HomeMy WebLinkAboutMinutes 2006Auks 4mmithe Mi tes 2/6/06
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MINUTES OF THE RULES COMMITTEE MEETING
MONDAY, FEBRUARY 6, 2006
6:00 P.M.
Aldermanic Library
Present: Aid. Bernstein, Hansen, Holmes, Jean -Baptiste, Moran, Rainey,
Tisdahl, & Wollin
Absent: Aid. Wynne
Presiding: Aid. Edmund Moran
Staff Present: Julla Carroll, Darlene Francelino, Herbert Hill, Gavin Morgan
and Elke Purze
Guest: Sue Brady, Mary Morris, Mayor Morton, & Betty Papangelis
CALIr TO ORDER:
Aid. Moran called the meeting to order at 6:10 p.m.
APPROVAL OF DECEMBER 5• 2005 MINUTES:
Aid. Tisdahl moved approval. Aid. Jean -Baptiste seconded. Minutes approved.
DISCUSSION OF THE LfAGUE OF VJQI EN VOTERS' OBSERVATIONS _&
RECOMMENDATIONS:
Members of the Observer Corps of the League of Women Voters of Evanston,
Betty Papangelis, chair, and Sue Brady reported on their observations and
recommendations submitted to the Rules Committee.
Ms. Papangelis reported they regularly monitor meetings of the City Council and
many of its committees. They view the Council meetings in their roles as both
citizens and as representatives of citizens they hear from. Their
recommendations and observations relate to these roles, and came out of a
couple of years of watching and seeing what goes on and seeing how the
citizens are perhaps prevented from really understanding what his or her
government is about. Some of the issues have already been worked on but the
League would like to point out that "we need to do better".
The first item was being on time. Ms. Papangelis has sat in Council Chambers
and waited a half an hour to 45 minutes or longer for the Council meeting to
start.
At times Council members do not use their microphones, which is a problem for
some who are aging.
Sometimes there are decisions made that seem to come out of the blue and not
out of some kind of a process that could be understood. This is not only for
those that are present at Council meetings but those watching on television.
The recommendation on this one is that the Council makes an effort to
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summarize the previous committee deliberations so that what is decided is
understandable.
The zoning issues are another problem and those that come now before the
P&D Committee need explanations for the citizens. A general summary sheet
about the process a zoning issue goes through might be extremely helpful to
the citizen. Staff memos explaining or analyzing a complex idea that Council
has to deal with that citizens may not readily understand would be helpful.
The website is a wonderful tool if it could be kept up-to-date and communicates
the Council and Committee issues more effectively to the public including
cancellation of meetings. There have been many times where citizens have
come and a meeting has been cancelled or a schedule change and nobody has
been able to find out about it. They are really trying to educate people into
using the website so if the information was adequate it would be helpful.
Aid. Wollin asked if they were on the list serve to receive the City Clerk's
update on meeting cancellations and/or changes. Ms. Brady noted that it is
Impossible to find that site. She searched for an hour and finally called
someone that was on the list, then called the Clerk's office and got verification
to be on the list. Updating the elevator calendar in these cases would also be a
good idea. Aid. Moran suggested taking that list of last minute update on
meetings and placing it as a regular posting on the front page of the website.
In addition maybe have a comprehensive list of what is happening today or on a
weekly basis inside the elevators and outside :he meeting rooms. So one, have
like a weekly set of description of meetings and two would be last minute of
updates. Aid. Hanson added making a link on the home page to "meeting up-
dates" would make it a lot easier. Ms. Carroll didn't realize there was a
problem and wants to make sure it Is made easy for people to sign up. She will
talk to the web designer.
Aid. Rainey shared that in the last 2 weeks they received a large document from
the legal department explaining the Klaeren process, what is a meeting, what is
a public hearing and then a page in the document of procedures for Klaeren
hearings, step by step. The document was available at the last Mather meeting
and people were encouraged to take them and read through it so when they
come to meetings they will understand what is going on. Also one of the rules
just changed in the Rules Committee meeting was to have the approved
minutes of P&D, A&PW and all the standing committees posted on the website.
That will be very helpful, especially for people coming to a meeting who knew
that a subject had been continued, they would be able to read the minutes
before coming to the next meeting.
Ms. Brady stated that the Klaeren decision is very important and if other
complex zoning issues come before P&D it would be helpful to have that
document available. Aid. Rainey explained that this document is good for
everybody, for all cases of special uses, not just planned developments.
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Ms. Brady complimented Aid. Rainey on leading a wonderful meeting at the last
P&D, it helped and was very clear.
Mayor Morton commented on a few of the recommendations. The fact that in
the City Council rules and Robert Rules of Order it states you should stand when
you speak. While thinking about the concern of not being able to hear, as a
Council we are not supposed to be speaking to the audience, we are suppose to
be speaking to each other. One of the problems is when you stand up you get
away from the microphones. If we didn't stand and just adjusted the macs,
almost all the way down, as she does, you never have to change it if you are
sitting and you will be able to hear. Others have complained about not being
able to hear and she decided to listen to a Council meeting and found that you
can't hear. We all have different voice levels but if we sit and keep the mics at
one spot, we would never have to touch them and would be heard and also save
time in the process.
Aid. Holmes asked if this was a rule change. Aid. Rainey said it was only done
out of respect.
Mayor Morton addressed the other issue of meetings being on time which she
believes is going to improve, because Council members are getting a little
tougher on letting people repeat themselves at committee meetings and
holding the consideration of items.
Philosophically Aid. Moran couldn't agree more, but it is the practicality of It
that gets difficult. Occasionally there is just pressure to finish an issue that has
frequented some moment to the city and you want to get it done. We have to
just continue to work on reconciling those competing interest.
Ms. Papengelis thought that sometimes a judgment could be made as to what is
going to happen at a meeting when you know there is some issue of
controversy. If there Is an issue where there are going to be a lot of people
there, some planning can be done in advance so that, you could still meet the
obligation of being on time. Aid. Moran agreed, and pointed out that the only
complication again is that there are things stacking up and people are waiting
for answers. We could for example say take the next 4 P&D meetings and make
them for the Mather issue, but we've got other business that has to be
addressed in those 4 meetings. It is a battle, but Council will try to be
conscious of it.
Aid. Jean -Baptiste would like to see A&PW, P&D and City Council agendas
available at each meeting, so that people understand what business we have to
take care of before we can move on to the next meeting of the three. it would
also be helpful if someone would announce for example that P&D is wrestling
with and issue and A&PW has a long agenda and to please be patient.
Mr. Hill suggested that the chairman of the standing committees meet with the
central staff person to the committee over the phone a few days before and
allocate time for each of the questions. It could be posted that 20 minutes Is
going to used for this, and 20 minutes for that which may give more discipline
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to the discussion and have It roll more quickly. It may limit the citizen
comment and get things done within that discrete period of time.
Ald. Hansen stated she has had citizens ask if P&D meetings could be televised.
Because we get through a lot of our discussions and/or questions at P&D since
all 9 of us are on that committee. Then when we get to the Council floor we
pass items without discussion. People watching television or who just come to
the Council meeting are wondering what happened, why we voted this way or
that way. She asked if there was a way to televise P&D meetings.
Aid. Moran said they could go to the Council Chambers. We should make a note
to talk to Evanston Community Media Center and see what their thoughts are.
It would be a good idea to televise the P&D meetings if we could and it would
really solve a lot of the problems Aid. Hansen raised. Televising is something
we should definitely think about doing.
Ms. Carroll said the easiest way would be to use the Council Chambers because
it Is already set up. We would have to acquire or get some portable equipment
In the other room which might not be as clear as what we have in the Council
Chambers and the lightening is not good.
Aid. Rainey added maybe not televising every P&D meeting because some P&D
meetings are boring, but we know the ones where there is going to be a lot of
citizen interest. A woman called her after the last P&D meeting was televised
and expressed how grateful she was.
Ald. Moran said in addition to getting a better understanding of the zoning
issues and recommendations that come before the P&D committee at the
bottom of the agenda cover sheets for a lot of the zoning and planning and
development meetings they give sort of a legislative history of what was before
the Plan Commission, what the vote was and on such and such date. You can
usually pick up a lot of the history but obviously a lot of the explanatory
material isn't there. Maybe we should make people a little bit more aware of
that.
Mayor Morton and members of the committee then discussed with Ms. Brady
the structure and responsibilities of the standing committees and the concept
of the Committee of the Whole. Aid. Holmes pointed out that the work of
having the bills list questions answered before the meeting saves some time.
Aid. Jean -Baptiste recommended that as part of the committee chair's report,
we may want to summarize the key issue of debate or interest. Because that Is
the only way people may understand, who may not have been a part of the P&D
discussion or Human Services or any of the other committees to understand
what went on and what were the issues and how we came to the conclusion
that we've come to. By the time we get to consent agenda we've debated
whatever the issues were.
Ald. Moran said what we've done is committed to the League to try to start as
close to on time as possible. We are going to be better about talking into the
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microphone. Perhaps we've got a nugget of an idea about how to do P&D by
potentially televising at least some of the meetings where there are major
issues where there is a lot of community interest and stay aware of that. On
zoning issues, if we've gone through a major discussion on an issue the
committee chair can come in and give a summary. And we've talked about the
website, posting meetings, and posting changes in meetings and so forth and
hopefully we will get that done.
The representatives of the League thanked the committee.
Aid. Jean -Baptiste said as far as communicating about meeting cancellations,
the switch board operator could also give information if he or she has a
calendar.
Aid. Bernstein noted that a general summary sheet of the process is very
Important, not only for the citizens but for the Council.
CONTINUED DISCU SION OF RULES:
Aid. Rainey gave a report from the Rules Committee sub -committee. The
committee discussed rule 7.2 regarding increasing the number of votes to
dismiss the city manager. In 30 years there has never been a firing of the city
manager in Evanston. Since we have a brand new city manager, she asked the
sub -committee if they would object to leaving the rule as it was originally. She
understands that somebody wanted to change it so that it would be equal to the
number that it takes to hire. The sub -committee agreed that there would be no
harm in leaving It the way it is and come back to visit this in a year.
Rule 7.6, "The City Manager may place an item on the City Council agenda for
consideration by the Council." It was the assumption of the sub -committee
that the city manager put all the items on the agenda and that it really wasn't a
Council rule and didn't really belong there.
And Rule 5.7.1, "Committees consisting of all aldermen shall have their chair
appointed by the Rules Committee." She tried to imagine having nothing to do
with the Council and reading this and it would appear that the Rules Committee
appoints all the chairs. The Rules Committee just begins the process by
appointing the first chair and then we rotate. So it should be clarified that the
Rules Committee appoints the first chair and it is done by seniority.
Discussion of rule 7.2 regarding the number of votes necessary to dismiss the
City Manager. The Rules Committee at their last meeting voted 7-0 to
recommend changing the number of votes necessary to dismiss the City
Manager from 6 to 7. The sub -committee, in reviewing the additional
recommendations of the full Rules Committee, suggested leaving it at 6 votes,
and questioned how this recommendation originally came up in the committee.
Mr. Morgan explained that the language of the rules had been inconsistent
regarding the use of "Corporate Authorities" and "Council", which describe the
same concept -- the Mayor and the Aldermen. When the committee was
considering the language change to make rule 7.1 and 7.2 consistent, they
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discussed making the number of votes to appoint and dismiss the manager the
same. The Rules Committee discussed the sub -committee's recommendation to
leave the language as it currently exists in the Rules, which is 7 votes to hire, 6
votes to dismiss.
After much discussion Aid. Moran moved to keep the change as 7 votes to
remove and 7 to hire. The motion failed for lack of a second.
Aid. Rainey moved to leave it at 7 votes to hire and 6 votes to remove. Aid.
Wollin seconded. The committee voted 4 to 4 on this recommendation.
The committee then discussed rule 7.6, which would allow the city manager to
place an item on the Council agenda. The feeling of the committee was that
this should be happening currently. Ms. Carroll agreed to operate under that
premise. The committee agreed by consensus.
Aid. Bernstein moved to modify rule 9.5 to take out Human Services Committee
responsibility for unified budgeting. The committee agreed.
CITY MANAGER'S EVALUATIQiN:
Aid. Rainey moved to appoint a sub -committee to get together and recommend
to the Rules Committee a model for evaluating the city manager and then go
forward from there. This sub -committee would include Mayor Morton and Aid.
Holmes would serve as chair. Whoever else wants to serve should be on it also.
Aid. Tisdahl - seconded.
Motion carried and approved.
The sub -committee will consist of Aid. Holmes as chair, Mayor Morton, Aid.
Bernstein, Wollin and Moran.
AD30URNMENT:
Meeting adjourned at 7:13 p.m.
Respectfully submitted,
Darlene Francellno
Rules Committee Minutes 3/6/06
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MINUTES OF THE RULES COMMITTEE MEETING
MONDAY, MARCH 6, 2006
6:00 p.m.
Aldermanic Library
Present: Aid. Bernstein, Hansen, Holmes, Jean -Baptiste, Moran, Rainey,
Tisdahl, Wollin & Wynne
Presiding: Aid. Edmund Moran
Staff Present: Judy Aiello, Julia Carroll, Darlene Francelino, Herbert Hill, &
Gavin Morgan
Guest: Bob Atkins, Patricia Atkins, Sue Brady, Chris Ernst, Judy Fiske,
Arlene Haas, Michael C. Hendershot, Barbara Janes, Robert
Janes, Jeanne Lindwall, Mary Morris, Mayor Morton, Betty
Papangelis, Bob Seidenberg, Mary Singh, & Eli Wolf
CA" TO ORDER:
Aid. Moran called the meeting to order at 6:10 p.m.
APPRQVAL OF FEBRUARY 6. 2006 MIN TES:
Aid. Tisdahl moved approval. Aid. Wollin seconded. Minutes approved.
REDUCTION IN THE NUMBER OF ENERGY COMMISSION MEMBERS (FROM 11 TO
n
This item was requested by Mayor Morton because she can't get enough people
to serve in order to have 11 members. She said she has kept one member on
until someone was appointed and he has served so long that he wrote to her,
and stated as of March 1, he could no longer serve. She has begged people to
serve, whom she has met that are qualified, but they will not. It isn't easy to
get people with the expertise required for the Energy Commission and it
occurred to her that there are presently 7 members on the committee who do
come. So it would seem that the only thing to do is reduce the number to 7 so
the Energy Commission can have a quorum and can function.
Aid. Wynne moved to reduce the number of the members of the Energy
Commission from 11 to 7. Aid. Holmes seconded. Motion carried and approved.
NXETING SCHEDULE AND TERM LIMIT FOR CITY/UNIVERSITY COMMITTEE;
This was Aid. Wollin's reference from increasing communication in the
neighborhood regarding the university on widening the dialogue.
Aid. Wynne had a 3 part motion with respect to this issue. She first proposed
that the NU/City Committee be expanded by 2 additional neighborhood
representatives and 2 additional members from the university. Second that
there be a 4-year staggered term limit to bring it in line with most of the other
boards and commissions, which would be beneficial to the institutional memory
and better functioning of the committee. Third, establish 2 meeting dates a
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year in March and October that are firm and on the calendar so that the
committee does not have scheduling problems. She had no particular date in
mind but, for example, the 2"e Tuesday in March & October so that it can be on
the calendar and the meeting could happen regularly whether there is anything
on the agenda to discuss or not. Aid. Bernstein seconded.
Mayor Morton said that according to their ordinance, the majority of the boards
and committees have terms of 3 years, except for a few that are special.
Aid. Wynne stated that the Zoning Board of Appeals has a 5-year term and she
thought that a 4-year term would be an appropriate length of time for this
committee and would create institutional memory. If NW does have long-range
plans, they are not likely to be presenting in a single year, and it probably is
going to be a multi -year discussion. This way you create continuity on the
committee from the citizens' and the neighbors' side and a requirement for the
NU/City Committee to have regular meeting dates, even if they don't have
anything to discuss, which promotes the whole point of Judge Mikva's goal.
Judge Mikva saw that we did not have a good relationship and the consent
decree negotiating team of which Aid. Wynne was a part was to create a good
relationship. Aid. Wynne said by having 2 regularly scheduled meetings, even if
it is just to sit down and get to know one another rather than have NW arrive
with a plan and have to begin to know who is on the other side of the table.
Her proposal retains Mr. Atkins and Mr. Schoenfeld on the committee. Their 4-
year term started when they were appointed. Aid. Wollin has proposed 2
additional members and she would have them appointed and approved by the
Council and start their 4-year term.
With respect to the motion Mr. Hill said there are some things this Rules
Committee can do unilaterally where there would be no need to go back to
court with respect to the consent decree. The consent decree is very specific In
the number of members on the committee. The suggestion to increase the
membership by 2 would need to be discussed with NW. If they were to agree it
would be amending the consent decree and that is not unilateral action by this
committee. The same thing with respect to regular meetings at whatever
times, that is not part of the consent decree and would have to go back to the
University for discussion. If they agree, it would be simply a matter of
presenting that to the court. If they don't agree, it becomes that much more
complex. The issue with respect to the 2 members on the board presently, is
not subject to the consent decree and the Rules Committee can do anything it
chooses with respect to the current membership structure of the two. The
Rules Committee can keep 2 on, change 2, modify it anyway, or stagger terms
for those 2, But the other 2 components, that is something that even if this
committee decides, it would be a recommendation that has to be taken to NW
for discussion and then onward to the court for a final order.
Aid. Holmes referred back to what the Mayor said regarding 3-year terms for
most boards and commissions. She wanted to know if the regular boards and
commissions have 3-year terms, if something special would have to be done to
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make the NU/City Committee a 4-year term, and what made the ZBA have a 5-
year term versus the others? Aid. Wynne said the Environment Board has a 4-
year term and generally the terms are 3, 4 or 5 years. She is recommending a
4-year term because they have 2 members presently on the committee who are
about to come up to their second earmark. If 2 additional members are
appointed then they would have people staggered at 2-year points on a 4-year
term. Aid. Holmes added that it could also be a 3-year point and a 1-year term,
which would allow some carry over with 1 year.
Arlene Haas of the Energy Commission asked if the terms would be renewable,
because on the Energy Commission has two 3-year terms. Aid. Wynne thought
It might be best to open it up to as many people as possible and not make them
renewable. Aid. Tisdahl suggested if the Alderman of the ward thinks
somebody is doing well and wants to keep them on or believes in rotating, that
should be the Alderman's decision. Aid. Jean -Baptiste added that NW would
not necessarily be rotating their people.
