeah.

So the study commission there had the as we did the summary and conclusions and the existing plan, the proposed plan, and why we did it in the comments.

I think that was a useful tool for educating after um after our decisions are made.

That was looked at a lot by the public, and there were some funky things in there.

I remember changing the law enforcement to the Department of Public or Public Safety.

And the they the study commission did some really cool things that that I thought really out of the box, kind of like we were providing recommendations too.

But at the end of the day the voters overwhelmingly denied or didn't the whatever the recommendations were, they weren't get they weren't going for it.

They wanted the a different sort of opinion.

And and that's that's great.

But we didn't lobby for any of that.

We said this is what our recommendations.

It's right in front of you.

Here's what the existing plan looks like.

This is what the cut study commission thought would be a better direction, and this is why the evaluating comments why we did it.

And they all took that and at during election day, it was a overwhelmingly great, but we don't agree with you.

So we want it as it is, other than the nonpartisan partisan election decision that was put on uh at the last minute from doing some horse trading between the Republicans and the Democrats, and it won by 42 votes of nonpartisan.

So it it not very much, but that's how it worked.

And so there's some things that I thought was great.

You know, young, I was a young guy, he swear to God I was a young guy.

I thought this was a greatest thing ever for local government to change.

And I didn't really I was so young and so naive that it came back and nah.

Sorry, boy.

Sorry, buddy, I don't care how many schools you went to, this is not gonna happen.

And and uh it was overwhelmingly uh, but we did get nonpartisan parties and elections out of it.

So yeah, that that's and we didn't go out and and lobby for it at all.

We just gave the submarine conclusions and the existing plan and proposed plan and let people decide.

And they sure did.

Okay, let's move on to the survey results.

I think we've been in and out of this this as well, but um like you said, we this is not all of them are not in yet, so we have more to go with uh she has to do the analysis on the written ones.

Um but it looks like our chief executive city manager, you know, we have 52 percent are saying they they like that appointed city manager, and then a appreciated your comment, Mr.

Dunnehy about there's some significant pieces of these pies that are not sure, which to me is you know important that we keep in mind that we need to, you know, that chart needs to be out in public.

Thank you, madam chair.

I'd also mention that uh while we'll probably have a better number and sample with the survey of over 500 compared to the first survey, which had almost 400, um, probably well more than that.

Um we do have thousands of people that are still wanting to be engaged.

So um, yeah, that's what I wanted to say.

Thanks.

With that, Ms.

Adams was asking, you know, how long do we want to leave the survey open for?

And you know, I'd like us to talk about that a little bit because the point of the survey is to help us feel good about which initiatives to move forward, but we could certainly leave it open longer if you know, past our you know, made deliberation time.

If we want to leave it open to the end of May and try to get more in there, I don't I don't know what you guys' thoughts are on that.

Maybe just think on it.

Yeah, I don't uh you know it's I go back and forth.

So um I'll start with Ms.

Dolan, then over to you, Miss Casey.

Um thank you, madam chair.

I think maybe um waiting until we see the turnout at the public hearing.

Um, but I am always in favor of more information we get the better.

And so if we are can leave it open for a while and and have some more um outreach, um, you know, be it radio or chamber or wherever else to say keep those surveys coming in, if we can move that out further um and expand the reach, great.

Ms.

Casey.

Thank you, madam chair.

I appreciate what Cindy said, but I also worry that every time we extend out, we're extending our deadlines.

I would be in favor of leaving it open a short time after the public hearing in case the folks that were at the public hearing and are engaged would like to take it, but I'd also kind of like to see it wrapped up so that we can make our affirmative votes and get the ballot language done, because I just fear we talked earlier that we're running out of time.

And while it is great to have that public engagement, at some time we have to call it in my fear is is if the survey is still open and we're going and we're gonna try and do some affirmative votes on what to put on the ballot, we'll be saying, well, we'd like to see what the survey says.

And so that's kind of my fear of leaving it open longer.

I'd be in favor of closing it a short time after the public hearing though, and so that that people may hear again that it's there is a survey online and they can go on and do it.

But I think I'm just worried that extending it may push us past what we need to get done.

Thank you, Ms.

Casey.

I was thinking, you know, I wouldn't know what the point of that analysis would be beyond our deliberations time, right?

And we we just we are on the clock because July 7th is when our final report is due.

So in my mind, our initiatives need to be written, our ballot language needs to be at least 95% clear, so it's in the report and we understand where we're at.

