City Council Workshop on Boards & Commissions Evaluation - February 10, 2025
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Greenville City Council Workshop on Boards & Commissions Evaluation - February 10, 2025
The Greenville City Council held a workshop on February 10, 2025, at 4:00 PM in City Hall Conference Room 337 to discuss the evaluation process for the city's boards and commissions. Mayor P.J. Connolly presided. The agenda consisted solely of this new business item, following roll call and approval of the agenda (motion passed 4-0).
Presentation and Discussion
City Clerk Valerie presented an overview of the 17 boards and commissions, categorizing them as quasi-judicial, autonomous, or advisory. She highlighted challenges including difficulty meeting quorum, high turnover, and unclear purposes. The presentation noted creation dates ranging from 1907 (Firefighters Relief Fund Committee) to 2020 (Multimodal Transportation Commission). Key distinctions were made: quasi-judicial boards' decisions bypass council and go directly to court; autonomous boards act as boards of directors with hiring/firing authority; advisory boards are strictly advisory to council. Appointment schedules were explained—some boards have rotating seats among council members, others have permanent assignments by liaison. The goal is to evaluate advisory boards first.
Council members discussed the need to reassess whether board purposes are still relevant. Mayor Pro Tem Daniels and Councilmember Willis emphasized the importance of restructuring boards to engage volunteers effectively and provide clear deliverables. Councilmember Black highlighted historical context for rotating seat policies, noting they were implemented in 2010 to prevent stacking boards with like-minded appointees. Councilmember Robinson raised concerns about consistency in appointment processes and term lengths. The city manager noted that staff liaison responsibilities are tied to job descriptions and accountability is a management issue.
Key Outcomes
- The council agreed to form a subcommittee of three members to meet monthly with staff from March through May to evaluate each advisory board individually.
- Mayor Connolly will appoint the subcommittee members by the end of the week, after consulting with absent council members Tommy and Les.
- The subcommittee will review board purposes, attendance/quorum, membership numbers, and the boards and commissions policy.
- Recommendations from the subcommittee will be brought back to the full council in June or August 2025 for approval.
- Councilmembers Willis, Daniels, and Robinson expressed strong interest in serving on the subcommittee.
The meeting adjourned with a motion by Mayor Pro Tem Daniels, second by Councilmember Black, all in favor.
Meeting Transcript
So welcome to the February 10th, 2025 workshop for the Greenville City Council. I'm Mayor P. J. Connolly. I'll be presiding over today's workshop. I'd like to first call on our illustrious and wonderful clerk for the roll call. Present. Councilmember Black. President. Councilmember is going. Here. Councilmember Robinson. Here. Thank you very much, Madam Clerk. Wonderful job. Wonderful job. Now we'll move on to the approval of the agenda. Mr. Manager. I know we've got a really long one. We have to have a motion to approve the agenda. Second. Alright, motion made by Councilman Black or a second by Council Member Willis. All those in favor say aye. Motion has is four of zero. Wonderful. Wonderful. Alright, let's move right into new business. Manager, item number one is evaluation of our boards and commissions. And we are going to have our course evaluation with order to get person. Unless everybody's one of that board and expanding those. So we're here today to talk about our boards and commissions. Just to bring us all to the same page. We're here because we've been hearing some things from board members, from you all, from staff liaisons about inability to meet quorum, some requests for support, better understanding of procedures and guidelines, things like that. So we thought it would be a good idea maybe to slow it down and take a good long look at our boards and commissions. Today our objective, what we want to do is we want to take a look at the boards and commissions. We want to define them, and then we want to narrow our focus on just those commissions that we'd like to evaluate. We're going to talk about some of the things that we're currently doing right now to support and then propose the next steps. So first defining boards and commissions. They are boards that are created by state statute and also by local ordinances and resolutions. They're created to meet the goals and priorities that you all have set forth. And they can also fulfill some statutory obligations that are imposed by the state. So things that would inform the work inform you of the work of the board would be those ordinance and resolutions that were adopted by council creating them. Also your boards and commissions policy. That's something that is adopted by you all and amended by you all as you see fit. And then at a finer level, the bylaws and rules of procedures for each of the boards and commissions. So first, of course, we have you all, the city council. You create these boards, you appoint the members. You also serve as the city liaison. Then you have the actual board members that carry out the work.
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