Robert Atkins, a member of the NU/City Committee, was somewhat confused by
the motion. They are all operating under a consent decree, and as he
understands it, the Alderman of the Vt ward has no authority whatsoever to
approve or disapprove of anybody on the committee. It is a City Council and a
consent decree, which is very explicit that they serve at the pleasure of the City
Council. The consent decree obviously has specific people in mind from NW,
and It reads "...shall be the Vice President with responsibility for development
and land use issues, or other Vice President with responsibility for the Issues to
be discussed by the committee;..." It is limited to 2 representatives and when
you start defusing it and having others for the sake of balance you get into the
issue of why the need to increase the membership of the committee that was
started as 2? They have had only 3 meetings, and part of the difficulty is
finding a date for the meetings. In November 2005, they had their third
meeting in 2 years, and at that meeting, it was agreed by NW and the
committee that they would meet quarterly on the 3rd Thursday of the second
month of each calendar quarter, which would have been the 16th of February.
That meeting got cancelled by the I" ward Alderman. It was the committee
that decided to meet quarterly and, looking at the consent decree, meeting
quarterly made sense and NW agreed. If there was anything further that had
to be done they would then meet between times.
Mr. Atkins went on to say that there has been some discussion that they
haven't had agendas. They've had agendas for every single meeting, plus the
fact there is an agenda in the consent decree that discusses the various land
use issues that the committee is to discuss, every single meeting they go
through that as an agenda. In summary, there is no reason that he has heard
other than it is good to have more people in the community on the committee.
Both he and Mr. Schoenfeld have had a long period of being dedicated to the
protection of their neighborhood. Once you start expanding to 4 members and
start talking about NW's 4 members and going before the district court to
change it there should be a good reason. He did not think there was a reason
beyond politics that he nor Mr. Schoenfeld should be removed from the
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committee or be on the committee for a few more years and adding someone
else.
Aid. Wynne said the consent decree was drafted so there is an equal number of
representatives from NW and the community and in order to keep the balance
her motion is to expand the number of members by 2 on the community side
and suggest to NW that they have 2 more representative. She appreciates Mr.
Atkins comments but what she is trying to do is make it so the committee can
function better. By having meetings twice a year and setting the dates in
advance it is on the calendar. By expanding the number of members by 2 if one
person is missing from the community there will still be 3 people from the
community who can be there. If the Judge doesn't agree, he doesn't agree but
the goal is to make this the functioning committee that Judge Mikva was urging
them to create when it was put into the consent decree.
Judy Fiske said when all the discussion of the consent decree took place It was
for very specific reasons and the Northeast Evanston Historic District
Association opposed the consent decree primarily because they knew it would
created more problems in the future than it would actually solve and this is one
of the problems. One reason she is here tonight is to support Mr. Atkins and
Mr. Schoenfeld who are board members of Northwestern Neighbors, the single
largest neighborhood based organization in northeast Evanston. As
representatives to the City/University Committee Mr. Atkins and Mr. Schoenfeld
are representing the Northwestern Neighbors and the hundreds of neighbors
who are effected by every decision NW makes Involving the T1 and T2 zoning
districts along Sheridan Road. The Northwestern Neighbors knew during the
historic district litigation that what NW really wanted was the re -zoning of
Sheridan Road. She trusts and feels every other member of the City/University
Committee and the NW Neighbors community, trusts that Mr. Atkins and Mr.
Schoenfeld are really there representing the individual neighbors and the
neighborhood, not an Alderman. She knows there is a mechanism In place
when a decision is made by that committee that it will be disseminated again to
the hundreds of people that live in the neighborhood.
In addition she doesn't know Ms. Dalton at all, she has never been involved
either in the historic district process nor does she believe that Ms. Dalton has
been involved with NW neighbors. Her understanding with Mr. Lobin is that he
has a personal relationship with certain administrators at NU and may in fact
have a contract with the University with his business. it would be worthwhile
asking how these people really are going to represent a neighborhood that
basically they have not been involved in. The Northwestern Neighbors have
enough going on in their neighborhood, as many other neighborhoods, and
adding one more thing to their plate in terms of having to following along with
what the new members of the City/University Committee may be doing, where
the absent of Mr. Atkins & Mr. Schoenfeld, creates a larger problem and they
don't need additional problems in their neighborhood.
Ald. Moran was a little discouraged because the idea of having this committee
was consistent with what Mr. Atkins said in relation to Judge Mikva's approach
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to the consent decree. It was to foster a better sense of cooperation to create a
forum where hopefully constructive discussions would take place between the
citizen members and the university members of the committee. He has no idea
what they have talked about in these 3 meetings, when they took place, and
has heard nothing positive or negative come out them. At this point, from his
perspective, the objective of that particular portion of the consent decree has
not been met and it appears to him to be an abject failure. He reminded all that
the consent decree was meant to bring peace between the participants, not to
encourage continued alienation and that is a problem that has to be addressed
In one fashion or another. Recently he has been hearing people making threats
about suggesting that the City somehow isn't complying with the consent
decree and there are probably a lot of people who could suggest to the court
that the consent decree is not being complied with. He thinks the 2 more
members and the 4 year term suggestions are good. The idea of expanding it
with the hope that new participants may be able to spur further conversations
or some, conversation might be helpful. He did not think that it really made
sense for the Rules Committee to suggest a meeting schedule whether it is two
meetings or 4 meetings. It seems as though quarterly meetings make sense
and maybe they could be more frequent if there was a need but he thinks that
is something he would be more comfortable letting the committee members
decide because perhaps they are in the best position to decide that. If they
can't decide then he would suggest bringing it back to the Rules Committee.
Aid. Wynne appreciated the fact that quarterly meetings might be a better
suggestion. But her understanding is that the committee has had difficulties
coming up with a meeting date. What she is trying to do is take some of that
problem away from the committee by establishing a firm meeting date.
Otherwise she believes they are going to be back in a year from now saying
they can't get a meeting date.
Aid. Tisdahl agreed. She also has heard a great deal about the difficulty that
this committee Is having in setting a meeting date. She would like to set at
least 2 specific dates a year and if they want to set more they would be free to
do that. They could meet quarterly, weekly or whatever they agree to, but if we
set 2 meeting dates that would help the committee to at least meet twice a
year.
Aid. Holmes asked what would be the timeframe and process of going back to
court. Mr. Hill said there is no set timeframe. The conclusion of this
committee, whatever it would be, if it effected the consent decree we would
contact NU and tell them what the committee is proposing and see if NU would
agree to it and have discussion with them about it. If the University does not
agree to it then we can always go to court to try and force an amendment to the
consent decree, which would probably be very unlikely. Whatever the Rules
Committee determines will need to be agreed to by the University to the extent
that it amends the consent decree. Aid. Wynne added that if the University
doesn't agree they would not force it.
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Aid. Rainey said she never had any respect for this concept of this committee
because she knew It would never be productive because it was not meant to be
productive. We ought to demand reports from this committee. We need to
know what they are doing, when they meet and receive the reports from the
previous meetings and meetings to come. We need to have regularly scheduled
meetings and she wants to know who has been to these meetings and what
happened.
Aid. Wallin stated that everyone on the committee has showed up starting with
the first meeting with Aid. Newman in April 2005. The 2 meetings she attended
the question about does NU have plans for the TI or T2 areas of the city were
raised and NU said they did not. They talked a little bit about parking and a
little bit about neighborhood issue. NU said their plans are for east of Sheridan
Road and they had no plans for zoning changes or for building. The October
meeting was changed to November because Mr. Schoenfeld couldn't be there In
October.
Mr. Atkins reported that there have been 3 meetings all with agendas. They put
It to NU what is basically going on in respect to land use issues that are set
forth in the consent decree. At the April 2005 meeting they asked NU for
further plans with respect to particular buildings. The committee has what was
going on in T1, T2 & U1. They have what NU plans are for additional space and
there was discussion. As the Alderman indicated NU said no they have no plans
right now with respect to any of those areas. It is important to meet on a
regular basis which is what the consent decree suggested so that we as
neighborhoods, you as Council members and the entire Evanston community
aren't surprised some day. There have been difficulties In setting a meeting
date and at their last meeting the committee all accepted and agreed to meet
quarterly. They want to meet with NW and want to do it as early as possible
because they don't want any surprises and they don't want to wait until 2 more
members possibly come on and a possible amendment to the consent decree.
That was one of the real purposes of this consent decree was surprises and the
committee has done just what the consent decree suggests. Everyone has
appeared at these committee hearings and in terms of scheduling, it should be
scheduled quarterly since NU has agreed.
Ms. Undwall was at 2 of the 3 meetings, the first and the 3`d. The first meeting
did have an agenda and one of the issues she raised was really being more
specific as to exactly which properties were included that were governed by
the consent decree to apply enough detail where if in the future NU wants to
build something they would know where the boundary lines are. aim Wolinski,
the building department and NU worked that out. The next meeting she was
unable to attend but there were minutes and that was resolved as a result of
the first meeting. The V meeting, as Mr. Atkins has indicated the regularly
meeting schedule was developed and there was a dialogue. With any new
committee it takes a while for the relationship to be established but she thinks
it would be a mistake to change members 2 years into the process when there
have been only 3 meetings. Having members of the citizen group representing
the neighborhood who work with the established neighborhood organizations
6 3/27/064:16:17 PM
Rulcs Gontni" s AMmit" 3/6/06
APPROVED
makes a lot of sense, because there is a lot of institutional memory and
knowledge that not every one In the neighborhood possesses.
Aid. Jean -Baptiste asked if it was correct that the only aspect of the proposal
that the Rules Committee has any kind of authority over is the responsibility of
the community representatives.
Mr. Hill said that was correct, what their participation and what their
involvement would be. Also the Rules Committee as the administrative
organizational committee of the City Council can determine whether it should
have term limits of the 2 members of the committee and what responsibility is
expected of those 2 members. Whether those 2 members are on for a definite
term, an indefinite term or a staggered term is not subject to the consent
decree. That is the city regulating its control of its members on the committee
which was a result of the consent decree. So any limit restrictions, manner of
reporting, or replacing of members of the committee, there is no requirement
that the members of the committee, on the city's part, be certain individuals or
have the term for any specific period of time. The City Council can remove
members at their pleasure and put new members on that committee. As an
example at the meeting tonight this committee could determine that 2
members have served the city well, that their services are no longer required or
necessary and 2 people can be recommended for appointment at the next City
Council meeting, all regulating the 2 members, which is the sole authority of
the city.
Aid. Jean -Baptiste suggested that they first try to consider those things that
they have authority over and then discuss whether or not to take on the court
to seek agreement of NU. On the expansion they have to approach NU,
responsibility, term limit and rotation they have authority over.
Mayor Morton asked who appointed the original committee. Mr. Hill said the 1"
Ward Alderman made the recommendation and the actual appointments were
made by the City Council.
Ald. Tisdahl said following Ald. Jean-Baptiste's suggestion, it Is within our
purview to go ahead and decide whether we want staggered terms and whether
we want to say the first term would be 2 years and what number serves for 4
and then you appoint another one. In other words you could have one term
that is up after 2 years, which would be coming shortly and one that goes for 4
years. So you would have one appointment now or one person would be
reappointed and you'd have one that would be done 2 years from now.
Aid. Wynne said there is a motion on the floor and Mr. Hill has told us that we
have authority to determine the term and the responsibilities. Her motion is for
4 years because that is in line with a number of the other committees. She did
not think anything short of 4 years is appropriate. There is an institutional
memory aspect of this that goes on and you build relationships, especially
because the committee has only met 3 times. Having the 2 members who have
been nominated and are on the committee continue because they've served
7 3/27/064:16:17 PH
Was Cmmittes Minutes 3/6/06
APPROVED
since the first moment and have them overlap with 2 additional members. She
would propose that they have the 4 year staggered term and add 2 additional
members on both sides. She knows the consent decree says meet regularly she
feels it is important to require that they meet at least twice a year. She
proposed that they vote on that plan and go with that plan to NU. If you have a
larger group you have the ability to have a meeting schedule and not require all
members to be there. By having it staggered this way if there is another
Alderman who serves for the 1st ward this is staggered so that as it continues
on through time every Alderman or every particular term has an opportunity to
nominate and appoint.
Aid. Moran asked that she explain the staggered term. Aid. Wynne explained
that Mr. Atkins and Mr. Schoenfeld have been serving since Feb. or June of 2004
and as of June 2008 their term expires. According to her motion, If they
succeed, they would have 2 members who have been nominated by Aid. Wollin
and approved by this Council who would have overlapped and have served 2
years. They would have been appointed in 2006 and their term would end in
2010. By then there would be 2 other new members who would be
overlapping. NU is not changing folks on the other side of the table and she
would like to have as much continuity as possible from the community to
discuss things with NU. This is positive for everyone in the community and
more members improves the discussion and improves the ability to get a
meeting scheduled. Having the staggered term improves the strength of the
committee from the community and by having a nomination/appointment every
Aldermanic term becomes less politicized because every Alderman will have an
opportunity to appoint 2 members, whether that alderman serves 1 term, 4
terms or whatever.
Aid. Moran said the motion has been moved and seconded.
Eli Wolf said that as he listens to all of this, he feels very unrepresented. Mr.
Atkins and Mr. Schoenfeld are strong representatives of the interest of our
neighborhood and this is vital. They can not sacrifice that voice or that
defense. He does not know who the new candidates are, has never heard of
them and they have not been present at any of the meetings that he has
attended. He is very discouraged with what is going on. Therefore, the notion
that their only 2 champions in the neighborhood shouldn't even be under
discussion for dismissal is absurd. Aid. Wynne said that is not on the table. Mr.
Wolf said but that is one of the reasons this meeting is taking place. He has big
problems with an alderman determining who his representatives are going to
be in the time to come, whoever that alderman is. They voted for these people
to represent them in City Council and Northwestern dealings and they did it
because they don't have their own voice.
Ms. Janes asked if the motion included the possibility of self -nomination as the
other commissions and boards. Aid. Wynne replied that people could certainly
give their name to the 1' ward alderman, but the consent decree Is drafted that
a 3/27/064:16:17 PH
Rules Om nittee Minutes 3i6/06
APPROVED
the 11 ward alderman nominates and the City Council approves the
representatives from the community.
Mr. Atkins differed with the committee in terms of the consent decree. The
consent decree has what lawyers talk about, a semi -colon. Regarding the
appointment of the committee it reads "(ii) two representatives of the
community, who shall be chosen by and serve at the pleasure of the City
Council; and (Ili) the Alderman of the First Ward." The Alderman of the 1st
Ward is a member of the committee, 2 members of the community are
members of the committee, and 2 members of NU are members of the
committee. The first ward alderman has nothing whatsoever, in the consent
decree, to do with the appointment process.
Mr. Hill said it is very interesting that Mr. Atkins points that out and he concurs
with his interpretation. But that is not the practice that has been in effect as it
was understood by the parties. A key component of the consent decree was
that the voting members are equal, and the proposal, as Mr. Atkins sets forth,
has the membership at 3, with 3 people being University representatives.
Mr. Atkins said no, paragraph 3 of the consent decree reads "The University
and the City have agreed to establish a special committee, comprised of: (I) two
representatives from the University, one of whom shall be the Vice President
with responsibility for development and land use issues, or other Vice President
with responsibility for issues to be discussed by the committee; (11) two
representatives of the community, who shall be chosen by and serve at the
pleasure of the City Council; and (iii) the Alderman of the First Ward......" This
Is basically a tripartite agreement with respect to the composition of this
committee, 2 from NW, 2 from the community and the Alderman of the First
Ward. And the Alderman of the First Ward does not appear to have any
appointment responsibility or involvement under the consent decree.
Aid. Moran said that certainly hasn't been the practice. Aid. Holmes said she
was at the P&D meeting when the members were selected and Newman
presented it to P&D. He had the right to nominate and there was no election
that night unless there was something within the community. Aid. Newman
came with the 2 names and P&D then voted and then It went to the Council.
Mr. Atkins said he did not think anyone had a problem with the fact that an
alderman or the alderman of the first ward can nominate. The Council has to
determine who serves at the pleasure of the Council, period. It is important to
understand that the Alderman of the 1s" ward can't send a letter to firing him
and Mr. Schoenfeld. Aid. Wynne said that is not what they are doing and Is not
what they are debating. There is a motion on the floor and right now she can't
remember and is going to call the question.
The vote was 9-0.
Aid. Bernstein asked who is going to be responsible for going to NU and ask
their consent. It was agreed by the committee that Aid. Wallin, the City
9 3/27/064:16:17 PM
Rules Committee ANnutes 3/6/46
APPROVED
Manager, Mr. Hill and Mr. Siegel should be the ones to discuss the consent
decree with NU.
Mr. Atkins thought it was appropriate for Council to approach NW about this
Issue. The second critical element is that the process of getting a change or
modification to the consent decree takes time. He did not think they should put
their meetings on hold while this goes along and 6 months from now maybe
look at a meeting date.
Ald. Moran said they are not going to be looking at 6 months from now. He
assured him that from his perspective this is going to be covered and as his
responsibility as chair of the Rules Committee he is going to insists that this be
taken up with the University expeditiously. They will find out whether NU
agrees or does not agree. Then depending on what their indications are they
will then go to court one way or another expeditiously. Certainly if they agree
this is a no brainier. He thinks if the City and NU goes in there with an essence
of a faith Judge Aspen is not going to have any problem with it and it will be
done in a very short period of time.
Mr. Atkins agreed, but wanted to know if there was reason why the 2 existing
members of this committee, 2 members from NW and the alderman of the first
ward can't have a meeting as early as possible. They will take up an agenda
that is similar to what they took up before, they don't rely on NW to say they
have nothing to talk because they don't want any surprises.
Ms. Carroll informed him that Aid. Wallin has given 2 dates in March the 20v'
and 23rd and Mr. Wolinski has told her that he Is going to contact all the
members and she will make sure that he does that.
It was requested that Council members be provided with all agendas and
minutes from the previous meetings held and the meetings to come.
SUB -COMMITTEE REPORT ON CITY MANAGER'S EVALUATION PROCESS:
Aid. Holmes reported that there is no report they are just trying to find a date
to meet.
ADJOURNMENT:
Meeting adjourned at 7:10 p.m.
Respectfully submitted,
Darlene Erancelino
10 3/27IG64:16:17 PM
Rules Conmi"ce Minutes 4/3/46
APPROVED
MINUTES OF THE RULES COMMITTEE MEETING
MONDAY, APRIL 3, 2006
6:00 p.m.
Aldermanic Library
Present: Aid. Bernstein, Holmes, Jean -Baptiste, Moran, Rainey, Tisdahl,
& Wollin
Absent: Aid. Hansen & Wynne
Presiding: Aid. Edmund Moran
Staff Present: Judy Aiello, Julia Carroll, Darlene Franceilno, Herbert Hill, &
Gavin Morgan
Guest: Sue Brady, Mary Morris, Mayor Morton, & Bill Smith
CALL TO ORDER:
Aid. Moran called the meeting to order at 6:10 p.m.
APPROVAL OF MARCH 6. 2006 MINUTES:
Aid. Tisdahl moved approval. Aid. Wollin seconded. Minutes approved.