But so that you know, if we move back from July 7th, yeah, that puts us at July 15 or June 15th to have those initiatives written by Mr.

N Ruth, so we have time to write our report, which pushes us back to making our decisions pretty much as I I stated earlier around the 11th and the 18th, you know, those those two meetings.

Ms.

McCormick.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I definitely believe that the survey should be concluded and this and the um findings to us by the May 11th meeting.

I mean it could stay open for a couple days after the public hearing and it should.

But you know, we've got to give Shannon some time to pull all that information together.

And you know, we may get in the in the immediate aftermath of the public hearing, get more people to do surveys, but I don't think it's you know we we can't spend a lot of time trying to go out there and get you know twenty-five more people to fill out the survey.

Given the trends, I don't think they're gonna change drastically either.

So these statistically have stayed the same from our first survey to this one.

We've shifted a little bit more to some of the unsures because people are are learning more.

But I I statistically don't think they're going to change much.

They'll I would think they would get stronger maybe in the affirmative or the negative based on the um per particular result.

Mr.

Denny.

And Madam Chair, I would like to make a motion that the survey be can uh conclude it May 11th and uh have that uh that date closed so the study commission can start their deliberation based on the information we had prior to May 11th.

Mr.

Dunhey, if I may, I I'd like us to be able to start voting May 11th if possible, given our timeline.

Um so the we were talking about getting it wrapped up immediately after the open the public hearing on May 4th and giving Ms.

Adams some time for analysis hearing hearing that response, I would like to amend my motion to have the survey concluded May 7th.

Uh and have the information from that time to be the final survey information that we are going to get from our process.

Second.

Okay, I have a motion from Denny and a second from Shaw.

Is there any further discussion about closing the survey?

Okay, all those in favor, please signify by saying aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Any opposed?

Okay.

Motion carries.

Thanks, Mr.

Denhey.

Moved us on.

All right.

Um, any other reflections or comments from the survey results?

Ms.

Casey.

Madam Chair, and I did discuss this with Mary the night of the meeting, but there was brought to the attention within the neighborhood council discussion.

We did have a little bit uh they were taking issue with how we said the current form of the charge charter is that we inserted the word may do council of neighborhood councils or community councils.

So uh we did talk about just correcting that to what the language exactly is.

And the current charter language doesn't have the word may.

So we did talk about just correcting that within our preliminary report.

So Ms.

Casey, so I understand.

Casey, so I understand, are you asking us to make an amendment to the existing preliminary report, or would it be sufficient to make that change and going into the final report?

Um Madam Chair, I think it would be okay to make it going into the final report because the preliminary report is out there and that's what the public hearing is going to be on.

So I just wanted to bring it up so that we don't um forget that there is that change that we charter does not say may.

So I but I think doing it in the final reports fine.

Thank you.

All right, any other discussion on survey.

All right.

So moving on to the public hearing on May 4th.

So I wanted to kind of walk through how we wish to proceed with that.

And then it happens to be that the public hearing procedures are right in front of us here.

Um and so we had talked about asking for public comment on each issue or each potential ballot question and then moving to the next.

And I wanted to see if that still resonates for folks.

Ms.

Casey.

Madam Chair, I kind of feel like we did that the last time, I feel like it's leading the public.

And I would just because we've advertised that we want comment on the whole preliminary report, I think it's more prudent to leave people come up.

I think we're all smart people.

We can break down which comments they're doing, but just leave them comment.

And part of it is then they don't have to wait till the end if they want to say, well, my comment is you didn't address this, and I'd like to see this addressed.

Or the comments that say, hey, I like the report, or I don't like the report at all or any of the recommendations, but I kind of feel like taking it section by section isn't allowing them to provide it's kind of d I don't know, directing, I felt like.

That's just my feeling about it, I just think, and then having some people come up two, three, four times during the public hearing.

I I would just like to see them come up and give their spiel.

Somebody else can say I agree with them or not.

Um that would just be my comment on it.

Ms.

Shaw.

I'm chuckling because how many public hearings has Lori been in?

Oh my lord, she's got that down Pat.

And I I totally agree because yeah, especially when people wait to the end and that sort of thing.

But I and I'm not sure if if the uh local government, you know, group if they have anything to say about the public hearing.

Is it supposed to what are the the goals or is it just to make an opportunity for the public to come up and speak about what we're you know what's being done?

I don't know.

