Minutes of the Regular Meeting or the BC/BT Joint Services Study Committee

Minutes of the Regular Meeting or the BC/BT Joint Services Study Committee

Date: September 13, 2001; 6:30 p.m.

Place: Aldrich Library Community Meeting Room

Present: Carl Rogers, Mary Welch, Joan Carrigan, Debbie Marting, Alex McHenry, Gordon Booth, Wayne

Pelkey, Richard Fitzgerald, Barry Driscoll, Marc Bernier, Dawna Attig, Charles Fantoni, Doug

Farnham, Dan Bellavance, Aaron Bredeur, Chip Castle, Debbie Sartelli, Mark Reaves

The meeting was called to order at 6:30pm by Carl Rogers, Barre Town Manager. There were no minutes from the July 19, 2001 meeting. Carl Rogers opened the meeting with the agenda:

Elect Officers

Develop Procedures

Develop Committees

Set Agenda for next three meetings

Round table discussion

Elect Officers

Carl Rogers explained that the committee needed to elect a Chairperson, Vice-Chairperson, and Secretary. He asked if there were any nominations or volunteers. Dawna Attig volunteered for Secretary. There was a motion to nominate Dawna and a second to that motion. There was no one else. A vote was taken: all ayes, no nays. The motion was carried.

4 Dawna Attig is Secretary.

Electing in reverse order, the table was open to nominations for Vice-Chairperson. Alex McHenry volunteered. There was a motion to nominate Alex for Vice-Chair and a second to that motion. There was no one else. A vote was taken: all ayes, no nays. The motion was carried.

4 Alex McHenry is Vice-Chairperson.

The table was now open for chairperson. There was a motion to nominate Barry Driscoll and a second to that motion. There was no one else. A vote was taken: all ayes, no nays. The motion was carried and Barry Driscoll is Chairperson.

4 Barry Driscoll is now facilitator of the meeting.

2. Develop Procedures

This topic was to define what will be the criteria for running the meetings using Roberts Rules of Order. The discussion centered on how would decisions be made: by simple majority, by consensus and/or by quorum. And, how would a quorum be defined.

Barry Driscoll suggested that simple majority should make decisions. There was some discussion that any decisions that we make will have to come before the City and Town Councils and that none of our decisions are binding. So given that we should probably come up with a best case to put forward. There was one suggestion to keep it simple. Although, some felt that it could not be too simple. We have to record our proposals. Decide on our best resolution that was arrived at through a majority and then go to the respective councils with that decision. So, it is important to decide on what makes a majority.

Barry Driscoll motioned that we decide by a mutual consensus through group discussion, but if anyone wanted a vote, then a vote would be taken. The motion was seconded. There were 17 ayes and 1 nay. The motion was carried.

4 Decisions will be made through consensus; however, if a vote is requested, then a vote is taken and a simple majority will win.

Dawna Attig asked for further clarification. Decisions would be made in one of two ways:

Agree by consensus, where there is no dissension, or

A vote can be requested, and
a. if a vote requested, a simple majority will be needed to carry.

The discussion then centered on what would constitute a quorum. We could have one for minimum number for a meeting and/or minimum number in order to take action. We decided that we should use 11 as the minimum number. There was a motion to use meeting quorum as majority present and for any action a quorum of 11 had to be present. The motion was seconded. A vote was taken: 18 ayes, no nays. The motion was carried.

4 The meeting quorum is a majority present but take any action a quorum of 11 must be present.

3. Develop Committees

Under this agenda item, we discussed Wayne Pelkey’s outline of the Services Inventory Analysis. The entire committed received a copy. We began the discussion by reading the outline and how we could apply it for our use. Barry Driscoll said that implicit in this outline of services would be the development of sub-committees that would study the selected topic from the outline with their main mission as one of data collection.

The original thought was to question only the Department heads, but when the discussion went to the types of questions, that we should ask and to whom, the suggestion was made to question representative line workers as well. Asking such questions as:

What do they use as a measure of success?

What is their best practice?

Get then to speak about what is working and maybe they will open up about what doesn’t work.

What are their needs?

The questions that the subcommittees would ask the Department heads and representative line worker would help them develop their presentation. Then the respective Department heads and line worker of both municipalities would be present for the others presentation.

! Note: The committee would have no problems getting their questions answered and the City and Town Managers would not be present at the interviews.

We then focused our attention on what to do about the schools. The schools are really not part of this and are separate entities. There were two suggestions made:

go to the school board and ask them if they want to be part of the study. Explain that some our

get our feet wet first. Have a few successes under our belt. Gain some credibility, then go to the superintendent of schools and school board and invite them to participate. However, this could serve to alienate them by giving the impression that they were an afterthought.

The decision was made by consensus that Barry Driscoll as Chairperson, would go to the Superintendent of Schools first and talk with him about being part of this.

Special notice, by the entire committee, was given to Barre Town member, Wayne Pelkey, for the excellent job he did in putting together the Outline. "Thank-You Wayne!"

We left this topic with the committee directing the City and Town Managers to fill out the numbers onto the outline and each committee member is to compile a list of questions to ask the Department Heads and line workers along with the priority of the question. They should then send their questions to Dawna Attig, Secretary, in order for them to be compiled into one list and eliminating duplicates. The list would then be reviewed at the next meeting.

4. Set Agenda for next three meetings

The committee decided to set the agenda for the next meeting only. That is

to discuss the compiled list of questions and their priority,

to set up the sub-committees, and

to set the agenda for the next 3 meetings.

The next meeting would be October 11, 2001.

5. Round Table Discussion

There was a brief discussion on how long the meetings should be.

4 It was decided by consensus, that the meetings would be kept to 2 hours, from 6:30p to 8:30p.

There was a motion to change the committed name to Greater Barre Joint Services Study Committee. The motion was seconded. There was a brief discussion, which resulted in an amended motion to change the name instead to the Greater Barre Services Study Committee. This motion was seconded. There was no further discussion. A vote was held on the amended motion. There were no nays. The motion was carried.

4 The new name is Greater Barre Services Study Committee.

Next, there was a vote on the original motion. There were no nays. The motion was carried.

4 The name is changed to Greater Barre Services Study Committee.

Everyone was pleased at the outcome of this meeting and how well it went.

Finally, there is a Joint Services Clubs Dinner (i.e. Kiwanis, Jaycees, Rotary, etc.) that is to be held on October 11. The committee needs to know as soon as possible, by the end of next week, who, if any or our group, will be attending this dinner, possibly changing the next meeting date to October 12. And, we are set for a meeting on November 8 and December 13.