9ITY/UNIVERSITY COMMITTEE:
Aid. Wollin reported she and the City Manager arranged a conference call with
NU and explained the motion and proposal from the last Rules Committee
meeting. NU respectfully denied accepting it and said it was inappropriate to
try to change the conditions of the consent decree and didn't want to legally
open the issue again. Aid. Wollin felt they still needed to put a term limit on
the NU/City Committee. She researched the city's boards and commissions and
found that 18 of them have 3 year terms, 2 have 4 years, 2 have 5 years and 2
have 2 years. Her suggestion would be a 3 year staggering term with rotation
of members, keep one of the current members and add one new member. The
current member would have one year left to serve and the new member would
start with a three year term. The consent decree calls for 2 community
members, 2 people from NU and the first ward Alderman. She also stated that
in the March 6, 2006 minutes of the Rules Committee Mr. Hill was pretty clear
about the fact that they can do what they want concerning the 2 community
members and the term limit.
Aid. Holmes felt a Plan 8 of having one of the members stay on and appointing
a new member was the fairest way to go and offered that as a motion. Aid.
Wollin added the 3 year term limit and Aid. Holmes agreed.
Aid. Wollin seconded. Then asked if there was a rule about members serving
on more than one board or commission.
6/29/2006 8:21s23 AM
Rules Coer mittee Minutes 4/3/06
APPROVED
Mayor Morton said there is a rule that you can only be appointed to one board
or commission. However, you can serve as a liaison to another committee and
the individual is referred by their particular board or commission.
Aid. Jean -Baptiste asked what the issue was that Mr. Atkins raised at the fast
meeting. Because it sounded to him that they wanted to have people chosen by
the community as oppose to the Alderman. In terms of the general process it is
the Mayor who appoints with the consent from Council. His question was
should that process be in effect, should they establish a new process or just
stick with what was done the first time. Because one year the alderman may
not be popular with the two who are holding the post or with the community
that is raising the issue and they want the Mayor to make the decision.
Another year or two they may want the Alderman to select the two community
members. Some consistency is needed in how the process ought to go.
Aid. Moran's thought was that Mr. Atkins finally conceded after some discussion
that history and practice was that the 1st ward Alderman's wishes were to be
the guide and force in the selection process and when all was said and done Mr.
Atkins was in agreement.
It seemed to Aid. Rainey that it is not the normal situation that a court orders
them to have a committee and that is how this came about. The consent decree
is loosely worded to the extent they don't see guidance there.
Aid. Wollin said there are no term limits in the decree. And in the pass the 2
community members were recommended by the 15t ward alderman with the
approval of the Council, but there is nothing in the consent decree.
Aid. Moran said what it comes down to is that the previsions are 2 community
members, 2 people from the University and the Alderman from the V ward,
everything else is open to their consideration and approach.
Aid. Rainey thought they should look to the Alderman. She is aware that it isn't
the popular thinking in the ward at this moment, at least not with the ones
talking the loudest, but they should look to the Alderman because what ever
decision she makes she is going to be held accountable for it.
Aid. Wollin felt that 3 years is a rational time period to serve and staggering is
reasonable and if they keep it at the 2 community members they don't have to
go back to court. Aid. Rainey asked for an explanation of the 3 year term. Aid.
Wollin replied that if they keep one of the old members and add one new
member the old member already would have served 2 years, so they would
have one more year to serve. Aid. Rainey's thought was that the smart political
thing would be to have the terms run concurrently with the Aldermen, because
it would be difficult for an Alderman to be working with people that are on the
opposite sides of the fence. She would suggest a 4 year term in the future and
this time just run the terms to the end of the Aldermen's terms. That way if
she is re-elected there would be 4 years of true bliss.
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Rules Committee Minutes 4/3/06
APPROVED
Aid. Wollin said the reason she initially suggested rotating is because it is a
difficult working relationship, and as far as improving the relationship with NU,
it has not been productive and she does not think it has accomplished what
]udge Mikva was hoping for. Aid. Rainey added that the relationship in the
neighborhood, NU's relationship with the neighborhood and the neighborhoods
relationship with NU are all important. Aid. Wollin agreed but stated that the
present members don't necessarily represent the entire neighborhood but are
the most vocal. Aid. Holmes added that the suggestion of the term limit came
from the way the regular boards and commissions are run for the city.
Aid. Moran said in his view he would like to see some new involvement in the
committee from their side. He does not see much positive happening and
thought it was a good idea to get at least one new person and it would behoove
them to do that sooner rather than later. The 3 year term seems rational
although he didn't know if he cared whether it was 2, 4 or 3 years. He did
suggest that Aid. Wollin might want to approach Mr. Atkins and Mr. Schoenfeld
and find out if either of them have a preference as to who wants to stay on and
go from there. If they both say they want to stay on then Aid. Wollin is going
to have to make a call and pick one. Then offer somebody else from the
neighborhood that she thinks would do a good job.
Aid. Bernstein said he would talk about a 4 year term only because they meet
at the most quarterly and the whole thing they are trying to do is to get a
relationship. He knows know they don't have much of a relationship and he
doesn't know where to attribute it to. But in his heart of hearts he is hoping
this committee works, but so far he has not seen much from it. If you are truly
trying to work together you have the time to grow in 4 years. In other words
the one existing member would continue to serve 2 more years. There is some
disparity in the feelings of the people in the ward and to keep the lid on, it is
better to give them more time than less. And in his opinion he would think it is
probably healthy if there is someone with an opposing view to the Aldermen on
the committee. He does agree with one new and one old but would make it a 4
year term and that way Aid. Wollin would still be on the Council and would have
another choice which will sort of start the rotation.
Mayor Morton stated her understanding is, according to what is in their rules,
board members are suppose to serve only 3 years and the ones that have
longer terms are due to some special arrangement.
Mr. Hill noted that generally there is a 3 year term, but there is no blanket rule
in the city code that establishes an across the board 3, 4 or 5 year term. There
Is no general rule that says all appointees shall be for X period of time. It is
with the discretion of the City Council to establish.
Aid. Moran said the motion on the floor is for a 3 year term. Aid. Bernstein
moved amendment to a 4 year term.
Aid. Rainey seconded.
6/29/2006 8:21:23 AM
Rules Committee Xmrtes 4/3/06
APPROVED
The vote was 5 to 2, motion passed.
Aid. Moran called for a vote on the main motion of one new member, one
existing member and a 4 year term limit. The vote was unanimous.
Aid. Wollin said she would call Mr. Atkins and Mr. Schoenfeld and find out which
of them would be interested in staying on and also contact the two new people.
There was some question brought up at the last meeting that one of the new
people had a conflict of interest. She spoke with him and he was ferociously
sure that he did not have a conflict of interest because his work contract is with
the Evanston Northwestern Hospital which is a separate corporation from the
University.
The question was asked when the term would be over. Aid. Wollin said the
present members were appointed in May of 2003 so which ever member
remains would have 2 more years to serve.
Aid. Moran reminded the committee that Aid. Wollin will nominate a new person
then inform them on whether Mr. Atkins or Mr. Schoenfeld will remain. The old
member will have 2 more years to serve and the new member will start a 4
years term once appointed and approved.
Aid. Wallin reported the next NU/City Committee meeting is June 22 and at
their last meeting in March they did talk about adding a small addition on to
Searle, the health care center and it is within zoning and complying with
everything. She was not sure if the minutes had been forwarded yet, but
minutes were taken.
Ms. Carroll noted that once the decision has been made they would place it on
the Council agenda so it is officially approved.
Aid. Rainey said the condition under which this is happening needs to be
reported out from the Rules Committee.
Mr. Morgan asked if anything needed to be changed in the rules. Mr. Hill said
no, if there is a non agreement for a person to leave he would suggest that the
City Council come back with a resolution creating a whole format of the
structure. If the structure is voluntary, as it is now, there is no need to make it
elaborate, but if there is disagreement then they would setforth the whereas
clauses of the court order or the people that were appointed if the term was x
and it is in the best interest to stagger the terms now. But as of now there is
no need to do something about it.
Aid. Wollin stated she would also like it not to be such an adversarial position
where people can't have civil discussions. That is her main goal to increase the
dialogue.
4 6/29/2006 8:21:23 AM
Rules Camittee Minutes 4/3/06
APPROVED
Mayor Morton looked up rule 5.3 of the rules which reads "The term for board
or commission membership shall be three years, except where otherwise
provided by statute or ordinance. Ald. Moran noted that they just passed a
motion that was not consistent with there rules.
Mr. Hill said based upon what the Mayor has suggested the approach would be
an ordinance that would clearly state that membership in this committee is x
for 4 years. So the whereas that he proposed for the resolution becomes an
ordinance. Theoretically, the City Council will adopt it on the 11th of April and
after the tit" the appointment can be made.
It was asked if the appointment and confirmation could be made the same
night. The response was Council would have to suspend the rules.
CITY MANAGER'S EVALUATION:
Aid. Holmes reported that the Sub -Committee met on the 20th of March and
reviewed the information that the City Manager had shared and other
evaluation formats from other communities. They looked at the City Manager's
accomplishments for 2005 and 2006 and the employment agreement. The
Mayor pointed out that they needed to look at the City Code and base the
evaluation on the city code. They took the points they wanted on the rating
scale from the evaluation forms and filled them in. There were 9 categories, A-
I - Enforcement and Administration; Appointments and Removals;
Administration of Departments; Annual Budget; Attend Council Meetings;
Contracts; Recommendations to the City Council; Reports and Publications &
Other Duties.
The 9 categories would be graded on "Below Expectations", "Meets
Expectations", & "Exceeds Expectations". There would also be a section for
"comments from the observer" and "suggestions for improvements". The other
piece is they would expect the City Manager to do a self -evaluation which
would be updated based upon this draft format if approved. In addition they
would look at the issues, challenges and opportunities that were on the job
description.
Aid. Bernstein said they would like Corporation Counsel to look at the language
in the existing ordinance. It seems to be a bit ludicrous, because under "F.
Contracts:" it says "The City Manager may sign, on behalf of the City, any
contract authorized by the City Council, except where otherwise directed by the
City Council......". They may want to remove that from the ordinance. But then
as a method by which they analyze this particular element, they talked about
the we talked about the City Manager's other requirements, if he or she
protects the city's interest in all dealings.
Aid. Holmes suggested they add under "F" three sub items: 1) Contracts are
properly bid in accordance with city ordinances; 2) Monitors compliance with
the terms of the contracts; 3) Protects the city's interests by enforcing
warranties and the clarity of city contracts.
5 6/29/2006 8:21:23 AM
Ruts Canmittts Anutts 4/3/06
APPROVED
It was requested that the Council be provided with the City Manager's job
description and the piece from Slavin Consultants. Ms. Carroll said she would
send out Slavin Consultants job description brochure, the contract and her
report on Friday.
Aid. Moran raised a point regarding the gird on the draft evaluation form where
it has "Below Expectations, "Meets Expectations" & "Exceeds Expectations".
He was not sure that he would want to base the evaluation on his expectations,
because his expectations would be that the performance under the
appointment would be excellent and that would not change. He suggested
maybe a 1-5 rating scale or something along those lines. For example, on each
one of the assessments you would assign a point, one being the lowest and five
being the highest.
Aid. Bernstein agreed and stated that historically his recollection was that the
more relevant portions came in the commentary, because you are not going to
get stars based on grades. But to the extent that they have some sense of
what is right or what is wrong will be put in the comments. As he recalls the
more important considerations came from the written evaluation and hopefully
everybody will write comments rather than just the numbers. The numbers
really don't tell where you are lacking and it is not fair if they don't tell in the
commentary why they got a 1 or 5.
Ms. Carroll shared that she has just been going through the evaluation process
with the directors and she uses a 5 point scale with definitions if they would
like to use them: 1. does not meet expectations; 2. needs improvements; 3.
meets expectations; 4. is often exceeds; and S. is consistently exceeds,
something along those lines.
The committee agreed with the changes to the evaluation form and accepted
Ms. Carroll's 5 point scale and she will email them to Ms. Francellno. Ms.
Franceiino will type the changes and email the final to the committee where it
can be filled out on line.
Aid. Wollin said the Sub -Committee envisions that the evaluation will go on-
line, there will be a certain amount of time to fill it out, and the city manager
will be doing her own self -evaluation concurrently. Then the Council will meet
in executive session to talk about the evaluation and will then bring the city
manager in and have a dialogue.
Mayor Morton noted that the Council will have to have another session with the
City Manager for her to set her goals. That would make it much easier for them
so when they get into the goal setting session, the goals that the City Manager
established should fit under each category. Then come back and fill out the
final form and make your evaluation. Ald. Holmes said that would be next year.
This year they don't have goals but are going to set them for next year. They
talked this morning at the meeting that the City Manager gave them sort of a
progress report but will give them something new based upon the issues,
6 6/29/2006 8:21:23 AM
Rules Canmittee Minutes 4/3/06
APPROVEb
challenges and opportunities that were written before she was hired. And as a
part of her self evaluation and the things that have been accomplished already
this year, that is what they will have to look at for the evaluation for this year.
But in terms of having a special meeting with her after that is done they will set
goals for next year based upon the strategic plan and it will fit under the 9
categories.
Mayor Morton asked if it was going to be the responsibility of the Sub-
committee to tabulate the results. The Rules Committee agreed that the sub-
committee would tabulate all the results.
Aid. Holmes stated that they would like to get any other suggestions/changes
to the evaluation form back by April 17, by April 24 the sub -committee will have
completed the form on line and May 1 everybody would be expected to have
filled the form out and submitted it. Then have the evaluation take place on
Sat., May 6 at 9:00 a.m., the committee will start and call Ms. Carroll in when
they are ready.
AWOURNMENT;
Meeting adjourned at 7:05 p.m.
Respectfully submitted,
Darlene Francellno
7 6/29/2006 8:21:23 AM
Rules Committee Minrtes 511A*
MINUTES OF THE RULES COMMITTEE MEETING
MONDAY, MAY 1 2006
6:00 p.m.
Aldermanic Library
Present: Aid. Bernstein, Hansen, Holmes, Moran, Rainey, & Wynne
Absent: Aid. Jean -Baptiste, Tisdahl & Wollin
Presiding: Aid. Edmund Moran
Staff Present: Judy Aiello, Julia Carroll, Darlene Francellno, Herbert Hill,
Gavin Morgan & Elky Purze
Guest: Sue Brady, Mary Gavin, Jeanne Lindwall, Mary Morris, Mimi
Peterson, Bob Seidenberg & Bill Smith
_CA" TO ORDI`R:
Aid. Moran called the meeting to order at 6:10 p.m.
APPROVAL OF APRIL 3. 2006 MINUTES;
Aid. Bernstein moved approval. Aid. Wynne seconded. Minutes approved.
ELECTRON ATTENDANCE AT COUNCIL MEETINGS:
Aid. Wynne's reaction was not to permit electronic attendance because it
degrades the quality of the meetings. If an Alderman can't be present and
there Is a critical Issue to that Alderman they would hold It over. She felt that
participating through a speaker box is in no way comparable to participating in
the meeting, both to the Alderman who is absent as well as the rest of them,
and the staff and citizens who are there. There have been other times when
someone has missed a meeting because of an unavoidable illness or emergency
and because an issue was of significance they held it over. While she does not
object to what they have done, she would prefer they not permit electronic
attendance. The vast majority of their meetings have had almost complete
attendance. She would like to know what other communities are doing.
Mr. Hill stated that he did not have a survey on what the majority of other
communities or typical communities are doing, but could get that information
for the next meeting. He did know that it is possible and within the discretion
of this body to allow electronic attendance.
Aid. Moran understood that frequently if somebody isn't able to be present they
can hold the item, but he foresees situations where the person will have to cast
a vote at a given meeting whether they can attend that meeting or not. One
instance would be that it might have been held once but under their rules an
Item can not be held more than once. Then at the next meeting the item is
going to be called for action and if that item is critical to that Alderman,
whether it is a city wide or a ward issue, they are going to want to vote. He can
foresee several situations where a person might be ill or out for a month or
longer, or it might just be bad luck where professional commitments take
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someone away. Maybe not a typical situation, but a bad run of luck that
someone has to be gone for a couple of meetings. There is also the other
question of between one meeting and the next there may not be a timing
problem, but if it goes out much longer than that maybe you will have the
timing problem and need to really bring it to a vote. With this they would have
the capacity to call up and vote on an issue that is critical from their
perspective.
The question Aid. Holmes had dealt with how many times this would be allowed
because she would not want to see it as an open ended thing where people
could do it all the time except in cases of an emergency and maybe no more
than 3 times a year.
Aid. Wynne thought 3 times a year was a lot. She hears what is being said and
all the situations sound absolutely plausible but when she thinks back on her 9
years on the Council and the variety of human and family experiences on the
Council, she can't think of a single instance when an Issue was held and
couldn't be held again. Even with the budget which absolutely must be voted
on. Her concern is what would happen if they had a meeting where 3 people
were participating electronically. To her that is not really a meeting, because
she has been on conference calls with lots of folks at different times and she
did not feel that they had a meaningful discussion.
Aid. Moran commented that there was a meeting because there was a quorum
present. But on the ocher hand the person calling in may not care to have a
meaningful discussion. They may have attended 18 meaningful discussions on
the issue and feel it is time to put discussion aside and vote for or against
something.
Aid. Wynne said that may not be the case because there have been significant
controversial issues that came before them and at the last second before it was
time to vote there was significant discussion that sometime has altered the
shape of what they vote on. If District 65 would have their spring break a
different week other than the 2"d week in April she would have attended one
extra meeting a year. She feels they have operated perfectly without this and
her tendency would be that she Is not in favor of this.
Philosophically, Aid. Bernstein was opposed also but thought as a fail safe they
might want to keep the opportunity there. For the 9 years he has been on the
Council he used it once for a Rules Committee meeting and Aid. Wallin did it
once for a Council meeting. If he remembers correctly, he was on vacation and
Aid. Wallin was at a National League of Cities Conference. As long as they
tighten up the rules so that it is strictly an emergency and not for somebody's
convenience he did not see a problem having it as a fail safe method.
Aid. Wynne asked what would be an emergency because both of the instances
mentioned do not fit under an emergency.
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Aid. Holmes thought the argument for Aid. Wollin would be city business and
there was a key vote happening in her ward. But it was not an emergency. Aid.
Rainey said she would call that an excused absence which they don't have that
designation right now. But they could have held the item.
Aid. Moran noted that most of them are present most of the time, but this gives
them a fail safe. Aid. Wollin's case is a perfect example; there was a critical
vote on an issue in her ward. It had been before various groups, commissions
and committees for 2 plus years. She was out of town on city business and
probably had made the arrangements months ahead of time not understanding
that this particular issue might come up at that very time that she was gone.
This is not something that is broke in the system and they are trying to fix it.
What this does is preserves the opportunity for Council members to cast a vote
when they must cast a vote when there is no opportunity for deferral. Things
happen and he is not saying that this might not happen again until this Council
is finished. But he has to realize that there can be circumstances and he would
not want an Alderman to not be able to vote on an issue that is important to
them, their ward or the city if for some reason they were absent from the
Council Chamber on that evening.