But maybe I don't know if Lori, if you can you is there anything that pops out on the uh you know in our study group with the local government.

Madam Chair, when we advertise the public hearing, it's specifically comment to accept public comments on the preliminary report.

So that's how I I think it should be.

I think we can do a presentation that outlines this is this is this kind of like we've did the open houses.

The here's the legislative branch, the executive, the fire options, but then when it's time for public comment, I just think it'd be better to allow people to come up and make their public comment, not have to wait for a particular item.

That's just because we did advertise public comment on the entire report.

Right.

I was thinking through the um individual questions thing too, imagining that some folks might have 23 minutes of time based on how many things there are, you know, and others might only have three minutes, so just thinking about um fairness in terms of the amount of time that people have to comment.

Um Ms.

Dolan.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Yeah, I was going to say um again with the public hearing, we can't comment, we can't engage, we can't dialogue with the public.

So to I and I'm sure Raylan, you're gonna mention that at the beginning of the meeting, so people would are you know, the pregnant pause of well, what do you all think about my comment?

Um but more importantly, if it's just about, and actually now agree with Lori, um that's a much better way of facilitating this, um, but to allow people maybe four minutes instead of two if they have multiple things they want to talk about because there are a lot of multiple things in the report um that they could comment on.

So, yeah, maybe kind of just figure out a good time to give each one.

And again, man, many will just focus in on one or two things.

But if we say the whole report, then maybe they'll be more um advantageous to them in their comment.

That's a good question to consider too.

And then I was gonna ask you all to the um the report to them that we would you know start with.

Do we want to present what we had presented to council?

I can certainly um send that back out to all of you to review and look at if there's anything we want to change, but we could roll through that.

It's time to be a 15-minute presentation, but it took a little longer at council.

So it's you know, 15 minutes, and then we can turn it over, you know, for the proponents, opponents.

But um question on the time that we want to allow for comment.

Um Ms.

Dolan had proposed four minutes.

Do we want to engage in a discussion about that?

Ms.

I'm really going back in my history here.

Um first of all, you can't demand that people limit their speaking.

I mean you ask them in in you know, and in uh in view of the fact that there's a whole lot of people here to try to keep your try to keep your comments down to three minutes, we'd say, but you really can't demand a time limit.

I don't know if you want to use that machine that is so annoying, you know, when it goes off because you but um I I don't know.

I I would say three to four minutes just to give a little bit of a leeway.

That's just my thoughts on it.

But you can't I don't I believe uh county attorney Ann Ruth can probably tell me that there's no limit.

You can't make people stop.

Maybe you can Jerome Brandle, um commissioners.

It's uh a topic that's been discussed across multiple platforms, including the judiciary, and there isn't a you know Supreme Court answer on it.

Some allow it, some don't.

It hasn't been challenged here yet, given the extensive nature of the preliminary report.

I think four to five minutes is very appropriate though.

Um a lot of people that are not I don't mean this in a negative way, they're not well spoken.

A lot of people don't speak publicly.

It's a hard thing to do, so giving them some grace and a little bit of time to get their you know how to make you know quick thought processes and really articulate what they're trying to say takes a couple more minutes, and I think four to five minutes is completely appropriate.

I think um last hearing I was rather permissive as well.

I think we said we had the three to five, and I I gave people up to seven because I wasn't gonna gavel down that they you know we did use the timer and then I allowed them to keep going, and then I said, you know, you've had an extra couple of minutes, so if you can wrap it up, but I think we can be graceful and kind with the comments.

Ms.

Dolan.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I think um I really like that machine.

I think it gives folks, and if you say at the beginning of the hearing, you're gonna we're going to allow grace and allow folks to speak their mind, and we want that input.

But we have to be respectful of everyone in the room and everyone's time that evening.

I would also say um I'm kind of on the fence of doing a whole nother presentation.

I feel like the people that are coming up to the public hearing have looked at this, have done some of do their own due diligence in education and want to come and make a comment.

Um so I don't know if necessarily we need to add on in a whole presentation at the public hearing.

Every other engagement sounds good, but I think with the public hearing, to Lori's point, we've advertised come up and make a comment about the about the report.

So I don't know if someone will come up and wing it after they've listened to a few.

Maybe that's some people do that.

So anyway, just for food for thought.

Ms.

McCormick.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I I agree with Cindy that I don't think we need to do a presentation again.

I do think it would be nice though to summarize the all the options that are ballot issues that we're considering, saying we're looking at going from a chief executive to a city county manager form of government.

