City Council to Use Shorter Minutes
Starting this coming Tuesday, the Port Angeles City Council will be using shorter minutes. This new condensed version will no longer include council discussions or presentations or comments from staff members.
They say it isn’t an attempt to conceal anything; it’s just to save time and make it quicker for people to see how council members voted.
City Clerk Janessa Hurd said: “It’s more of what happened than what was said.”
The Council will be using these shorter minutes for a 6-month trial period. Mayor Dan Di Guilio said feedback from the public will determine whether these shortened minutes will be a permanent change.
They say it isn’t an attempt to conceal anything; it’s just to save time and make it quicker for people to see how council members voted.
City Clerk Janessa Hurd said: “It’s more of what happened than what was said.”
The Council will be using these shorter minutes for a 6-month trial period. Mayor Dan Di Guilio said feedback from the public will determine whether these shortened minutes will be a permanent change.
Labels: Port Angeles City Council, shorter minutes
posted by Tom Harper at 6:41 PM
16 Comments:
Right!
And the city manager is complaining about all the requests for documents from the public, as it is.
What a crock of shite.
It sounds like its time for citizens to organize an audio-recording crew and send at least one crew member with a good recorder to every council meeting so that there will be a true record of what actually occurred there. Shortening the official meeting minutes is not a way to restore public confidence in City government. Sure, they claim that they are recording the meeting themselves and will post the audio on the city web site; but it's funny how often those audio-tapes seem to be inaudible or defective. The ghost of Rosemary Woods inhabits City Hall, perhaps?
I think this idea to shorten the already too-short council meeting minutes is a very bad idea. Just as I was beginning to have hope that the Mark Madsen/Karen Rogers era of "governing " in secret was finally being ushered-out, here comes this new twist on keeping the public in the dark. It's so much easier to recreate history if you don't record what actually happened! I'm really disappointed in who ever at City Hall instigated and approved this shortened minute-taking. What a discouraging way to start a new year.
I urge you all to come to an occasional City Council meeting and watch the business of the city being transacted. Only if people are involved and aware will things improve in Port Angeles. Don't expect the City Council to do it without your input, suggestions and, yes, oversight.
Also, write the Council members to let them know you DO NOT want the shorter minutes. This is a pilot program - speak out on it. (And not just here.)
And then there is the article in todays' paper, where the city manager, Port of Port Angeles manager, and Jeff Lincoln are caught lying about using public funds to investigate Schanfeld because she dared to present a view they didn't like!
What is going ON here?! That is a deliberate attempt to silence dissent. Right here in Port Angeles.
One step forward, two steps back.
Most if you liberals on this blog don't have any friggin idea how city government is run. All you do is whine and complain, no solutions.
So go crawl back in your crappy little hidey-holes and leave the real work to the adults.
Would you bloggers like cheese with your whine? Get real, lose the paranoia.
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"Sally said...
Most if you liberals on this blog don't have any friggin idea how city government is run. All you do is whine and complain, no solutions.
So go crawl back in your crappy little hidey-holes and leave the real work to the adults."
Sally, I have YET to see YOU contribute any "solutions", or in fact, do ANYTHING other than show up here periodically to insult people.
Yeah, THAT is the way to be credible!
Tom why do you bother to post the nonsense @ 4:34?
This is the third such post of drivel.
It's not funny or even SLIGHTLY clever; it's annoying as hell as a matter of fact.
Thanks,still a great blog,BTW...
I remember not so long ago the city manager complaining that his staff was spending so much time responding to requests for information from the public.
How is this going to make that any less? Seems to me that by shortening the minutes, and leaving out more information, the likelyhood that more people will want additional information will increase.
It makes sense to me that both the short minutes and the full minutes should be available, but it takes a lot of time (and taxpayer money) to type a word for word transcript. If the voice recording is a problem, the system should be upgraded.
Hurray! Brad Collins has applied for the vacant Council seat. Now there are at least two qualified candidates in the running.
And, of course, a handful of kooks.
And, of course, Rick Burton.
"It sounds like its time for citizens to organize an audio-recording crew and send at least one crew member with a good recorder to every council meeting so that there will be a true record of what actually occurred there."
Sounds good! Let us know when you've got that done and we can all get the recording from you.
I've lived in communities that had the local community college media students run video cameras, and the meetings were televised on the local community channel, live.
We would video tape meetings we were interested in, that we had to miss. Sometimes, we'd be at home watching, and see something said, and would jump in the car to go participate in the public hearing.
They did both Planning Commission, and City Council. This was 30 years ago!
Well, at least the "trial period" for the shortened minutes has itself been shortened. Now, if you don't like this set-up, let the Council know. Obviously they're somewhat concerned about this already.
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