Aid. Wynne appreciated Aid. Moran's comments and she also would not want to
cast a vote In a reciprocal situation with him absent from something that was
critical to the 6"' ward. The other mechanism they have is they can hold things
as a courtesy which they regularly do.
Aid. Bernstein said they could vote on the reason for allowing electronic
attendance. In other words allow it infrequently but only in circumstances
where it is absolutely mandatory that we vote on a particular night, absent that
they can always hold it over. It is not a bad idea to have it in the arsenal just in
case. What they could do is in the resolution put in a prevision to say by prior
vote of Council, unless someone is sick because they don't know about that. In
his mind there is a difference between something that is pre -arranged and
something that is an emergency. He is not sure that if someone who is sick will
have the capacity to vote. He does remember when he was on the speaker
phone that it was not very satisfying voting on the phone, it was sort of like a
conference call with too many voices. In certain circumstances it is not a bad
Idea, but again they would have to limit it so It can not become abused.
Aid. Rainey said a rule will give permission to do it more frequently, they did It
once without any rules so why do they need a rule. If a vote of Bristol were
coming up on this Council she would not go on a Caribbean vacation or a
National League of Cities meeting. This would be the most important issue for
her and she would be here, even if they were allowed to have electronic voting
she would not be absent on an occasion such as that. She did not see any
defense for this unless a person was in a body cast in one of our 2 fine hospitals
and was mentally alert but physically unable to get here. For example, Aid.
Moran was on a mission to Boston an a case and his plane just did not take off
and he was scheduled to be here, she would think they would make
arrangements for him to Interact with the Council that night. They have all
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managed to run this city in a fairly efficient way without calling In their interest
and she would really argue that they continue that.
Aid. Bernstein asked how the last two instances were handled. Mr. Hill's
response was Council operated under the premise as there was no prohibition
that allowed it which brought to the attention that perhaps there should be a
standard as to when it would apply and would not apply.
Aid. Hansen's thought was since they don't have any prohibition against it as it
stands and don't have an ordinance that limits it, someone could justify it by
saying they can do it whenever they want and then Council is constantly
operating under these circumstances. But it gives somebody an opportunity to
put it to Council numerous times throughout their term to say they can't be
there and there is no prohibition against it and no limitation. She would rather
have a rule that sets the limit regardless of what the excuse is and they are not
there yet. In addition she feels that 3 times maybe is too much, 1 or 2 times a
year at best.
Aid. Rainey said what happens if 6 Aldermen do it on the same night. Mr. Hill
stated that paragraph (a) of proposed resolution 35-11-06 may have to be
changed because the "physically present" is a majority of a quorum. One basis
would be there must be a quorum present and you would need at least 5
Aldermen here. So (a) could read "a quorum of members must be present" and
delete the introductory part.
Aid. Rainey said she did not want to sound factious and did not mean it to be,
but wondered if this meant that they are going to consider having the city
manager and the staff call in because she sees this moving in that direction.
Ms. Carroll said she would not do that and if she was going to be gone for any
reason she would name someone to act in her place. That is something she can
do but the Council can not name someone to act in their place. The reason this
came up is because of the electronic attendance previously and there was a
reference made to the Rules Committee which is why it is on the agenda.
And in talking this through at the staff level they were really trying to provide
for those rare exceptions when something might happen. Staff was just trying
to provide the framework that would be allowed under the research that was
done on this.
Aid. Moran suggested they get away from the details and take a poll to see who
feels that it makes sense to allow this to happen under some circumstances. If
there is a majority in favor of that then talk about the particular ordinance, rule
or no rule and if there is a rule what should it say. Those that were interested
were Aid. Bernstein, Hansen, Holmes, Moran and Wynne. Aid. Wynne said she
would be in favor of having some rule to define it, not necessarily for this
Council but for future Council members.
The committee agreed to change Section 1, 21.2, to read (a) " a quorum of
members must be present", (b) (1) "serious illness or disability or", (b) (2)
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"absence from the jurisdiction for employment or for the business of the public
body or" and add to (c) ".........once a year........"
Aid. Wynne moved all of the items just discussed. Ald. Hansen seconded.
Motion carried.
DISCUSSION OF A CITY REFERENDUM TO INCREASE THE REAL ESTATE
TRANSFER TAX TO SUPPORT INCLUSIONARY HOUSING:
Mr. Hill stated a referendum question is permitted and possible. The reason the
material was not submitted prior to this meeting was because they needed to
track down the deadline date for the City Council action which would be on the
question. The deadline is September S. By Sept. S the resolution must be
adopted by the City Council and there is a minimal public notice requirement.
The public meeting can be part of the City Council. If the proposition is to
Increase an existing real estate transfer tax, the question set forth would be:
"Shall the City of Evanston impose a real estate transfer tax increase of, (X)
percent to establish a new transfer tax rate of (X)..." (whatever it is per
thousand dollars), "...to be paid by the (seller) of the real estate transferred."
Then the next statement is affirmative "The current rate of the real estate
transfer tax is (X)..." (it is now $5.00 per thousand) "... and the revenue Is used
for (general fund purposes)....." He did not believe there was a limitation now
for the revenue. It goes on to say "The revenue from the increase is to be used
for (whatever the purpose is)." If this is what this Council would want, this
sets forth the procedures and that is how they would proceed.
Mr. Hill continued on to say this must be done by referendum. The statute in
paragraph (d) pre-empts home rule and if this were to be on the ballot it is
purely informational and there is not campaigning one way or the other
because public funds are being used. There could be 2 sides to the issue and
they are using public funds to promote one side of the issue and you can't use
the money to advocate the political position.
Aid. Moran asked who determines that? Mr. Hill replied that it is in the statute
and there is a law with a respect to the tax dollars and he could provide that
information to the Council. For example, say the City Council was split on the
Issue of who would direct and how would they direct the expenditures of the
funds for the political purposes. Explaining what the affordable housing fund is
would be appropriate - this Is what the fund is, this is what the dollars are used
for that way the public can make the decision whether or not the money should
be made for it. He explained that the law hasn't changed since the enhanced
911 legislation. The question narrowly drawn today is, is the City Council
prepared to have staff draft a resolution, set the newspaper publication so the
matter can be considered.
Aid. Rainey said this will create a community campaign for people for affordable
housing in Evanston, who sees this as an opportunity to generate anywhere
between five hundred and a million dollars a year, depending on whether our
transfer tax goes up or down. It will also be a referendum on the community's
position on affordable housing on if it is worth it to them to pay$1.00 per a
thousand dollar of the sale of their house for affordable housing. It is really an
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ongoing, constant, while fluctuating, amount of money. it will be something
you can always count on, even in the bad days they had money from the
transfer tax. Secondly, she would argue for the use of some of those dollars to
consider a way to fund First Time Home Buyers for homes that are already on
the market. The idea of this inclusionary ordinance they are doing now all
really focuses on condominiums. She does not know how many people with a
family of 3 kids would want to move into a condo maybe they do, especially if
they can get a good price. But once that boom is over, the number of units that
are going to be added to the affordable housing stuff is minor. The inclusionary
housing ordinance being considered right now will put an absolute stop to any
15 or 20 unit building in her ward.
She went on to say that Howard Street is Howard Street as you see it right now.
It is not going to gain any housing units and conversions will cease if they
Include conversions. She is really looking for a way to see how the community
feels about affordable housing and if they feel the way she does they will vote
for this because it makes more sense than finding developers. One example of
something that has happened in her ward, at the corner of Dobson and Ridge
there are 3 little buildings with 6 units each owned by the family that owns
D&D Foods. They have no experience in apartment buildings and she had
encouraged them not to purchase these buildings, but they did so for tax
reasons. The buildings were bad when they purchased them, not so much
physically but the tenants were terrible and even though these landlords tried
they have not done a very good job. They have submitted a proposal to the city
to tear down these 3 buildings to build a very lovely 33 unit condo. These
people are going to be charged 300,000 a unit to tear down those 3 buildings
and then be hit with an affordable housing tax when they build their new condo
building. This is a family who wants to build 33 units and Is going to be
charged all this money just to do this. They are not a developer like Optima
who can build 100, 200 and 300 units. The city should being paying this family
$300,000 a unit to tear these 3 buildings down, they have been nothing but
trouble due to the number of police calls a year probably total $56,000 in value.
She feels the commitment ought to be spread around and she has heard from a
lot of people that if affordable housing is the thing they ought to do then
everybody should help out and they should. All the big projects are in and none
of the 100 plus units will get hit by this, only the little guys.
Mr. Hill said from the knowledge with other referendum questions he wanted to
put out there that it is not as simple as putting in the word affordable housing.
Council needs to look at what that means, what is it defined as, or is it to vague
for a purpose. Otherwise the question itself will be challenged
Ms. Carroll added that Council would have to pass a referendum by the August
meeting because the first meeting in September will not occur before
September 5 so as far at timing goes it takes away about a month to make a
decision.
Aid. Rainey shared that Aid. Tisdahl called her today and told her that she
should let the committee know that she supports this 100%.
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Aid. Rainey moved that they propose to the Council a referendum adding $1.00
per thousand to real estate transfer tax for the purpose of affordable housing
soon to be defined. Aid. Bernstein asked that it be called Inclusionary Housing.
Aid. Moran suggested that since Mr. Hill is going to explore language and he
also is a little concerned about how definitionally, what they end up with in
relation to inclusionary. He is totally supportive of the concept, but even when
they look at the proposed ordinance it is like which part of that is inclusionary
and which is not so that could be a complicated task but certainly one that Mr.
Hill could pursue. Aid. Bernstein stated if possible he would like that done.
Mr. Hill said one that comes to mind but may not be the appropriate one is the
special housing fund. It is a fund that is established that may have a definition
In place, but it needs to be something that the public knows what it is and what
Is affordable to one person may not be affordable to someone else. Aid.
Bernstein asked that he also find out what is taken out of the fund.
Aid. Bernstein seconded the motion. Motion carried.
DISCU,5SION OF AGENDA PROCLS51
Ms. Carroll provided a memo that suggests ways to try and tighten up the
process in terms of ordinances, resolution and how business is done. The
concerns particularly relate to complex policy matters or the case of planned
developments. Staff is trying to facilitate the process in a matter that will give
Council the ability to come to consensus before an ordinance Is drafted.
Sometime staff is putting out, for introduction, an ordinance that doesn't
necessarily have all the final parts in it. Ms. Carroll is recommending that staff
come to the P&D Committee with a report that really ferrets out all the
variances and all the things that the benefits the public that Council wants the
developer to give them, etc. and get consensus around that before drafting it
into an ordinance. Because what has happened a few times is that it gets
discussed on the floor and then staff is asked to go back and either meet with
the developer or clarify something. Then staff comes back and maybe that still
doesn't meet the committee's needs. At time there have been 2 to 8 drafts of
something before getting all the way through the process. The feeling is it can
be done better by having a more thorough discussion with the P&D Committee
of all the issues, questions and concern. Then come back and reach consensus
on that and then bring back the ordinance for adoption.
Aid. Rainey asked for an example that generated this concern. Ms. Carroll
mentioned the Mather,1613 Church, Inclusionary Housing, any kind of big
policy issue or planned development that maybe isn't fully developed when It
reaches the committee. Aid. Rainey said those are all cases where citizen
groups have been very much involved in presenting in between meetings and
changes in the development and plans and wanted to know what the plan was
to get around those changes. Ms. Carroll said that would not change what they
are thinking is getting some sort of consensus of the majority of the committee
on those points before drafting.
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Ald. Moran thought that what Ms. Carroll was getting at is sort of the efficiency
of staff resources. Ms. Carroll stated that was part of it, sometimes they are
bringing changes back on the floor where Council has denied its adoption and
she thinks, for the public's benefit, it would be better for them to have the
opportunity to see that in writing before it gets adopted. The public has
opportunity to see that language whether it be in the introduction stage or the
adoption stage before Council actually takes a vote on it and that is another
important point in itself.
Mr. Hill noted that in general there are several instances. One is the standing
committee votes out a draft of an ordinance, from the time that draft is voted
out and the law department is trying to craft, using the minutes, what is going
on there can be suggestions to make further changes in it and you have the
issue with the respect to the integrity of the committee process versus Input
from and individual Alderman or even from a citizen at that point and time. The
preference that he would have is the committee has voted something out, that
would be the draft that goes to City Council for consideration and that is
basically pretty close to final. The danger he has had in the law department is
the committee votes something out but they are not finished with it. They
voted something out but it is for introduction but is held in committee then 2
weeks later the committee makes some decision and is now putting in
additional language that is substantive into the ordinance and there is an issue
sometimes of fundamental legal issues that are then generalized policy issues.
The difficulty in what is for consideration is it may slow the process down a
little bit from the legal perspective, not the political perspective, to get it right
and it is better to get it the way the Council wants it.
Mimi Peterson said it seemed that what was being described is the process.
Very often it is a case, it gets voted out of committee and there are changes
that occur between the times it is ready to be introduced. This seems to her
that this is almost a subversion of the process if you can't have the opportunity
to interact if you are asking for the consensus on major components prior to it
being adopted.
Ms. Carroll said it definitely is not intended to be subversion. What they are
seeing is when they are having these discussions and staff is expected to
capture that in the moment on the floor and then the Council votes on it. The
concern is they really are not presenting that to the public, in writing and In
advance and that is the key point.
Aid. Moran's perspective was really kind of opposite because part of their
obligation is to let people know what they are proposing and to not say that
they are going to give about 7501b of what they are proposing and if you are
sharp and are there that night maybe you will get the other 15%. You want to
steady the process a little bit, not subvert it so that people can have a fair
appreciation several days in advance of the meeting of what they basically are
proposing. What is being addressed is a circumstance where major projects
that are coming down the pipe and big changes are being made on the fly or on
the last night and some think that is not the best way to do business.
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Aid. Rainey said part of the problem is they shouldn't send things to the floor of
the Council until they are ready to go to and they do that to please the proposer
usually because they feel terrible that they've been held up so long. On the
other hand they have a process whereby they introduce something one week so
then the 2 weeks before the next meeting can be used to thrash out, discussed,
thought about, changed, fixed, argued about, and debated about. Then produce
the real final product on the action night which is 2 weeks later. They have to
some how or another coordinate those issues because she would agree that
getting on the floor of the Council and having a huge pile of formal amendments
is difficult.
Ms. Carroll state that Aid. Rainey hit it on the head, if it is not ready to leave the
committee it does not need to leave the committee and that would solve a lot of
issues. If the issues aren't worked through it doesn't get introduced or if it is
Introduced and there are things to be worked out it must come back to the
committee and not be sent for action. That would solve her concerns about
those amendments on the floor and not having the law department have time to
work through the language. Aid. Rainey said it would be very helpful to the
committee to have staff say to them, at that point, that they don't think that
this should be placed for action because staff doesn't feel comfortable at this
point. They can always say no but it would be helpful to hear the reason that
this is not that simple. Ms. Carroll said they would be happy to do that but
thinks maybe there has been some hesitancy to do that.
Ms. Undwall shared that she has attended several Plan Commission, public
hearings, City Council and P&D meetings over the last year or so and would
agree with Ms. Carroll. When an item gets to the committee level, absolutely
until the ordinance is ready to go it shouldn't go. The same concerns go back to
the Plan Commission level, particular with the planned development
applications, because in her view one of the reasons that things take so long to
get through the process is that the initial application is frequently not ready for
prime time to begin with. Sometimes it is not a complete application or you get
to the public hearing and what the applicant is presenting is not the same
project that was noticed in the public hearing. There are a lot of instances
where, in the effort to keep the developer's building whatever sequence it is,
the hearing is scheduled well before the plan is ready to be heard. Which
means that the Plan Commission spends a lot of time trying to figure out what
it Is the developer is asking for, the neighbors spend a lot of time asking
question to try and figure out what the project is and those things could be
short circuited if they did what a lot of other communities do. Which is not
allow the hearing to proceed or be noticed until the application is complete and
staff has had an opportunity to review it. The question period for the public has
been much shorter, the hearings proceed in a more orderly fashion, there have
been a lot fewer questions and issues and then the Plan Commission can make
intelligent decision. They can list what other changes, conditions or other
issues that need to be resolved and they can address those in their
recommendation. She thinks the issues are not just what happens when it gets
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to the Council floor the problems and solutions need to be addressed in other
levels.
Aid. Rainey said she did not understand the part about applications not being
complete in getting to the Plan Commission. Ms. Undwall said it happens
before It gets there. The issue is that it is very confusing for both the Plan
Commission and public because while the Plan Commission may have the
correct application, the public who is relying on the notice may not have the
correct material and may have prepared their questions and other issues for
what was noticed.
Aid. Rainey said that hopefully this whole issue will be discussed more fully
when they talk with the consultant on the Planning and Development analysis,
which is very interesting thus far.
ADJOURNMENT:
Meeting adjourned at 7:15 p.m.
Respectfully submitted,
Darlene Francellno
10 WW200610:08:4z AM
Ruks C resit?" Mjft tss 6/5/06
APPROVED
MINUTES OF THE RULES COMMITTEE MEETING
MONDAY, JUNE S, 2006
6:00 p.m.
Aldermanic Library
Present: Aid. Bernstein, Hansen, Holmes, Jean -Baptiste, Moran, Tisdahl, Wollln,
& Wynne
Absent: Aid. Rainey
Presiding: Aid. Steven Bernstein
Staff Present: Judy Aiello, Darlene Francellno, Herbert Hill, Vincent Jones,
& Gavin Morgan
Guest: Sue Brady, Mary Morris, & Bill Smith
CALL ]Q ORDER:
Aid. Bernstein called the meeting to order at 6:12 p.m.
APPROVAL OF FLAY 1. 2006 MINUTES:
Aid. Moran moved approval. Aid. Bernstein seconded. Minutes approved.
MEETING SPACE FOR PLANNING & DEVELOPMENT COMMITTEE:
Aid. Wynne, Chair of the P&D Committee stated she was not at the Rules Committee
meeting when it was decided to move the meeting location to the Council Chambers and
asked that it be moved back to room 2200 or one of the other meeting rooms. They do
not function weal as a committee in Council Chambers up on the dais. She has always felt
that it is very difficult to see all the committee members while on the dais and hard to
keep track of the conversation and discussions. Frankly, she doesn't know how the
Mayor does it. She went on to say that if Aid. Rainey were here she would let you that
when they first became Aldermen they seriously looked at changing the configuration of
Council Chambers because there was a sense of not having real deliberations. There is a
big difference in seeing each others facial expressions and recognizing that someone else
has a point to make and that is very difficult to do in the formal Council Chambers. At
P&D they should be slightly less formal and tend to be much more formal when meeting
in Council Chambers. She recognizes that the point of moving to Council Chamber is
because the meetings can be televised and that could still happen when they know they
are going to have 150 people or so. Max Rubin has looked at televising from room 2200
and it is prohibitively expensive. A&PW is not televised and P&D has never been
televised and having it televised is a laudable goal, but having a better discussion and
real deliberations produces a better outcome which is a higher goal.