If we go to city county manager, we would include a mayor, which I just want to say that's how other communities do it.

I don't think we should be rewriting the book on that.

There's lots of procedures in place, and we're not I rather propose that than something that is we make up here.

And then you know, the fire services and the and the neighborhood councils, just just list the issues for discussion because people that are coming to this meeting, I'm sure are somewhat educated on, you know, they're not just coming clear up out of the blue.

And if they are hopefully they'll sit back and listen to what other people say, but I don't think we should take the time for a formal presentation again.

Okay.

We were working on that from previous meetings too.

I mean I think we made Mr.

Denhey go do the work, so you could say put that off to Ms.

Uh Adams, they kind of shaped up what we we presented to council.

But I think it's reasonable we could have one slide that has the initiatives on it, and that would be simple enough.

And we already have that existing with our um hardboards that we put out too.

Yeah.

Okay, so I think we have an agreement of let's be liberal with our time, maybe five minutes.

Ms.

Dolan, I think that this does help me a little bit because it if it's glowing red and it's been glowing red for a little while, then I feel you know more empowered to say it's time to wrap it up.

Um because I am permissive with with allowing comment.

Um and then we can have one slide.

Do we feel comfortable with that format?

Ms.

Casey.

Madam Chair, I'm I I like the one slide.

I think it might be um okay to set up our boards like out in the hallway as folks come up.

I think those boards are real informative that we've used at the open houses, and if people want to glance at them before the meeting or the public hearing, I think that would be good just to set them up out in the hallway, though for folks to look at.

Yeah, we have them.

Might as well use them, right?

Okay.

Anything else for the public hearing?

Ms.

Dolan.

Um thank you, Madam Chair.

Uh, just we will have um make sure with uh the Beat Silverbo staff that we will have ADA equipment in case someone is hard of hearing and needs that assistance for um the room, that should be done too.

Thanks.

Absolutely.

Anything else on this?

Okay, so I want to um in our other scheduled matters.

Um I just want to go back through that schedule.

We kind of rolled through it really fast, just imagining.

So if we're working backwards from July 7th, our report is final due published.

Um looking at that, I think Mr.

Anruth, I think we would need to to have the ballot question.

You would have to have the ballot questions kind of back to us by June 15th so that we have that language for the report.

Is it is that resonating with you?

Uh General and Brandle, yes.

I I would say June 15th at the latest.

So if we're looking at May 4th and the next meeting is the 11th, in which this council is tentatively going to decide what is and is not going to possibly go on the ballot.

Um that provides us approximately a month to get that language drafted, get it to the Secretary of State, get their opinions on it, and get it back.

So it is a it is a tight time frame, but I think we can do it so long as we have answers on the 11th.

So, Mr.

Enruth, with that given that we have some flow chart issues, if you will, or if-thens, like if we have do the city manager versus we affirm the chief executive.

When we're making our recommendations of what to move forward to ballot, how clean does that need to be?

Like how much do you like do we need to do some really deep deliberation about um number of commissioners for the if-then and all of that kind of guide me here a little bit?

Uh Chairman Brennell Commissioners, yes.

Uh, I would say that on May 11th, I would anticipate a longer than normal meeting and a lot of discussion and you know, final voting on them.

Uh, so we don't have you know, uh uh read this, go to page 52 type book where it's this council has decided five commissioners, you know, or go the this to start with the form of government if the council sees fit to modify the form of government, you know, um to a uh three or five person uh council commissional council.

I would suggest being able to narrow that down to the one, which number you want, or four with a mayor.

Um specifically full time or part-time, and I think it needs to be made clear uh in this instance what the council wants because uh particularly this issue just came up recently with our coroner, our corners technically part-time, but that is because the uh charter is silent on it, so it can be part-time or full-time.

Um, and they can modify it as they go.

So that's what I'm saying.

This is I I I really think on May 11th, the council needs to have good hard answers on this, this, or this, but not four or five of them.

They're not five, not three, not keep it the same.

I really think that's the council's responsibility to narrow that down and get it tight.

So then that way we are within our limited time frame can get those answers to the commission, excuse me, to the Secretary of State, and make sure we're not violating the three bytes of our Apple Apple rule uh with regards to chains and forms of government.

Mr.

Denny?

Ma'am chair.

And Matt, I I I understand that, and I think that makes a lot of sense, and it it's easy, it'd be easier for us to finalize that.

But if the voters decided that the chief executive is the form of government they want, then it kind of plays into what the council of commissioners might look like.

So if we say the council, and I it's so uh I guess that's why you want a final answer, but if it does chief executive, then the council of commissioners will have not have a mayor form of government.

So I don't know if there's got to be asterisk there saying if you do this, this doesn't make make a difference, or are you saying, hey, that's you gotta be you gotta be uh on your game and this is how it goes.

Chairwoman Brandle, um Commissioner Haney, I'll I can contact the Secretary of State and get their opinion on it, but I think if you start doing the the multiples, you might be violating the rule requirement, the the mod the statute in which we can only change the three things.

But technically the changes you're going from one to the other, does giving them the options constitute additional questions?

And so that is something I can try and get us a solid answer to, but genuinely genuinely generally speaking, excuse me, um, I do believe that trying to keep the ballots the absolute cleanest as possible is the best option so voters don't get confused and don't even vote on it.

Um to be honest with you, I I you know Ms.

Budolin and a few other people in here have been in uh you know the legislature and legislature and things like that a lot more than I have, but I have always found that when I read you know a ballot issue, if it's overly confusing, I used to just gloss over it because you know, I I uh the school ballot the school district one just came out, or where you get something that's overly complicated and you start reading it, it's I don't even know what that is because I don't care now.

So that's why I'm saying is this with how important this is, I would try and keep it clean and to the point and have concise answers come out of the commission.

Ms.

Dolan and then Ms.

Casey.

Thank you, madam chair.

Um I would ask the commission to think about instead of doing everything on the 11th, can we chop it up and do half one night, half another night, either the same week or the 11th and the 18th?

I mean, I think that we're gonna be discussing a lot of minutiae and things to really to the county attorney's point to tighten things up and and I I don't know what that will look like, but I have a feeling um with everyone together and trying to make all of these determinations, it may well suit us to do it in two chunks.

It might be easier or it might not.

Ms.

Casey.

Thank you, madam chair.

A question for the county attorney, because you mentioned that the charter is silent on the coroner.

So if the charter remains silent on the the council of commissioners of whether they're full-time or part-time, then would it be up to them to decide their fate as whether they're full-time or part-time?

Chairman Brandle, um uh commission yes, in my opinion, because at that point, you know, the the community has hypothetically voted to reduce the number of commissioners.

Well, then they have to put are they gonna be full-time or part-time?

And this is something that just came up with the coroner recently, and and the law allows for that to say whether they're full-time or part-time, or that it's silent and allows for the uh consolidated city county governments to make that decision themselves internally.

Mr.

Silk.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Um I'm glad to hear that question was asked.

I uh I was trying to get to that a couple weeks ago or maybe like a month ago now, but I I almost feel that we are potentially micromanaging when we put the full-time or part-time in.

I understand the theory 100%, and I completely appreciate it.

But all of those, what we're trying to do, we we could have 12 full-time commissioners right now if the chief executive put that in his budget and the council commissioners approved it legally.

We could do that right now.

Is that correct, County Attorney Handworth?

Chairman Brendel, um, commissioners.

I can't remember off the top of my head if the commissioners are labeled part-time in the charter or not.

Follow vote.

They're not labeled.

Yeah, and so I guess that's where I was going with that is if we're having a hard time dis you know deciphering between okay, say if the community wants a reduction of commissioners, but they also don't want those commissioners to be full-time.

I just feel I really feel that the public should come up here and have a discussion with the council of commissioners during the during the transition years to say, okay, we as a commission think that we can do our job in 20 hours a week, or we need to be three-quarters time, and to not put that in the charter to decide for the community that might not it might not be the best thing ten years from now.

And it almost goes back to my feeling on ordinance where we set the structure, here's how many commissioners the community wanted, and then through ordinance and through the budget that can happen annually with plenty of input from the community over those years can decide whether the commissioners are going to be full-time, three-quarter time, half-time, quarter time, or just stipend.

I I just would ask um a discussion on that, or just to think about it, because I think it's very important, and I think it is a reason why it doesn't even state it in there is because it allows the the commission and the community to adapt over time without being stuck.

So I just wanted to mention that.

Thank you.

Ms.

Dolan.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I think there are a couple issues there.

I think that um what we've been trying to do in the study commission, knowing that the results will be 10 years at least, is the balance between the executive branch and the legislative branch.