Ald. Bernstein ciid not recall a discussion to move P&D to Council Chambers to begin with.
He thought the only discussion they've ever had with respect to where it was held was
that it not be in the big room because of the sound system, which has been addressed.
Nor did he recall having a conversation about moving the meeting because of the
overflow. They decided that since they were in Council Chambers and had the capacity to
put it on TV why not put it on TV. He did not rill that they had a conversation that they
wanted it televised.
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Rules Cawmttee Minrtes 6/3/06
APPROVED
Mr. Morgan noted that the recommendation came from the League of Women Voters.
Aid. Moran added that part of the discussion with the League was that frequently when
they are working in the committee context, a lot of policy discussion, pros and cons and
peoples formulation of what is happening on these issues takes place at the committee
level over numerous meetings. When it comes out of committee it gets to the Council
floor and the outflow of the committee work has typically been hashed out. And
sometimes it is hard to recap committee meeting results and have all of that out there for
people whether they are tuning in or attending the Council meetings to hear what is
going to happen on a particular planning and development issue. He thinks the idea was
to try to promote a more comprehensive understanding of what all has gone into the
process and if people can't make it to all of these meetings they can at least tune in,
listen or watch one of the repeats. Aid. Wynne said she heard from someone that the
PAD meeting that was televised was not repeated.
Aid. Moran went on to say that room 2200 reminds him of sort of a bowling alley. It is so
narrow and so long and on nights when they have big issues and the room is full he feels
totally detached from the audience. The Council Chamber does allow them to get it
televised. But the idea of having it in a forum where people can get educated about the
issue and how it has worked up through numerous P&D meetings is a value that is
significant
Aid. Sean -Baptiste didn't think they went to the Council Chamber as a result of the
Intervention of the League of Women Voters. What the League had proposed was that
committee chairs explain what went on and what led to the conclusion that the
committee might reach. The move to Council Chambers was for the Mather and Darrow
Corners items, not as a result of a policy decision on their part. It might have been the
solution that was developed but they didn't proactively make that decision.
Aid. Bernstein thought they should discuss it because there is a tendency now that P&D is
now 9 members rather than 5, not to have to regenerate or repeat what they have done
because everyone has heard it once. Historically the 5 members would have to convince
or inform the 4 members and that was a different kind of discussion.
Aid. Wollin said it was also mentioned that if people tuned in at 8:30 p.m. expecting the
Council meeting to have started and PAD is still going on in the other room, far away,
nobody knows what is going on. The atmosphere is very difficult to make eye contact
and to converse in the Council Chambers but for the viewing audience it helps for them to
know what is going on when they tune in. Aid. Tisdahl said she likes the smaller room
and agrees that it does help for the audience to know where they are but the biggest
point is what makes them come to the best conclusion because that is really what the
audience wants as well as everyone else.
The committee asked if they could pipe in the audio, put it on the radio station and direct
people to use the radio and asked if anything is broadcasted before Council meetings on
Monday nights?
Aid. Wynne stated they do want to keep people informed. They are under a different
system now and as chair she is happy to do much more of an explanation of what
happens, what they do and what they've done In the committee.
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Ms. Aiello asked if the committee would want to try the Human Services room for P&D
meetings.
Aid. Holmes said she does not like room 2200 at all and stated that in the very beginning.
That room is like a canyon and has a very cold feeling. If they are not going to be in the
Council Chamber she would suggest the idea of moving to the Human Services room. It
has a much warmer feeling and if you are talking about trying to connect with the people
and the audience the Human Services room is a good suggestion.
Aid. Hansen added that one of the things they have to weigh is the deliberations and
discussions and how intimate it is for them at P&D versus the community and the public
and what they get out of it. Because what the League brought to them was that the
public doesn't know what has been done because they haven't had the benefit to be in
P&D. Then they come to the Council floor and since their structure has changed they
have no due and a lot of people are concerned about that. They have been in room 2200
often when developers or somebody is presenting something and the audience hasn't
been able to hear or see what is going on.
Ms. Aiello for clarification said they would not be investing in a TV. Staff would
Investigate, depending on where they end up moving, if they could do audio feed to the
radio station on a trial basis. They will still move into Council Chambers when they
anticipate large crowds and the chair will sit at one end or the other of the dais. Other
than that they are going to try meeting in room 2404.
After much discussion the committee agreed to hold PAD meetings in room 2404 which is
the Human Services meeting room. When large crowds are expected they will meet in
Council Chambers and the chair will sit at either comer of the dais to allow better
deliberations and a better view of the members.
Ms. Aiello asked if the committee wanted staff to consult with the chair as to the agenda
and which room the meeting should be held in. Aid. Wynne said that would be fine.
DISCUSSION OF BUDGET POLICY COMMITTEE:
Aid. Bernstein said Ms. Carroll asked that this item be placed on the agenda. Ms. Aiello
stated that Ms. Carroll is asking for some prospective dates and to determine a set
membership so that they would know if there is a quorum or not. The dates are listed on
the memo.
Aid. Wynne suggested they do what was done the last time which was all members could
be on the committee. There were about 5 of them who were regular members and had
regular drop -ins from others but there was a quorum of about 5 who were in attendance
at every meeting.
Aid. Moran thought it should include everybody for starters and he would encourage
everybody to come. Because the last process they had where everybody is kind of on it
and then 5 people show up was a real defect. There should be 7, 8 or 9 people at all the
meetings, someone is going to miss every once in a while and that is understandable. But
If they don't do that then the process gets scuttled because you then bring
recommendations out of the committee setting and half the people weren't there to
participate and you lose that consensus part of the process.
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Aid. Wollin's thought was that for those of them that are new it would be an educational
opportunity, but would like to know what time would the meetings be held. The
response was 7:00 or 7:30 pm.
Mr. Hill asked if the Budget Policy Committee would not be chaired by the Mayor. Or
would it be an aldermanic meeting as opposed to a Committee of the Whole where the
Mayor would be the chair? Or would the Mayor be a member of the committee or always
welcomed to attend.
Aid. Holmes thought it should be a Committee of the Whole and let the Mayor be the
chair. That way you cut out a lot of stuff because if everybody is involved in the
beginning you don't have to re -hash so much stuff. That is the whole beauty of having
Committee of the Whole.
Aid. Bernstein said the failure of the prior budget committee meetings was the lack of
mission. When former alderman Stephen Engelman was chairing the budget committee
they had a good system set up that they just couldn't quite put into play. For the benefit
of those who were not there they had a role play with meetings of the non -for -profits, for
profits, and of the community. They had those groups and actually broke off into
different sections and everybody was given information about this or that and they had
to come up with a balanced budget. And he thought in part, the reason was that they
were trying to get somebody else to take the heat and then they would get these groups
to fight it out and it never quite worked out that way. There was still the resentment to
giving up your particularly favorite thing, but in the next time they just lost focus. But
the first time he thought they had pretty productive meetings and it sounded like a great
Idea.
Aid. Wynne noted that for the 6 or 8 months before that they met with staff and
discussed and established a budget policy guideline on a number of Issues and carefully
drafted it and it was very productive as a committee. In that sense it was very
productive. They did all of that, not in the heat of the budget and are still adhering to
those guidelines now.
Aid. Moran noted that one thing that will help now is they've gotten a number of things
recently that will provide form to the discussion, including the strategic plan, the water
rate, the sewer rate and other things that he expects will be coming down the pipe. They
will be able to relay their budget discussions to those priorities established in those
studies and in the strategic plan. An implementation of the strategic plan is going to take
a lot of budget work to make it happen. So he thinks the budget committee is going to
have a menu to work with when it forms and kicks off its work.
Aid. Holmes followed -up in terms of the sub -committees of the community and the not -
for -profits and having been a part of that she thought they were very productive. She did
not view it in terms of the Alderman trying to get someone else to take the heat, but for
the first time the community had a chance to really look at the budget and begin to
understand some of the obstacles that the city was up against and to look at where there
might possibly be ways in which to make it more efficient and that kind of thing. In fact
those meetings are what really got her interested in city government at all. Susan
Horowitz, former mayor of Iowa, who passed away, was very, very involved and brought
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out so many points to look at and communities to look at that help you to begin to
broaden where everybody thinks that the city is wasting money. Of course, everybody
has an Idea where the money is going and all that This was a real chance for people to
have a guide and really be able to look at it and have some input and give some
suggestions. It was a very good beginning and it is just too bad that there was never any
follow up on it.
Aid. Bernstein agreed that the workshop aspect of those things was wonderful. He was a
little discouraged that they had such a great energy in the not -for -profit and then it was
gone. The hospitals were talking about this and they never got it together for whatever
reason.
Aid. Tisdahl, as a former high school board member felt that she had much more Input
Into the budget because they had meetings once a month and everybody came at 7:00 in
the morning, as brutal as that was. But with the budget here she does not feel she has
as much input at all. It seems it is hurry up and you've got to do it now and here is staffs
recommendation and she just didn't feel as thought she a handle on it.
Aid. Jean -Baptiste said he just wanted to put it on the table that what he thought lead to
the demise of the budget committee was just a lack of agenda and the further you are
from the budget the less of an agenda or urgency you have. So they didn't have things to
put on the table or issues needed to discuss so maybe Aid. Ttshdahl could share what the
school did. Aid. Tisdahl said they had an agenda every time from the budget director that
the staff brought to them and that way they would worked on it little bit by little at a
time and they had a sense of urgency because they always were going to have to cut
programs so they wanted to get in there and try to figure it out
Aid. Bernstein asked if they were all in agreement that it is a committee of 9 and the
Mayor obviously being welcome to attend and that the dates set forth in Ms. Carroll's
memo are ok unless they change them. Ms. Aiello asked for clarification on whether It
would be a committee of 9 as oppose to a committee of the whole?
The committee agreed to have a Committee of the Whole for the budget committee and
the Mayor will preside. The first meeting will be held June 19 at 7:00 p.m. after the 6:00
p.m. CIP meeting.
Ms. Aiello said the first meeting will basically be just to get your idea of what are the
themes, the mission and sort of developing that, and probably give a copy of the existing
budget policy.
ADJOURNMENT:
Meeting adjourned at 6:50 p.m.
Respectfully submitted,
Darlene Francellno
5 911CD% 6:13:47 Pit
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MINUTES OF THE RULES COMMITTEE MEETING
MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 5, 2006
6:00 p.m.
Aldermanic Library
Present: Aid. Bernstein, Hansen, Holmes, Jean -Baptiste, Moran, Rainey,
Tisdahl, Wollin, A Wynne
Presiding: Aid. Steven Bernstein
Staff Present: Judy Aiello, Julia Carroll, Darlene Francellno, Herbert Hill, Gavin
Morgan, Elke Purze, Donna Stuckert, Ellen Szymanski Ik aim Wolinski,
Guest: Mary Morris, Bill Smith A Bob Seidenberg
AU TO ORDER:
Aid. Bernstein called the meeting to order at 6.10 p.m.
APPROVAL OF JUNE S. 2006 MINUTES:
Aid. Tisdahi moved approval. Aid. Wollin seconded. Minutes approved. Aid. Rainey noted
that when you are absent minutes really help.
POLICY ON THE USE OF LIST SERVES BY ALDERMAN:
Ms. Carroll stated there was a request fulfilled for Aid. Wynne to create a list serve and
staff wanted to extend this information to all Aldermen to let them know it is available if
they would be interested.
Aid. Wynne explained that this came about because she distributes 1000 flyers for her
town hall meetings and it doesn't work very effectively if you have condos and
apartments in your wards. The idea was that in her one time a year postal mailing she
would give people an opportunity to sign up on a 3`d ward list serve so she would have a
much more effective method of blanketing the ward with an announcement of a town
hall meeting. There were issues from the legal and Information Systems departments
but were all resolved. The way it works is you look her up on the city's website and there
is a link to "Sign up for the 3' Ward e-newsletter" and once someone has signed up she is
able to send information and news to anyone on that list. The hope is to have 10DO
people sign up and so far there are a couple hundred. The list has been very helpful and
It can be set up for town hall meetings and crime or safety alerts but not a message
board.
Aid. Rainey commented that she has 1100 signed up. Her list is fragmented by sections
of her ward and she sends announcements out in pieces but the list serve is a great idea.
She also stated that since the Evanston Now, Evanston Roundtable and Evanston Review
were present tonight more people will know about it.
Mr. Morgan stated that if Aldermen are interested Donna Stuckert would set it up for
them. He explained that the set-up is like all the other city list serves where an individual
can sign themselves up to receive various information through emails.
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Aid. Bernstein asked if they would have to generate the addresses. The response was
yes. Aid. Rainey asked what form the addresses would need to be in because she already
has a list established.
Ms. Carroll stated that permission needs to be given because it is coming through the
city's website. Aid. Rainey said they gave their permission when they signed up on her
list. Ms. Stuckert said she had left it up to Aid. Wynne to administrator her own list, so
she is able to add people. Aid. Rainey said that would work for her.
Aid. Wynne explained that her issue was that she wanted to add some kind of disclaimer
letting people know that she wasn't going to distribute her list to anybody else. The
legal department's issue was it could be FOIA because it is a public document, but all of
that got straighten out One extra wrinkle in all of this is that this list can not be used In
future campaigns by them or anyone else because it is generated by the use of public
funds.
Aid. Moran asked if they have any work to do in terms of communication amongst the
Aldermen in relation to emails in terms of meeting requirements. Aid. Holmes asked if he
was referring to the school districts and the problems they are haying because that
should be on their agenda. The response was yes.
Mr. Hill stated that ernails are not concurrent or simultaneous, it is consecutive. A
meeting is dealing with people in the same place at the same time either electronically or
physically. If you email 6 people you are not In a discussion with them at the same time.
He believes that would be the distinction. You can email the Aldermen and get comments
back from the Aldermen. What you can't have is 6 aldermen on an instant messaging
device at the same time where you are corresponding back and forth. That would be the
same as a group conference call and they can't have that happen. He went on to the
Home Rule, there is litigation now involving Champaign with respect to emails and
instantaneous as opposed to concurrent or a consecutive reporting. For example, one
Alderman can email another Alderman and get a response back but you can't have all the
alderman together, so to speak, at the same time. If S Aldermen are the addressees of
one other alderman, does that make it a meeting? He believes the answer is no. But if 8
aldermen were in a chat room that would be a meeting and that Is a violation of the open
meetings act
Aid. Moran said the question beyond that is because he assumed Mr. Hill's opinion was In
light of the open meetings act, whether this Council should consider whether It is under
the open meetings act or otherwise. What limitations should there be in terms of
Aldermen having discussions between themselves through emails.
Mr. Hill said if you don't have a gathering you don't have a meeting and that Is the focal
point they are going to be dealing with. But the City Council can devise a rule with
respect to Aldermen communicating collectively or individually and that is a different
question. With respect to the open meetings act you need a gathering for the purpose of
discussing public purposes and the argument is, is a broadcast email a gathering. If
there Is no recipient on the other side at the time you send the email, does that make 1t a
gathering.
2 10!10,1006 10:18:14 ANI
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Aid. Moran said the question is outside the strict limitations of the open meetings act
where the term "gathering" was used. For instance, if there Is a quorum of the Council
talking on the Internet or through emails, should they do that or not. Mr. Hill said that is
a policy question into whom the government can decide on its own, it is not govern by
any particular body.
Aid. Bernstein said if he sent out a blast email to all the Council, he would say they are
concurrent not consecutive because they all are going at the same second.
Aid. Rainey asked how would sending an email to 8 Aldermen be different than typing a
letter, addressing 8 envelopes, putting it in the mail and having 8 Aldermen get that mail.
Nobody has ever challenged that.
Aid. Holmes said suppose an Alderman sends her an email and she happens to be on her
computer and opens it and another Alderman is on their computer and opens it and they
both respond back to the email.
After much discussion Mr. Hill stated that the law department would give a written report
on this at the next meeting.
EWCY ON MAILINGS (WARD MEETINGS. F-TC.):
Mr. Morgan said traditionally as requested and with permission they send out flyers for
ward meetings. Staff is asking that a month In advance notice be given to allow time to
copy, collate, put together, stamp, etc.
Aid. Wynne asked what the budget for mailings is because In the old days it used to be
that you got one mailing per year for ward wide stuff. She would like to know what the
rule or policy is for spending money for mailings which she understands Is expensive. But
mailings would help her reach people in condos and apartments.
Mr. Morgan reported that the postage budget right now is $500.00 for the Council. As he
understands it, in the past there was a budget and that line item has disappeared.
Ms. Carroll said what they are trying to get at is how much does the Council want to
budget for this and how often do they think they want to send mailings. Maybe a month
seems like a long time but staff does need some advance notice. They can't get a 2 day
notice and be expected to turn something around. At least a couple of weeks notice
would help. Aid. Holmes does a wonderful job of scheduling her meetings so staff knows
exactly when her meetings are going to take place. So if you know you are going to have
a meeting help staff help you so it can be done in a timely manner to get distributed.
Aid. Holmes added that she does not use a mailing, she gets her copies and people help
distribute them in various places.
Aid. Bernstein asked what would be the possibility of including it with a water bill or
under some other cover. Ms. Carroll said the water bills only come out every 2 months.
Staff is willing to work with the Council they just don't want to have a 2 day notice. They
will deal with the budgetary Issue separately, but right now they are just trying to
establish what the Council would like to have from a policy perspective, what staff can
assist with and then budget appropriately. Aid. Wollin added that the list serve would
help.
3 10 102006 10--1[ 14 AM
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Aid. Wynne said up until the last time she has always paid for all her copies and did all
the footwork. The second week in 3anuary she will be having her second ward meeting.
She would like information on how much mailings cost because it is very hard for any
ward that has condos or apartments. She can put an announcement in the papers,
distribute flyers, place flyers in several different places and still there are people who
never hear a word about it.
Aid. Tisdahl shared that she only flyers 2/3rds of her ward because she doesn't have
enough people to distribute so she switches the 2/3rds each time.
Aid. Hansen suggested using the "Highlights'. She has used it twice and so many people
turned out at the meeting she had in the spring. The meeting before that she had
volunteers flyer the ward and she knew they couldn't hit every door but 50 people
showed up. So if there are enough of them that are willing and able to put it in the
Highlights ahead of time maybe they could specifically highlight ward meetings.
Aid. Bernstein asked if there is a bulk rate for municipal mailings. Ms. Stuckert said they
use a postal patron rate and she was not sure if that was different from bulk rate. Postal
patron rate runs about 12 cents a piece but that was about a year ago and postage has
gone up.
Aid. Bernstein asked that staff find out whether or not there is a discount rate for
municipal mailings.