Uh I don't know if the county attorney would have an opinion on this, but if you decide if we deflect that full-time, part-time issue to the council of commissioners, wouldn't that be a conflict of interest because they're voting on their own salary and their own time.

And I think that that essential question has to be to the voter because they're paying the bills.

And so I just find that very conflicted.

Thank you, Ms.

Dillon, Mr.

and Ruth.

Chairman and Brandle, um, commissioners.

It is their option, though.

They always have the option to vote them out.

Um if if it's again, if it's in the charter as full-time, then that's the way it is.

Uh if it's in the charter as part-time, then that's the way it is, or if it's uh not in there at all, that allows it to be done through ordinance and resolution.

The one thing the state law specifically states is you cannot reduce an elected official's salary during their elected term.

I can I do believe it can happen after based on budgetary constraints, obviously.

Um but depending on the number of uh commissioners and their terms, the people still have a voice if they've got a smaller commission that continues to uh you know vote for higher salaries and things like that, they can obviously vote them out if they'd like to.

Um but the commissioners do vote on their salaries now, if they so choose, they could uh request an increase in that, put a communication in and try and show why.

Um, and then if they voted to increase their salaries, they would have to answer to the people that put them in the office later on why.

That's my opinion on it.

Yeah, so I think this is um an interesting question and it helps us clean up the language a bit.

My concerns are that we've talked about in our analysis when we did the evaluation that it seemed necessary for people to be doing this job full time.

Um there's a pathway where if we left the charter language silent on it, we could make the recommendation that they're full-time.

Um we could, you know, say we we believe firmly that you have enough work to do to be there full-time.

Um, and especially the piece that was giving us the full-time recommendation was about representation.

We wanted people to be in community, we wanted them to be, you know, working with these possible neighborhood councils.

We want them to be, you know, staffing up all the various boards that we have and be deeply involved in community more so than they have time for now.

And I think the part-time structure with full-time commissioners could be quite challenging.

Excuse me, part-time with fewer commissioners could be quite challenging.

You know, if they they said, no, we we're just gonna do it like we do now, then we'd have four people or five people at their very limited hours.

And I I you know that tends to to seem like we'd make the problem worse.

Mr.

Silk.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

And I I totally agree, and I understand the logic of being out there, boots on the ground, doing a lot of the stuff that we've been doing this last month or so.

But there's nothing saying that you put full-time commissioners in the charter.

What that's subjective to me.

Full time just in the office, full time.

Like we might not get everything that we want out of a full-time commissioner.

But what I'm saying is in every other form of government, there are legislators that always vote on their salary.

That's how you pass a budget.

So there has to be faith within the um constraints of okay, if my commissioner doesn't do what I want them to do, I get to vote them out later.

I I totally agree that there needs to be more representation, and I hope I I don't know how else to explain that.

I really do understand that there needs to be you know more involved commissioners.

I know if you go from twelve to four that there's going to be more work and they need to be more efficient.

Totally understand that.

And I'm I'm not trying to go against full-time commissioners right now.

I guess I would just ask the body to think about it for uh a little while because they can do that right now, but we're not telling them they have to do it right now.

What if full-time doesn't work?

What if what if three quarters times does, you know, and and just working the salary through the ordinance or resolution or just the budget itself is the only thing that I would just ask.

I'm not going to go against it at all, because I I truly believe in um just having a more efficient government.

But I just wondering, are we do we have to say you are going to be full time and although we want them to be out more and we want them to be engaged more, just because you make someone full time doesn't mean they're going to do it.

Um I believe that they would because they would actually be able to focus on issues, but um the structure is set up currently to where they could be full-time now, and I guess that's just where I'll I'll end it with that because I'm just going around around.

But thank you.

Ms.

Casey.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I think I think Chad brings up some good points, and I I do know that uh we have presented in our report better representation and that, but I think it is something to consider because w uh at least the I wasn't at the Council of Commissioners or the last meeting, but the other meetings, I think there was some concern and why they're asking for the fiscal impact and why we're struggling of what's the correct number of commissioners.

So I just think that it's something for us to think individually and kind of deliberate about in our own minds um till we come May 11th and and give it consideration because even though they vote their own salary in, they do not do it without some kind of public comment.

Public the budget goes out public, there's public comment on the budget.

If they do it by ordinance or resolution, there's public comment.

So it doesn't just cut the public completely out.

Um if it is up to the council of commissioners to make that decision.

There is opportunity for the public to participate and let the council know what their thoughts are on that.

So I just think it's something to consider because I agree with you.

We've we all felt that full-time, better representation, doing a better job, but there's also that that yin-yang out there about can we afford this?

And and so I just think it's something for us to think about and uh before we vote on May 11th.

And I think to your point, Ms.

Casey, when you're thinking about can we afford this, we're thinking about a 10-year plan too.

So we we don't know what our budget authority is gonna look like ten years down the road.

So allowing there to be enough flexibility is important, I think.

Um but I'm just like really think they need to be doing a better job.

And I think to that end it's always about the people.

You know, you can't I always have said you can't mandate ethics, you can't mandate work ethic.

But um, you know, if we set it up that they are expected that, and then the voters are really eyeballing it.

You know, are you doing my job that I asked you to do?

Mr.

Denehya, Madam Chair and members of council.

I know Lori and and Chad have been a big proponent of ordinances and letting the council um make decisions that they should be making based on their rules and based on ordinance and resolutions, and I really appreciate that.

And I'm with you in terms of God, I think that we need to have full-time commissioners because there's so many larger issues that will come up and they're complicated and if they are here full time and they they can call and make uh decisions based on research and based on their analysis.

And then I heard last Thursday uh listen, how you paying for this?

Um, you know, and we'll find out Thursday, you and I will discuss that.

But you know, it seems to me that all the good things that we're doing can stop by how do you pay for this?

And I'm not going to vote for it because it's way too much.

And I know that's a scare tactic sometimes in government that you know it's gonna cost something, and that's a reason for not doing it.

And I I I'm uh always opposed to that.

I think we can do whatever our minds set on doing.

But it does make some sense in terms of being flexible in terms of the future of our community and whether or not full time is going to be uh something that the commissions want to tackle.

And sometimes they have to have skin in the game too.

Uh sometimes they have to make decisions that might not be popular, but you know, I'm I'm sure if anybody here wanted to vote for a salary increase, I know what my vote would be.

And uh they have to make that same decision.

So actually I'm not making what my hands gonna be, but uh I am thinking about uh not being in the full-time let's do it um come hill or high water, but thinking very rationally, and I think Glory and and Chen make a good point.

Just think about it when we were talking about May 11th, just think about are we that solid on what we're doing, or does the council commissioner have to make a decision based on what they do too, and maybe they should Miss Dolan.

I'll take you, Ms.

McCormick.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Um so a couple of things.

Um with regard to full-time commissioners, I understand the the fiscal um consequence of that.

But more importantly, having been a commissioner on the council and having a full-time job.

You have a full-time job in a family, most commissioners do.

And then trying to add in a part-time commissioner work to Dan Denehy's point that there is so much and the volume of complicated work, but especially in Butte Silverbow with Superfund and everything else on the the plate that we have and that we've been given.

The idea that um I I just don't know why we're at the point of a year and a half in to this, and we're still trying to, and and rightly so.

We're not at a at a formal um pol we have a preliminary report, we don't have our final report.

But the fact of the matter is the study commission, we have done the deep dive.

We have done the work to try and figure out the charter and what best to move forward with, and at this late date, to try and rein everything back and punt it over to the council of commissioners ver vis-a-vis um ordinance or resolution, um budget impacts, we get all that.

But for them to then try and tackle those kinds of issues that we've been dealing with for then we'll be dealing with for two years, and then have them be as green as they are because we have to be honest.

How many commissioners have joined us for these meetings?

One, maybe two, a couple of came to the last listening session, which is great, but for all intents and purposes, they have not been engaged with us week in and week out that I know of, and I just want to, you know, I don't want all of our work to just be rained back when we take a final vote.

I just think that's very uh unproductive at this point.

That's just my opinion.

Ms.

McCormick.

Thank you, madam chair, and I kind of agree with Cindy, and I I think these are something we need to deliberate on the 11th and or the 18th.

I think we get a meeting eleventh.

If it's getting too long, we can cut it off and go on to the 18th.

But you know, someone who worked with an ordinance that um you can have an ordinance and doesn't mean anybody's gonna follow it.

That's what I have to say.

There's a lot of ordinances out there fall aren't followed.

There is, you know, certainly council is able to set their salary by ordinance right now.

But for me, one of the things that I think about having a full-time commissioners is who is going to be attracted.

If they think they can have full-time work, you might get people who say, I can put my job aside for a little bit and go after this.

I think you know, somebody who is dedicated who's gonna commit to it.