Ms. Carroll said staff would do that, the question is how many times a year would Council
want to do this so staff can have a budget for it
Aid. Sean -Baptiste felt that this Council and the Council before has not gotten much
financial support or staff support. He thinks the policy ought to be that they get the
necessary support to do the work they have to do. The way he sees it is they should have
a general policy of facilitating the work of the Aldermen and staff should talk to them
separately one on one in terms of what they need and what their plan is in terms of
carrying out mailings, etc. Because every Alderman is different in terms of how they
manage. He doesn't do general mailings because he does not hold ward meetings. His
ward is from downtown to almost out of town so his issues on McDaniel are not the same
issues on Benson. If he were to bring all those people together they are not even going
to be able to talk to each other. The support that he has been getting has been to help do
some distribution. And that may be one person running around for a day which is not a
lot of money if you get a student, part-time person or an intern and that helps him out
Aid. Bernstein said in that case they should set a ceiling on cost. Aid. Tisdahl suggested
$2,000 per aldermen.
Ms. Carroll said that would be tine, staff is just looking for some consistency so they
know how to administer the budget and how to use the staff.
Aid. Holmes asked if the $2,000 would be for mailings only or can it be used for
something else.
4 1W1a2006 10:19:14 AM
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Aid. Bernstein asked that staff do research on that so they will know what the perimeters
of certain kinds of communication might be.
Ms. Carroll went on to say the reason they are bringing this up now Is if there is a need
they want to take care of it in the next budget cycle because the Council hasn't had any
Input into their budget. So they need to discuss it and find out what are the needs.
Aid. Bernstein clarified that staff will find out what the costs are for bulk mailing, one day
of a kid's time running around and whatever those different variables are. Then they can
see what a reasonable amount would be and decided whether or not they want to cap it
at $2,000 and if it is not spent should it go into the general fund.
Ms. Carroll said staff will bring something back for the next meeting, which will be
Wednesday, Oct. 4 at 6:00 p.m. because Yom Kippur fails on Oct 2.
ADQPTION OF NEW PANNING & DENELOPMCNT COMMITTEE RULES FOR
CONSIDERATION OF PLANNED DEVELOPMENTS:
Ms. Szymanski noted that this is post Klaeren.
Aid. Rainey referred to page 3, section C, which would require a written submittal to the
Community Development Director from persons wishing to present new evidence by the
Wednesday prior to the Committee meeting. She knows how much more helpful it would
be if people submitted their information way in advance of their meetings or the Monday
or Wednesday before. But it just seems too bureaucratic because she doesn't think it is
being done for any legal reason. She thinks it is just being done to make matters run
more smoothly for the Council. So she doesn't support submitting written information
and evidence in advance if it isn't new information. But would support anybody bringing
new information to submit it in writing but would absolutely not require it but would
encourage it. She does not think they should preclude people giving new information if
they didn't send it to them the Wednesday before. Smart constituents probably do bring
information over or send it in advance.
Aid. Wallin said her problem is new evidence, because it doesn't give you any time to be
able to rebut or bring other information in. If you knew it was coming you could make
some effort to try and get what the consequences of that new information would be or
any other perspectives.
Aid. Wynne apologized because she wasn't able to read this before the meeting, but
wanted to clarify her understanding of it Does this mean that anyone who Is coming to
testify in front of P&D has to make a written request to provide new evidence before
hand? Aid. Wallin said if it is new and hasn't been in the record before.
Aid. Wynne went on to say they should encourage it but thought it would be really unfair
to the public to put another thing that they have to do before they get to the meeting.
Most people who are working on these things have day jobs and are calling back and
forth to each other and sometimes they don't even know exactly what the new evidence
Is until the day of while putting things together. This is really unfair to the public
because anyone who is a representative of a developer has lots of help preparing and
they know exactly when they are going to have new evidence. She would not support
this change.
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Ms. Carroll staged that the reason this was included was to try and help the Council by
having all the information needed to make a decision in advance of the meeting. If staff
receives the information on the Wednesday prior, they can put it out with the Thursday
Council packets. That would give Council more time to think about any new information
rather than hearing it for the first time on the floor of the meeting and trying to act upon
it or postpone the decision as a result of not having had time to review it She
understands the burden they are considering for the public but it is really about trying to
help the Council have all the information they need to make a decision as early as
possible.
Aid. Wynne under stood the City Manager's point but as she thinks about that last
weekend before that P&D meeting, the public who is opposed to some issue in front of
PhD has spent all day Saturday and Sunday at some neighbor's house trying to figure out
what their arguments are going to be and it is not fair to make them push that back.
Most of these groups or neighbors who are organized recognize the value of getting
something into the Council's hands as early as possible. She would suggest encouraging
people to do that. Whenever someone calls her and asks what they should do if they
want to oppose something for P&D, she tells them to get it into the Council packet That
way everybody gets a chance to read it and digest it and if they can't do that then come
to the meeting. That is the whole point of the meeting, to have a hearing where people
are free to speak.
Aid. ]ean-Baptiste asked if Ms. Szymanski would help them understand what would be
the difference now in terms of procedures than what they have been doing.
Ms. Szymanski explained that the substantial difference is that you are conducting a
public meeting just as was done before Klaeren. Before Klaeren, essentially what the
committee did, although it did not have formal rules of procedure, was to ask the
applicant if they wanted to make a presentation, generally the response was yes and if
there were any persons in opposition who would like to address the committee. Typically
the applicant, who has the burden of proof, was allowed to speak last if that person
wanted to do a summation. We are now back post Klaeren to that - rather an informal
meeting type approach to the consideration of planned developments, special uses,
variations and so forth. A court reporter is not needed, although the proposed rules say
that a court reporter can be used but that does not make it into a public hearing, it is just
for convenience. There is no reason to have persons sworn in to address the committee
and there is no cross examination. The sense of the rules is that at the previous Board or
Commission, that is the recommending body, the public has had a chance to give their
input The Board or Commission has had a chance to evaluate at that point, testimony
and give a recommendation. At this point if the committee decides that it does need
additional information or simply wants to give the public an opportunity to address the
P&D then these rules are there for Council's guideline.
Ald. Tisdahl said what would help heir is new evidence and having it be as easy as
possible for people to bring it in without having to hear old evidence over and over again.
If they get rid of the old evidence their decision making would be much faster. Ald.
Rainey said she couldn't agree more and thought that maybe they should limit that.
6 Io IU?60610:1B:t<AM
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Aid. Rainey moved on to the second part of page 3, section 6B regarding the timing. She
thought it should be up to the chair consulting with the committee members as to how
those parts of the meeting are going to be handled. Most of them can look at the
audience and know how to time it and can determine if they should give them each a half
and hour and let them figure it out themselves or do you give each person 3 minutes and
have a little timer. That should really be left up to the chair of the committee. It is all
laid out "Comments will be limited to a maximum of 3 minutes per speaker, with an
overall limit of 30 minutes for all who wish to speak. Speakers may cede their allotted
time to others." It is just way too complex. Ald. Wollin asked if the 30 minutes was ok
with her. Aid. Rainey said it has worked in the past so she doesn't know why that has to
be clarified.
Aid. Holmes feels that if everybody has the same parameters to work within people would
feel better. The way it is laid out in the rules seems fine to her. If the Committee gives
one group 30 minutes, some other group 50 minutes and somebody else an hour that
really bothers her. When they just leave it open without having some kind of limitation
or guidelines that makes it much more difficult. That is not fair and it is not consistent.
She feels that any group at any given time or at any given meeting should always be
allotted the same time.
Aid. Bernstein said although sometimes the complexity of an issue mandates more time
and sometime there isn't going to be a unanimous group of objectors, then it is unfair to
do that. He thought it was not a bad idea to have some sense of limitation and thought
that was really their concern, limitation of discussion, so they don't go on forever, which
historically they have a tendency to do. He agrees that the chair should be able to modify
the time based on the conditions and the complexity of an issue.
Aid. Holmes stated that when a large number of people are present for another item on
the same night, and there is an hour set aside for each presentation and once that hour is
up they would just have to come back at another time and it would have to be redone. It
Is not fair to have people sit there thinking they are on the agenda and they've been
notified, then the committee never gets to them.
Aid. Bernstein said only to the extent that they have 2 complex issues on the agenda at a
time, the chair is going to have to tell these people, before the meeting begins, that they
are sorry they don't think they are going to get to them that night so they can leave if
they wish to. Aid. Rainey suggested that this should happen before it gets on the
agenda. Aid. Bernstein said that is important to the extent that they know that.
Ms. Carroll said, in fairness to the staff, it is difficult to know how long the committee is
going to talk about something. That is one of the reasons it is important to have some
parameters. Each chairman handles things a little differently, which is ok, but if they
have some sort of consistency in the time and the amount of time that is given to each
issue, staff can do a better job of scheduling the agenda. Now if there is a need to extend
the time beyond the 30 minutes that is proposed, that is fine, but the committee would
decide at that point if they aren't going to get to the other issue and then send people
home if they are not.
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Aid. Bernstein said what they are going to have to do is get the chair in concert with the
staff and the chair is going to have to make that determination of how much time he or
she thinks an issue is going to require. Nobody ever knows, but to the extent that they
do know that there is going to be a lengthy discussion, then they can limit what is on this
agenda to things that they can go through quickly, maybe on discussion items. He thinks
they went through lots of things quickly and there were a lot of things that weren't going
to result in a blood bath.
Aid. Sean -Baptiste thought that the essence of the discussion is that the 30 minutes may
be too limited because in their experience any of the issues that have come from the Plan
Commission to the P&D committee have lasted much more than 30 minutes in terms of
discussion. So to limit the overall discussion to 30 minutes is where he thinks people are
having problems in terms of saying they ought to have the authority to open the door for
more time and it seems everyone is in agreement on that. So if they say they have an
hour to consider an issue it could be more limited, it could be they have decided that they
can finish the matter in less than one hour. They ought to have the flexibility to give
more time to different speakers for whatever reason the chair may judge necessary. In a
sense, if they give themselves more time to treat a particular issue, they could say 3
minutes per speaker, but the chair will have the latitude to extend that.
Ms. Carroll said that is how the Council rules are set up and staff was modeling this off of
the Council rules. The Committee can allow the 3 minutes, and if necessary extend the
time. She feels it would be a mistake if they made the time longer up front. Aid. Jean -
Baptiste said what he is saying is that when they schedule matters give themselves at
least one hour per major issue. Ms. Carroll said then that would only allow the committee
to handle 2 in one night. Aid. 3ean-Baptiste said maybe and sometimes only one. If they
schedule 3 or 4 and don't get to the rest of them, there are a lot of resources mobilized
for no reason. Aid. Tisdahl agreed.
Aid. Wynne added that there are some issues that come through that are just very
complex. Thinking back to the Mather issue and the number of variations they needed.
In these eases, there is a lot to be said, or it draws people out. In that sense they've got
to have some flexibility on that. Her other point was that her email was down so she had
not had a real opportunity to read this thoroughly and would like to have more time to
read it.
Mr. Wolinski commented that he has had the opportunity to work with most of them as
the chair of Planning & Development and what they've always tried to do is if the project
Is ready, not a thought, concept or idea, but the project is ready they try to get it on the
agenda as quickly as possible, with the thought of talking with the developers or the
applicant to inform them that they may not get to them that night. Mr. Wolinski stated
that often they still want to take that opportunity with the hope that the Committee will
somehow get to them. To them it is worth it to take that risk of not being heard that
night.
Aid. Wollin said that it isn't worth the risk of bringing bus loads of elderly people and
having them sit there and have to have snacks and water because it has been 2 1/2 hours
and their rase hasn't even started.
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Ms. Szymanski noted that the anti-Klaeren rule, if you will, was effective on August 15,
2006 and In the rules on page 2, section 3C are the list of what cases the new rules are
Intended to apply to and her implication is if a perfected application for a special use of
planned development was filed before the 1St' of August her opinion is that the Klaeren
rules still apply. Staff will let the committee know this with each agenda data sheet or
others.
AMEND COUNCIL RULES TO REMQYE REQUIREMENT THAT ALDERMEN MND WHEN
;PEA NG AT COUNCILMEETINGS:
Ms. Carroll said this was the Mayor's reference.
Aid. Rainey said her request is that they stand. When watching the major legislative
bodies around the world they stand because it is a respectful position to take when
making important comments. They have always had microphones and people have
always been able to hear them. The problem with sitting, for example, her chair is so low
and the table is so high. Maybe her chair could be fixed.
Aid. Holmes commented that she would prefer sitting only because of her knees but will
stand.
After more discussion the committee agreed to stand.
Aid. Bernstein reminded the committee that the next meeting Is Wednesday, October 4.
AWOURMENL
Meeting adjourned at 7:07 p.m.
Respectfully submitted,
Darlene Francellno
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MINUTES OF THE RULES COMMITTEE MEETING
WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 4, 2006
6:00 P.M.
Aldermanic Library
Present: Aid. Bernstein, Hansen, Holmes, lean -Baptiste, Moran, Rainey,
Wollin, & Wynne
Absent: Aid. Tisdahl
Presiding: Aid. Steven Bernstein
Staff Present: Judith Aiello, Kenneth Cox, Darlene Francellno, Herbert Hill, Vincent
Jones, Gavin Morgan A James Wolinski
Guest: Mary Morris
CALL TO ORDER:
Aid. Bernstein called the meeting to order at 6:15 p.m.
AI!PRQVAL OF SEPTEMBER S. 2096 MINUTES:
Aid. Wynne had a correction In the second paragraph under Policy on the Use of List
Serves by Alderman" the second line down says "Aid. Wynne explained that this came
about ...for her one time a year town hall meetings..," She stated she has town hall
meetings more frequently than that and wanted the "one time a year" deleted. With
that amendment she moved approval. Ald. Wollin seconded. Minutes approved.
POLICY ON COUNCIL DISCUSSION VIA EMAIL:
Herbert Hill stated Gavin Morgan summed up his comments from the last meeting in a
memo that the committee received. He went on to say that the memo basically says If
it is a majority of a quorum in the same place the open meetings act Is being violated.
If it is not a majority of a quorum in the same place there is no violation of the act and
with technology the issue is defining the same place. For example, if you are in a chat
room you are together, if you are doing instant messaging, arguably that Is together,
beyond that there Is no clear answer. They are not saying you can't use email, they are
saying there is no definitive court ruling.
Aid. Moran asked Mr. Hill if he had talked to the people from District 65 about their
experience and if a copy of the letter sent from either the Attorney General's office or
the States Attorney's office was available. He raised the question because he has
heard it recounted that the letter said that whatever was happening through emalls
was a violation of the spirit of the open meetings act.
Mr. Hill said he had no specific information. But would be glad to look into that and
report back at the next meeting. He said he would not comment on the difference
between the spirit and the technical violation of the act.
Aid. Rainey said the case that resulted in the complaint was that the school board made
a decision through emailing one another about a proposal to deliver to the full board
and the community. It was an established fact that the school board developed a
policy to present through emailing. It was a very clearly, policy that was made as a
result of the back and forth emailing.
Aid. Moran stated that Mr. Hill's opinion seems to give a clean bill of health to emalling
as opposed to instant messaging or chatting but he was not sure where his clarity was
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In relation to that opinion. It is clear that certainly the spirit, if not the letter of the
open meetings act could be violated through emailing. It seems that what Aid. Rainey
said was that these people devised a policy through emails that clearly needed public
discussion. The potential for abuse is there, and they should think about whether it Is
the letter or the spirit. They should think about rules that would provide some
limitations on what can and can't be done through emailing. There can be innocent
emails and some of those would not violate either the spirit or the open meetings act.
But conversely there can be emails that do violate certainly the spirit if not the letter of
the open meetings act.
Aid. Jean -Baptiste said if he supports a particular policy and tries to build consensus
via email he does not feel that is violating the open meetings act. Part of their work is
to try to advance particular policies, try and talk to each other and build consensus. If
he calls one Alderman to talk about a particular policy then calls another and gets
agreement or a different modification on the proposal he Is not gathering everybody
together or a quorum to make the decision. If he emails the entire Council he has no
way of knowing when they are going to open their email or if they open it at all. It
seems to him that discussions can go on without having a quorum coming together to
make a decision collectively.
Aid. Moran said he is not against the notion of trying to build consensus and absolutely
agrees that they are entitled to talk to each other and try to build a consensus and do
all those things that were mentioned. The question is that if there is sort of a
cumulative discussion, it doesn't happen between 2 and 3 on Thursday afternoon, but it
might span a couple of days, which commenting on Mr. Hill's opinion about it not being
simultaneous, but if between 2:00 p.m. on Wednesday and 2:00 p.m. on Thursday there
has been a whole series of communications and it says that Is It, somehow to him that
suggests the notion of government and the public has been by passed.
Aid. Wynne stated they should understand what happened at D65 in great detail and
get a copy of the letter from the AG's office and find out how the school board crossed
over the line for the spirit of it. She also pointed out that before they had email, when
they were figuring out the budget former Aid. Dennis Drummer sat up late a night and
would call every one of them back and forth, back and forth sharing information and
would say he just talked to so and so and how about these numbers and 5 minutes
later he would call each of them back. This went on and on. How is emailing any
different from what Drummer used to do late at night. All they are doing Is using
emails as a substitute for a telephone and it is not simultaneous. Or as was said at the
last meeting how is It any different than writing a letter, putting it in an envelope,
mailing it and all of them opening that envelope at the same time. Some of them may
respond by a phone call, some might mail a note back, some of might ignore it or some
of them might email.
Aid. Hansen said there is a further question on this email and that is that it has
happened at D65 and the AG got involved and someone came and told the school board
why or why they didn't do something wrong. We need to find out what that letter said
and maybe Mr. Hill could tali the Assistant AG that came to the school district or that
was on the case to just clarify. Otherwise she didn't know if this discussion could be
completed without that information.
Aid. Holmes stated that is pretty much what she was going to say. They should be pro-
active rather than reactive toward knowing or ignoring exactly what can happen. If
they get the information on D65 maybe they will be able to have a clearer
understanding of what can and cannot happen. Because she thinks there is a clear
distinction between them doing something when the staff sends something as
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administrative then making policies and don't quote her, but from her understanding,
policy was the issue with D65 and they really need to be clear on it.
Aid. Bernstein suggested they ask Mr. Hill to do two things. First, find out what the
letter said and how D65 violated it and next maybe get a legal opinion from the AG
about what they can and can't do.
Mr. Hill said that is true. There have been times in which the law department, Mr.
Siegel and himself have been in disagreement with the opinion from the AG's office and
they've taken the position that the Attorney General's opinion Is not binding upon the
law department's opinion. The value of the AG's opinion is wide open so he will get the
letter and see what the issues are.