If certainly you may get people that are, you know, gonna not do anything still, but I think that is less likely.

I think we'll get people that are more committed to the government if they have to work if they're working for time.

And I just think of like all the committees, the judicial, the fine, the budget committee, um, public works.

We reduce it to four.

Those four commissioners are gonna have to man all of those committees.

I mean, their work is just gonna be exponential.

So, but I'm gonna shut up because we can talk about this on the 11th.

Thank you.

I I also see it as elevating and honoring the position.

Um I've talked about it a little bit, seeming like it's almost a stipend for volunteers.

And although I appreciate volunteer, you know, governance, we're certainly doing it, and I I would vote for a red double our salary.

But zero times zero is zero.

But um, you know, I I I honor that and I believe that people will do that.

But I also think that you know, elevating the position, making it full time, making it professional, kind of it gives credibility and weight to the council.

And and I think that's important.

So as we think about these things.

Back to Ms.

Dolan's point of the dates of breaking up the voting.

Um Mr.

Enruth, if we were to take half on the 11th and half on the 18th, does that put you back too far?

Is it maybe you could work on the ones on the 11th and it's just called work in a weekend, it's not a big deal.

Not you guys, me.

And that's what that's just part of the job.

That's part of being an elected official, that's part of all this.

That's everything that you guys are discussing.

That sometimes we're here on the weekends, it just is what it is.

That's uh when you get the job done.

Okay.

I think Ms.

Dolan had her finger up first, and then I'll take you, Ms.

McCormick and then Ms.

Casey.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I just wanted to ask um when you are yeah, I said thank you, sorry.

I make sure my protocol's right.

Um, when you see um Director Hassler, um, could you ask her?

I'm just curious, and I don't know the answer.

Um, how many times has the Council of Commissioner voted, Council of Commissioners voted to raise their salaries over the course of the consolidated government, how far she can go back with that.

I'm just curious to know that.

Thank you.

Ms.

McCormick, and then I'll I think I have McCormick, um, Casey, and then I'll take you, Shaw.

Again, I I thank you, Madam Chair.

Again, I'd like us to consider just seeing how far we get on the 11th, we might be able to get through it all.

And so I don't want to commit to coming to the 18th until we see can we say if we you know we're gonna have a two or three hour meeting on the 11th and it looks like it's gonna go long, then we could decide to go to the 18th.

But I don't think we have to commit to both days right now.

Okay, fair enough.

Ms.

Casey?

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I was just gonna say instead of pushing to the 18th, because the county attorneys and the deputy county attorneys also have a holiday in the month of May also that reduces them by one day.

That what's wrong with maybe meeting the 11th and 12th if we need to.

I agree with Mary.

If we come and everybody does their homework and looks at the surveys before we get here on that Monday, that we probably should be able to get it done.

But I also think that there's nothing that would preclude us that we should be able to find a meeting room somewhere for the um like that Tuesday the 12th and wrap it up.

I I I'm just getting a little bit nervous about our meetings and um I was hoping the county attorney would say, I can't do that, you have to get it done.

So um would would we be open to meeting back to back if needed?

Okay, so we'll just we can just notice two meetings and then um council if we need to if we get through it on the 11th.

But it does it makes us do our homework, and there's a lot of conversations we've had tonight just in like the strategy, you know, and I think that the flow chart is gonna be important as you know, if we vote for this then that, if you vote for this then that, and thinking about that language, I'm gonna be curious as to what comes back if we you know when we meet after that.

So Ms.

Sha.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I'm gonna get back to Cindy Purdue Dolan's question about um increases in salaries.

Every year it's simply a cola increase.

That's it.

Ever since I was a council member, you need we didn't go any higher than that, and that was just and it was across the board.

Ms.

Shaw, were there changes in insurance or any of those kind of decisions?

Okay.

Ms.

Dillon.

Thank you, and thank you, Cindy.

Appreciate that.

And that's almost political suicide for someone to vote way up their salary.

That's why, you know, historically speaking, a lot of uh people in government do it at midnight when no one when no one's watching.

So thank you.

Folks, um, I think that brings us through everything.

We kind of got off on a little bit of discussion there, but um the announcements obviously we have the May 4th public hearing at 5 30 here, and then we'll have our May 11th uh deliberations.

So I would um ask for a motion to adjourn.

I move to adjourn.

Is there a second?

Okay, I have multiple seconds, so I have a motion from Shaw and a second by Silk will say thank you all, and we'll see you next week.