PQLICY ON MAILINGS [WARD MEETINGS. ETCJ:
Mr. Morgan said to answer some of the questions that came up at the last meeting, on
how much is bulk mailing with the discount for sending a large mailing and dependent
upon whether the theory route is entirely within a ward boundary or whether it crosses
ward boundaries is the difference between the 12.7 cents per piece and the 17.1 cents
per piece. For the mailing service they have been utilizing to help pre-sort the mail
before it goes to the post office to package it, send It and deliver it is $125.00. The
copying and folding will come into account anyway they do it. He noted that this Is
more efficient and cheaper than copying it in house which is $90.00. As far as the
seasonal employees from the Farmers' Market to deliver flyers around town, they can't
always get them because some of them are practicing football and other sports right
now, so they are not always reliable and it requires staff to hunt them down and take
them to do this work.
Aid. Bernstein said the last thing they talked about for policy with respect to what they
can and can't do as Aldermen for communication with their constituency, they threw
around a figure of $2,000.00 per aldermen per year.
Aid. Wynne suggested they start off with this $2,000.00 number per ward, per year.
The big question is does It roil over. The response was no. Ms. Aiello added that she
thought they should include the Mayor. Aid. Rainey suggested $2,000 for everybody.
Aid. Bernstein asked If for example when Donna Stuckert helps somebody do a
newsletter are they going to charge back a portion of that $2,000.00 for her salary.
Aid. Wynne said didn't think that they should because that is part of Ms. Stuckert's jab.
Aid. Hansen also mentioned that if enough notice is given they might be able to put
something in the Highlights. Ms. Aiello said there are a lot of different things that staff
can do and they can help create the list serve, it is Jost a matter of having enough time
so that in addition to the other stuff that Ms. Stuckert is doing it Is going to be worked
In to her responsibilities.
Aid. Bernstein asked for a consensus with respect to an amount and then ask staff to
come up with some kind of a method.
Aid. Wynne moved for the $2,000.00 per year per ward including the Mayor but not for
Ms. Stuckert because that is all the reason why they created the public relations office
In the budget Aid. Rainey seconded.
The committee agreed to have a budget of $2,000.00 per Aldermen and Mayor per year.
Aid. Holmes shared with the committee another suggestion In terms of getting
Information out in the community which is by signing up with Bill Smith of Evanston
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Now. He will list your ward with information you provide him and newsletters and
flyers. She encouraged the committee to check out his website and let their
constituents know about It.
There being no further discussion the vote was unanimous and will be incorporated
into the budget for the upcoming fiscal year.
ADOPTION OF NEW PLANNING & DEVELOPMENT COMMITTEE RULES FOR
TION OF PLANNED DEVELOPMENTS:
This item got referred from P&D and Ms. Aiello and Mr. Wolinski have been working on
revising the rules based upon comments from the last meeting and recommendations
from staff have been added and some of the comments from the time before.
Mr. Wolinski turned their attention to his memo to Ms. Carroll dated September 28 with
the rules attached. One thing the City Manager had requested was that the staff
person to the P&D Committee be more active as far as assisting the chair and working
with the committee as far as results of votes and issues brought up, etc. The language
was put together by Kenneth Cox from the Law department and himself. For instance,
procedure on how amendments to ordinances, resolutions, etc. are conducted, under
Section 8 of the rules it reads "Should the Committee wish to amend, rather than
recommend or deny the applications, it may do so by of a majority vote of a quorum
present.
Any amendments will thereby become part of the application. Should the Committee
be unable to extemporaneously craft sufficiently precise or thorough language to
amend the application, it may instruct Staff to prepare an amended
application/ordinance for future consideration. The Committee should issue clear and
precise directions to Staff as to what the desired changes are, and at which future
meeting they would like to see the amended documents. After every vote, the
Committee's Staff Liaison shall review the agenda item, identifying the moving and
seconding Committee Members, the recommendation given, and the vote tally."
Aid. Jean -Baptiste asked If he was talking about how the committee should instruct
staff. Mr. Wolinski's response was yes. Aid. Jean -Baptiste stated that he thought they
were going to have some discussion on conducting the session in general, for example,
when they have to consider proponents and opponents, etc. Aid. Rainey said it looks to
her like the staff is constructing the committee.
Ms. Aiello said what they are trying to do is just set forth in writing what the practice
has been so that it is very clear to somebody new sitting in the audience and the rules
will always be there and the audience will know that the committee Is giving direction
to staff for amendments to the ordinances or resolutions.
Aid. Moran asked if the sentence "...Any amendments will thereby become part of the
application." Would include planned developments? Mr. Wolinski said yes. Aid. Moran
didn't understand how the committee could take action to change the application
because they are not the applicants. Aid. Bernstein said they pretty much do it all the
time.
Aid. Wynne noted that for clarity they could just delete "..Any amendments will thereby
become part of the application." Ms. Aiello said In this case the application means the
project. Aid. Wynne said use the word "project" instead of "application". She thinks It
Is Important for clarity sake that they have something clear that people who come to
P&D can read and understand the procedure in what is going on.
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Aid. Rainey said this is actually one of the best examples of putting their practice into
words.
Aid. Wynne brought attention to page 3, section G, sub section B which reads "Whether
the Members will hear new evidence. Persons who seek to present new evidence shall
submit a written request to present such evidence." This is unduly burdensome on any
citizen coming before them about a project that they are concerned about. Obviously,
if people are smart they will come early to get it into their packets, but a lot of people
don't necessarily know about that. She doesn't like this requirement and thinks it
really squelches citizens being able to participate in this.
Ms. Aiello said one of the reasons she thinks staff put this in was because they have
Instances where someone will come and just talk and there is no opportunity for the
staff to review it, present what the data might be, or clarify what they are presenting.
So It is always a catch up game for both staff and the committee members on what is
being presented by someone from the public if staff is not given time to review it and
provide the committee with an analysis of it.
Aid. Wynne said members of the public can't always get it to the correct office by the
Wednesday before the committee meeting and sometimes people are working on stuff
right up until the meeting.
Ms. Aiello said that is the problem they have, at the last minute stuff is provided to the
committee and she does not think it is good analysis for the committee or for staff at
that point.
Aid. Bernstein's response was if they undertake analysis concurrent with its
submission, yes, but the question is to whose convenience. Is It the citizens or the
staff? A lot of times the citizens won't know what they are objecting to until they hear
a presentation, in some instances. Sometimes they will have already seen the
application and made their commentary.
Aid. Wynne asked what if the new data is actually something that is really straight
forward that doesn't need a lot of staff review and they find out about it on
Wednesday. 5o they are prohibited from presenting it to the committee. Let's say the
committee is ready to take a vote and what was going to be presented was actually
something very critical. Ms. Aiello thought that if something comes up just delay the
vote. They have had lots of examples over these last several projects where
Information has come at the last minute where ordinances have had to be changed on
the Monday of the Council meeting and that makes it really difficult for staff to really
provide good information for the committee to analyze. Aid. Wynne understood that
but felt they should put something In the rules urging people that In the interest of
anyone coming before the Committee that they submit any information for the
committee. But by making it a complete prohibition is doing a disservice to the people
In the community.
Ms. Aiello noted they are not thinking prohibition. All staff is asking is that the same
deadline staff has to get information out to the Council so it is thorough is the same
thing they are asking of the public. Aid. Wynne said it reads "This information shall be
submitted to, and received by, the Director of Community Development, no later than
the Wednesday before the Committee meeting...", that is making a prohibition. Ms
Aiello went on to say that if there Is someone from the public who wants to present
something on Monday and the Council wants to consider It than we delay the item for 2
weeks and let staff and the committee have a chance to look at it.
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When people talk to Aid. Wynne about what is the procedural process she tells them to
get any information into everybody's hands as quickly as possible to make it part of the
packet because that is the best possible thing to do. She said she has been one of
those citizens before a committee and knows that not everybody is around to work on
something, you don't always get the information that you want and yes, ideally you
want to get that information in. But what if you get some critical single piece of data
and it doesn't need staff review and you are prohibited from getting it out. Then you
come to the meeting saying you have this critical piece of data, but missed the deadline
can it be delayed for 2 weeks. Ms. Aiello said she thought maybe that is what they
should be doing.
It does delay said Aid. Wollin because if she got new Information at the last minute she
is going to need to think about it. And the other proponent is going to say that is new
information for them also and they are going to need time to prepare their rebuttal. So
no matter how it is done it Is delaying the 2 weeks.
Ms. Aiello noted that they could move the time to noon on Fridays, but she has been
nuts with the staff about stuff coming in Monday for Council to look at Monday night
when they haven't had a chance to look at it. What staff has seen in the last couple of
projects is the opponent has come In at the last minute and given Council information
over the weekend or on Monday and staff has never seen it and that really puts staff at
a disadvantage to be able to respond to it. Staff is just trying to get something so that
there is a uniform process that going forward the public knows that their information Is
welcome they've just got to give it to them in a timely manner so staff can take a look
at it and provide the Council of it.
Aid. Jean -Baptiste didn't think that the citizenry should have a condition on their ability
to get information to them in writing by a date certain. He understands the concern but
some people will not be able to put it in writing and they've always sort of weighed the
Issues as to whether or not the question proposed or the objections raised requires
delaying a decision to give them time to consider the matter. So, if the concern is that
staff has not reviewed items when issues are put on the table at the last minute and
feels the committee has been imposing on them to have an instantaneous response
then he thinks they need to be more considerate of their abilAy to turn answers around
that quickly. Because he knows they've had situations where they have asked what do
you know and when did you know it etc. They can encourage people to do so and can
weigh, as they've done in the past the value of what Is being presented as to whether
or not they need more time to consider the issues raised or do more research. But he
would not do it as a pre -condition for them to be able to put it on the table when they
have it. He remembered when they were dealing with Hines and there were some
neighbors who came late in the process and Aid. Rainey had to allow them to come
forward and make their statements. Then the committee was able to go back and
consider their issues because the value was placed on their participation and not so
much the process. He thinks they would do greater harm to participation if they
impose this rule. They need to find some other way to insure that staff has adequate
time to consider stuff.
Ms. Aiello said anote., issue is where an opponent or some interested person gets
information to the committee and it never gets to staff and that is a problem.
Aid. Moran said another way to look at this is there may be some person who comes in
on Monday night and thinks they have the key to the solution. There may have been 10
people who were there 2 weeks before talking about this same project. This one
person comes in on Monday night, and of the 10 people before some may have come
back and some may not and all the points that those 10 people tried to establish are
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now threatened, the whole table is threatened because this one person who comes in
at the 11th and a half hour says he or she knows what should happen. If you are
talking about a process and talking about citizens having fair input, he has to be honest
by saying that he has a tendency to give much less consideration to somebody who
comes in at the 11 1/2 hour when the 10 people who came 2 weeks before were
organized, got their stuff in, and were fair to everybody. He understands the concern
about everybody getting their say and that maybe they shouldn't have a rule. But
people have to deal with rules all the time in their day jobs and when you have a rule
sometimes it makes people do things differently. Because when you understand that
something must be done by a certain time you probably should drs it by then. If they
were organizing as a neighborhood or a community movement for or against a
particular initiative somebody would have to find out when they needed to get their
stuff in. And if there is a rule that says this is how it should be done he thinks people
are going to be inclined to get their information in by that Wednesday, Thursday or
Friday.
Aid. Rainey thought they could resolve this by taking this pile of writing and dividing it
Into two documents. One document would be rules of Planning and Development and
the other would be guidelines for citizen participation. Everything being talked about is
guidelines that the chair ought to be able to implement, if necessary, and they can't
control citizen's behavior. But at a meeting they could hand out the guidelines and say
we hope you would adhere to this. It is not always going to be possible but have the
rules amended for situations such as what Mr. Wolinski discussed earlier about
amending an application and things like that. Those are the rules, but governing
citizens should not be part of the planning and development rules. It is all about how
their constituents should behave at meetings and that is not necessary. So if anybody
would agree on sorting out the two issues they could have rules for citizen behavior but
not as part of the committee rules.
Aid. Holmes Indicated some of the Council have much more experience than she does,
but just over this past year sitting through some of these meetings she questions new
information because she has sat through when people are coming in with last minute
stuff and it is nothing but the same stuff rehashed in another way. So she would really
think that they would want the staff to sort of help the citizens understand that this
may not even be new information that they are giving. We have to be clear that they
are able to be free to speak out and do whatever but citizens need to understand that
when they are not permitting new information that it is not additional information.
Ms. Aiello said trust her they are not trying to stifle public participation. But what they
really feel is that In order for staff to provide better service to the committee and the
community they really wanted some process by which information would come in and
they do tell people that the best way Is to get it in a Thursday so that it can be put in
with the packets. You've seen in this last year how much stuff you've gotten on all
these projects at the last minute staff just feels that is really hasn't been beneficial.
They don't feel as though they are giving the committee the best product and that is
part of what staff wants to do. Aid. Rainey said she thought their product has been
superb and doesn't think it has been affected at all by people who fly in at the last
minute.
Aid. Wynne said she appreciated what Ms. Aiello said and when someone comes
rushing In at the last minute they are much more skeptical, but one of those times
someone is going to come with something really Important. She likes Aid. Rainey's
suggestion; this should be divided into rules and then guidelines. She did state that
under "General Considerations" under "F" reads "...The Chair may disallow statements
which are irrelevant..." and she did not think they should permit that.
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Aid. Hansen was also fine with Aid_ Rainey's suggestion but was thinking of another
way to clear this up in relation to new evidence. If people are uncomfortable between
rules and guidelines why not put, in addition to what they are already doing, in there
that it is up to the committee chair to consider it and if it is such a thing that needs to
be investigated by staff kick it back for another 2 weeks. That way they have it so if
that person doesn't' need this deadline we do it anyway.
Mr. Wolinski said they have such a relief valve in the public discussion aspect of it
where they were hopefully trying to limit it to 30 minutes but if a quorum of the
committee decides that they want to extend that, as is done at citizen comment, they
could certainly vote and do that as well. Aid. Rainey said on the other hand the chair
rules and somebody on the committee can move to overrule the chair. She did not
think they had to put that in the committee rules. Ms. Aiello said all this is are rules of
procedure. She asked if they would want to say guidelines and procedures. Aid.
Rainey said no she thought they should hand out a citizen handbook or something on
how to behave.
Aid. Wynne moved their attention to page 5, 9c "A person may speak on behalf of
another person, group, or an organization only if the person submits written
authorization to do so at or prior to the meeting." She said most people ethically don't
do that. How often have they had some one stand up and say for example they
represent Southeast Evanston Association. That organization is In her ward and meets
on a monthly basis and won't be able to get written permission but when they want to
make a statement they will call each other and ask if they all agree to do such and
such. But they are not going to put it in writing from the chairman of the board and
submit it prior. Aid. Holmes added that there are people who get up and speak for
organizations that don't meet. Aid. Wynne commented on page 5, 9g "The Chair may
cause removal from the meeting of a person who is disorderly or contemptuous." She
asked who is going to judge on contemptuous. Aid. Rainey said she didn't think they
needed a rule for that. Aid. Wynne stated they should call it Rules and Guidelines, be
polite about it.
Aid. Jean -Baptiste said they might need something to give to the public that says
proponents have x number of minutes to speak and add a few more guidelines and
leave it at that. But let the public know what it is they have to do and then have some
general guidelines in terms of what it is that the committee does. The way they have
been conducting their meetings over the last 3 or 4 months have been good and
probably is due to the fact that people had to be sworn in. Other than that the fact that
opponents and proponents had their say it was a format and it disciplined the process
so that the committee made sure that each side had ample time. And when late comers
did come the chair did weigh the situation and allowed people to participate.
Sometimes there has been good information that came out of it and the committee was
able to strengthen the project. He suggested they ought to continue to consider the
guidelines but streamline them and try to stay pretty consistent to where they have
been so it doesn't seem like a major departure from whatever they've been doing.
Mr. Wolinski pointed out a couple of things that he wanted to know if the committee
wanted to continue the process. Under Agenda Items on page 2, #4 "Items shall be
placed on the Committee Agenda try the following procedures and according to the
following schedules:" Traditionally the Committee has received recommendation from
the Zoning Board, Plan Commission, Preservation Commission and what not and staff
would put those recommendations on the P&D agenda as staff has prepared them and
the law department has reviewed them.
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For example, the process has been that a phone call to the Manager's office or to him
from an Alderman saying they need such and such to be discussed at the meeting
Monday night. The item is placed on the agenda as an item for action. There has been
no discussion before the committee because maybe it is a moratorium issue or
something the Alderman wanted on immediately. The Alderman who requested it
wants it to move forward so he or she presents the case and then the committee takes
a vote and directs staff to prepare the ordinance for Monday night. Ms. Aiello added
that staff has brought things in ordinance form at the request of an Alderman before
anybody else and staff is uncomfortable preparing stuff for action because they don't
know if it is the will of all 9 Aldermen.
Aid. Rainey was not sure but thought that in the Council rules that it says an Alderman
Is allowed to solely refer any item to a standing committee which means for discussion.
She knows that over the years on the Council floor an Alderman has the right to stand
up and make a reference to a committee. Ms. Aiello said that Is correct and they have
no problem with that. But what staff has had is individual Aldermen calling and saying
they want an ordinance on the agenda for Monday night.
Aid. Rainey said a good example would be if some new ordinance gets created and
dumped on them without any discussion. Ms. Aiello said yes and that is all they are
saying is bring it to the Committee for discussion and then the committee can direct
staff on what to draft and how to draft it.
Mr. Hill stated that he thought the approach they are talking about is what Is the role of
the committee, the role of the committee chair and of an independent Alderman.
Because when you have the committee chair who is working to set the agenda for the
meeting, 2 weeks from now, what does an individual Alderman do with respect to the
agenda that the committee chair is setting up? Looking at a fundamental question,
how is it established? What is the role that the City Council wants the chairman of the
committee to play and what Is the role of the committee versus the city council?
Because there are times where Committees deliberate on something and the issue
should go to the committee and as an example, an alderman can say rather than take it
to committee lets put it on the Council agenda. This is theoretically possible under the
system now. The point is what the Rules Committee wants to do, not just at PAD
proceedings, but In general. What is the function that the Committee has for the City
Council and what is the function the Chair has to the Committee to serve the City
Council. That is the bigger picture.
Aid. Bernstein said historically the best situation has been when the staff In charge of
the committee meets with the chairman and talks about what Is potentially there and
we can work out an arrangement as to what we think can fit in a given timeframe.
That is really the most important consideration.
Aid. Moran said a committee member should be able to call and say they want
something on the committee agenda absent some compelling circumstance. The
chairman should have a supervisory role at the end of the day when the agenda has to
be put in form the chairman should look at it and say ok we've got this, that and the
other and that is good. But he still thinks that individual committee members should
be able to suggest that an item be on an agenda. Ms. Aiello asked if he was talking
about an item or an ordinance because there is a big difference. Aid. Bernstein said the
question is suggest or mandate an item or an ordinance. Items for discussion really
shouldn't be a problem subject to time. Ms. Aiello asked if they would want them to go
to the chair for their approval.
Aid. ]ean-Baptiste said the system Is not broken. Agenda Items have not been an issue.
The staff person calls the chair and says these are the Items on the agenda, so and so
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put such and such on there, what do you think? Ms. Aiello added that they have no
problem with that. Aid. lean -Baptiste asked if staff was suggesting that before
something becomes an action item/agenda item that it should go through discussion
first. Ms. Aiello's response was yes, If an Alderman calls up and says he or she wants
an issue in an ordinance form and on the committee agenda for Monday night, there
has been no discussion of the issue by the committee. It is staffs recommendation that
all that should be on the committee agenda is a discussion of the issue.
Aid. Bernstein said they had that on the bees where they had a discussion but never
voted as a committee on the ordinance.
Aid. Wynne's thought was they should have a very strong sense of the Council that
absent something such as a moratorium or something that they can't think of that has
some timeliness and time is of the essence issue that it should go to discussion before
It becomes a action item. Ms. Aiello said perfect. Aid. Wynne said so why not have a
general agreement on the sense of the Council. They just need to say that a chair has
some authority to say they had this discussion at Rules and the sense of the Council is
that they don't do that. Aid. Rainey added that she was sure there could be exceptions.
There being no further discussion Ms. Aiello said staff would try and separate the
guidelines from the rules. Aid. Bernstein said maybe they could produce a video that
could be linked to our website.
AD]OURMENT:
Meeting adjourned at 7:30 p.m.
Respectfully submitted,
Darlene Francellno
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MINUTES OF THE RULES COMMITTEE MEETING
MONDAY, NOVEMBER 6, 2006
6:00 P.M.
Levy Center Library
Present: Aid. Bernstein, Hansen, Holmes, Merin -Baptiste, Moran, Rainey,
Tisdahl, Wallin, & Wynne
Presiding: Aid. Ann Rainey
Staff Present: Judith Aiello, Julia Carroll, Darlene Francellno, Douglas
Gaynor, Herbert Hill, Vincent Jones, Gavin Morgan, Rolanda
Russell & James Wolinski
Guest: Mary Morris, Lorraine H. Morton, Bill Smith
CA" TO ORDI.
Aid. Rainey called the meeting to order at 6:10 p.m.
City Manager Carroll introduced the new Assistant City Manager Rolanda
Russell who comes from Roanoke, Virginia where she was the Assistant City
Manager for 5 •h years with a population of 95,000. Prior to that she was the
Assistant City Manager in Decatur, Illinois with a population of about 85,000.
Ms. Russell said it is a pleasure and honor to be able to work for such a
beautiful city and is thrilled to have been selected and looks forward to working
with them.
d"ROVAL OF OCTOBER 4,.,1006 MINUTES:
Aid. Wallin moved approval of the October 4, 2006 minutes. Aid. Hansen
seconded. Minutes approved.
2007 CALENDAR OF MEETINGS:
Ms. Carroll noted that Memorial Day falls on the 4" Monday in May so they
moved the meeting to Tuesday May 29. Other than that everything is the same.
Aid. Holmes moved approval of the 2007 Calendar of Meetings to be
recommended to the City Council. Ald. Wallin seconded. Motion passed.
POLICY ON COUNCIL DISCUS.$ION VIA EMAW
Aid. Moran thought it was interesting and significant that the Assistant Attorney
General in charge of these matters, although finding that there was not a
technical violation of the open meetings act, made a rather strong statement to
the effect that what took place had violated the spirit of the open meetings act.
One can see from the description of the circumstances how by emailing, one
can, although it might not be a literal violation of the open meetings act, lead to
a contravention of the general policy of the open meetings act. Policy matters
are meant to be discussed In the open, with notice and full disclosure to the
public. As he shared at the last meeting his thoughts are that they should work
on a rule whereby there should be a delineation of what City Council can and
cannot do by way of email so they would have clear direction with respect to
auks Co miths AA rafts 11/6106
APPROVED
things that are allowable and not allowable by email. He does not find anything
wrong with one Alderman emailing another Alderman or anything else. Clearly
the notion behind the open meetings act requires that there be sort of a critical
mask which is described as a majority of a quorum. if that threshold doesn't
apply then he doesn't think any proposed rules would apply. Nor does he think
it should apply to routine matters or administrative matters or anything of that
ilk. It has to do with policy formulation and that should be the focus of any rule
that they would entertain.
Aid. Rainey stated that in reading the letter from the Assistant Attorney
General, Terry Mutchler, it seemed very clear to her that the rule was all set.
She felt that the Attorney General's office gave District 6S School Board the
benefit of the doubt. It was pretty clear that the rule was violated in this case.
Looking at the second paragraph on page 6 of the fax it is as clear as day as to
what you can do. it reads "Of course, as with regular mail, there is nothing
that would preclude a Board Member from forwarding via electronic mail a
proposal - compromise or otherwise - to other Board members to consider
individually prior to its discussion in a public forum..." So you can send all of
your good ideas to one another but you get into trouble and violate the law
when you ask people for feedback, a decision or an agreement on policy prior to
entering the public arena. it is so simple and very clear that she thinks they
would get in trouble by making a rule, unless the rule is that they have to
follow the Attorney General's opinion. They are smart enough to know where
you cross the line.
Mr. Hill commented that the opinion is clear on this case. It is basically a policy
Issue by this committee should it decide to tighten up the rule or not. The
guidance from the Attorney General and from the staff Is always available. Ald.
Rainey added that if anybody wants to have a workshop they could do that but
she thinks they all can read fairly well.
Aid. Moran noted that there are two important things, one Is although Aid.
Rainey pointed out that by the time you get to a certain level in a discussion of
the background facts you thought they were going to get hung with the
violation. As you read through the letter, ultimately there was a finding that
there was no violation and that's where he thinks there is a gap they can
address with having their own rule. Two, adopting a rule that would say you
can't do this will give the citizenry confidence that they will avoid a situation
like this. He was not sure if he was going to get a second but moved that the
legal staff be directed to formulate a new Council rule that would address this
issue. The motion failed.
ADOPTION OF NEW PLANNING & DEVELOPMENT COMMITTEE RULES FOR
CONSIDERATION OF PLA,LVNED DEVELOPMENTS:
Aid. Wynne appreciated staff separating the rules from the guidelines. It will
be helpful to anyone appearing before them, but had some concerns. In the
first paragraph on new evidence in the Guidelines it says "Persons who seek to
present new evidence should submit a written request to present such
evidence. The request should include: the evidence sought to be presented; an
explanation of the relevancy... This Information should be submitted to, and
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received by, the Director of Community Development, no later than the
Wednesday before the Committee meeting at which the submitter wishes to
present it...... Number one that language no longer sounds like a guideline, two
as she raised at the last meeting, Wednesday is too early. The Wednesday
deadline puts a huge burden on the community who are frequently scrambling
and often working on their off hours for this. The third issue, with no offense to
the Director of Community Development, she was not sure about that person
making the decision as to whether it is new evidence. She would like this
language to read more like a guideline than a rule and would like the deadline
moved to Friday with some strong urging to people that the earlier the better
when submitting new evidence. She also suggested that new evidence should
be in consultation with whoever is the committee chair at the time.
Aid. Holmes noted that wouldn't they look to the Director of Community
Development to read through the new evidence because that person would
have seen all the minutes, materials and evidence that had been presented
before and would have all that readily to look at and see if it was new
Information. She wouldn't have any problem with it being in concert with the
committee chair but thinks that would be part of the responsibly of the Director
of Community Development.
Aid. Wynne said she could see that whoever Is Director of Community
Development will have been to all the Plan Commission meetings and at least
will know what has happened at the ZBA meetings but would like to add that it
be in consultation with the committee chair.
Aid. ]ean-Baptiste said the last time they looked at the proposed guidelines the
outstanding question, which they still don't have an answer to is what is
broken. He understands from staff's perspective there is a sense that they
don't have enough control over some of the information flowing. Sometimes in
their committee work they move too fast and demand stuff very quickly. They
need to talk about this as a Council to understand and determine whether or
not what they are suggesting to integrate as new guidelines makes something
better at this particular point and time.
Ms. Carroll stated there are a couple of reasons for these guidelines. One,
people don't always know within the public what they should do about
presenting information, signing up to speak or whatever. If they had a set of
guidelines it would be very clear. The second piece on receiving new
Information is by having it on Friday staff has a chance to review it and be
prepared to respond to it at the Monday night meeting, rather than someone
just handing it in at the time of the meeting. She feels it is very Important that
they not consider or possibly make a decision on something handed to them
that night without at least having an opportunity for staff to review it in the
context of everything else that has been submitted. If the committee chooses
to move the deadline to Friday that is fine, staff does have a cut off point that
they need to receive things so it can get In Council packets because if they
show up at 5 till 5 it is kind of difficult.
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Aid. Jean -Baptiste understood the need for some general rules of participation.
He knows for example that District 65 requires people to sign up well in
advance to make public comments which seemed to have discouraged
participation. He also remembers when the Mather project came before them
they ran into some problems with people submitting information late and the
same with the Hines project, groups came up late and they raised issue of
notice. Although he felt that the chair at that particular time made an
evaluation as to whether or not they could integrate this kind of Information,
accept this new information or ask for delay for further consideration and
review. His concern is that they may err on the side that they do not want to
err on and that is to chill participation. He understands the guidelines in terms
of how many minutes one side should intervene or not but does not want to
discourage participation and feels they should be cautious about that. They
should still give themselves some latitude for the chair to make a determination
as to whether or not to accept the new evidence that is presented because it
may not be that complex.
Ms. Carroll said it was not a matter of trying to chill participation. The concern
is taking information the night of the meeting and making a decision on it that
same night without staff having a chance to review it. If you automatically held
the matter over to allow staff time to review it and respond to it that might be
different. Staff is just trying to get ahead of the game because you could
receive information via phone calls or some other method that staff doesn't get
a chance to respond to and as professionals they want to be able to look at that
and determine if it is appropriate.
Aid. Jean -Baptiste said he was not suggesting that chilling participation would
be the intent, but it may be the consequences. Ms. Carroll didn't think that
allowing people to get it in by Friday would necessarily chill participation. It
actually would make it public so that those not on staff or on the Council could
actually get copies of It. Right now people in the public are not having that
opportunity to see those copies ahead of time.
Mr. Wolinski noted that he certainly would not want to be the only one directing
on how new evidence can be examined. When he, Kenneth Cox and Mr. Hill
looked these rules over the one thing they wanted to do was separate
guidelines from rules. At the last meeting when staff presented this, all this
information in the guidelines was in the rules and it gave no flexibility or
latitude, you either had to do it or not do it. There isn't anything in these
guidelines that says you can't accept new evidence the night of the meeting It is
simply guidelines. It is more of a document for the citizenry to know that they
would like this information prior to so they can give it sufficient time to review.
He has been staffing P&D for a long time and a lot of times Aldermen are
emailed information and staff has not received those emails and will not see
them until maybe the chair sends it to them Monday afternoon. He thinks the
assumption is that staff always gets it and that is not always the case. The
other issues that come about are things like petitions that are presented on the
night of the meeting. He has had the opportunity on many of the big cases to
review the petitions after the meeting is over and there isn't an Evanston
address on It, it is just all over the place. Not that petitions have the force of
4 12i7i2wh 11:+OA7 a361
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APPaovab
the law but certainly have the force of influence. So when someone says they
have 50 to 100 petitioners signing he understands that is not in all cases. Staff
has always tried to provide information prior to the meetings but that is not to
say that staff doesn't also provide last minute information with things that pop
up at the last minute. They are aware that Council doesn't necessarily like that
per say but sometimes it is necessary to provide them information on Monday
night. These are just guidelines for the public and not necessarily etched in
stone. When and if someone asks him how would they present information to
the committee, his suggestion is always a letter to the committee prior to the
meeting and let them know if there will be public comments. Quite frankly if
people want to speak and/or present something at a meeting there is nothing
in these rules that says they can't as long as the chair says it is ok.
Aid. Moran said what tends to support the suggestion is that it is sort of a
bareness question that comes in here, where presumably somebody who is
petitioning for some relief is anxious to find out whether the Planning and
Development Committee and/or the City Council is going to grant or deny them
that relief. With an advance in writing process in place the petitioners have
some ability to make an assessment of knowing somebody is going to show up
Monday night and if they are going to dive boom their petition. Isn't it really
fair to at least give them a minimal amount of notice that somebody is going to
try and whack them with some big new portfolio of evidence 2 or 3 days later?
Some of the projects that Aid. lean -Baptiste talked about involved big stuff and
if somebody has a poison pill or something and they are over their rate to
spring it 3 days from now that is pretty hard.
Aid. Wynne understood the staff's point of view of trying to make sure there
isn't Monday evening surprises for them. She thought the committee could
decide to make it a rule that if it is new evidence it has to be submitted by a
certain timeline. But feels if they word the language pertaining to new
evidence in such a way that there is a sense that urging people to do this and if
they don't the committee is going to be a little more skeptical when they arrive
on Monday night and haven't submitted their information earlier, unless they've
got some really good explanation for it. Her suggestion for #8 of the Guidelines
was using something like "Anyone who is speaking on behalf of another person,
group, or an organization is strongly urged to provide written authorization."
Aid. Rainey didn't think that should be a concern to them. Because they will not
have anyway of knowing that the letter of authorization had any authority.
Aid. Wallin said she didn't want to be the only cynic but there are people who
will purposely say they have new information to delay the process or a vote or
action on an issue. There are times when there may be a latest traffic study
that they didn't see before that could be submitted but she would suggest that
they urge people to get information in by noon on Friday or whatever deadline
because there is a strategy of opponents who want to stop the process from
moving forward and she finds that to be unacceptable.
Aid. Holmes agreed with Aid. Wallin but would suggest a deadline of Thursday
at 5:00 p.m. She added that she could also live with Aid. Wynne's wording in
terms of strongly urging any new information. But referring back to #8, while
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thinking about CDBG where neighborhood group had to present minutes of their
meeting and it showed where the board had voted for someone from the group
to come and speak on their behalf. Maybe CDBG doesn't do that anymore but if
people say they are representing a specific group they should have the minutes
and dates in which that group met and said they would have someone speak to
represent them. You don't want to have to call people out but thinks that is not
an unreasonable request and it is fair.
Aid. Bernstein really didn't want to foreclose anybody from putting forth any
information that might be relevant. The committee chair has the responsibility
and the ability to determine what is relevant and what is not relevant. He feels
they should say something that indicates that a strong suggestion will be
looked more favorably if they have more time to review it. Theoretically they
are talking about new evidence, so with respect to an organization getting
together having a meeting, which may not be a possibility, in fact if they are
talking about new evidence that materializes, the chances are very good that
neighborhood organizations already have had conversations and meetings and
have taken a position. This is beyond that. He just feels it is unreasonable to
ask that. He is sure that they all know that there have been people who have
stood up and made representations about groups that don't exist. He doesn't
want to make it finite because it is a strategy.
He went on to say that he understands staff's standpoint but to the extent that
they do feel it is relevant and new information, they are going to continue
things and have never rushed a judgment. As evidence by the fact that some of
their cases have gone on for 3 years, that has never really been a problem. To
the extent that people are going to be obstructionist, they know they are going
to be obstructionist. People are going to go to the Preservation Commission,
they are going to bite every bit of the apple they can bite and they don't like it
but they accept that. He hopes though that the facts are always what they
determine their response on. This is human nature and they are human beings
and know when they are being taken advantage of. So he thinks guidelines
that you know are for the convenience of the litigants and for the Council, it Is
suggested and/or requested that you get your information in, in written form if
you can. There are some people who want to bring in charts and what not and
he is not sure, other than they want to change the deal, how relevant that new
information is. The Kendall project was a request for a different proposal all
together, which was a little bit ridiculous after the fact. He doesn't know that
they've been burned by this so he would trust that the chairman of the
committees, and the committee can overrule the chair, can make a
determination about what is relevant. To the extent that staff needs time to
respond and the committee thinks it is important they can allow some time to
respond. But he does not want to foreclose anybody the ability to come in and
say anything that they have to say. And at this late date you are talking about
something that has already been through the entire process theoretically and it
comes up in the last minute.
Aid. Rainey asked what would be wrong with saying "new information has to be
received by our staff by noon on Friday otherwise it will not be delivered to the
Aldermen. Any new information not received by noon on Friday may or may not
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DROVED
be accepted by the chair of the committee at the meeting on Monday night."
And just leave it at that. Because people should be educated and that really is
the point, that it does no good to hand anyone of them a petition of 10,000 or
10 names at the beginning of a meeting. She never has the ability to
concentrate on any new written information dump on their desk the night of the
meeting. So while they say that the chair may consider entertaining it they
rarely stop the meeting so the chair and members of the committee can read
new information. This language would deter people and will attempt them to
get information in. But there are those that are so organized and will deliver a
notebook to their homes on Sunday night.
Aid. Wynne said that language Is fine with her. It distills it perfectly as far as
she is concerned because it provides the incentive for people to do it and leaves
the safety value for the committee. Clearly people are going to see this and
think If they bring something new in on Monday they are going to have to face
the committee chair and that may not work.
Aid. Rainey suggested if something comes in at 12:01 they shouldn't get it
because she was sure that causes all sorts of chaos trying to get things copied
and ready for the Council and the public. Aid. Holmes said In order to support
the staff couldn't they say 5:00 p.m. on Thursday. Ms. Carroll said Friday is fine
as long as they don't get it beyond that point. Aid. Rainey added if something
comes in that is just so bombastic that they have to deal with It they will just
deal with it.
Aid. Wollin asked should this information be submitted to the City Manager's
office. Mr. Wolinski suggested the City Manager's office should be the
depository simply because that office needs to be aware that it has come in.
Moving on to S8, Aid. Jean -Baptiste did not think that was going to work
practically and the reality is during their deliberations if somebody comes in
from the 2n° ward and says they represent the entire 2"d ward in terms of
grassroots organizations, he would raise issues with that and would inform the
committee that that is not true. Aid. Holmes stated that if they were going to
agree to do just that she would be satisfied because they've not done that. She
thinks it is outrageous to make that claim in the beginning. And people should
know that that should not happen. It is a matter of principal for her.
Aid. Wollin said it is also a matter of principal for her. For example, there is an
organization in her ward and nobody on the board of that organization knew
that a statement was going to be made or that their names were going to be
used. That is dishonest. She can understand that you don't have to have
written authorization, but they have to be able to call up on them if they have
to. That seems rather awkward to do in public but it has to be done because
people don't speak for others.
Mr. Hill suggested that the language could read "A person who speaks on behalf
of another person or an organization should be prepared to submit
documentation of that representation." Aid. Rainey thought that was good.
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Aid. Wollin seconded. Aid. Jean -Baptiste asked what would they require. The
response from Mr. Hill was it would be open ended.
The committee agreed with the suggested language provided by Mr. Hill.
Aid. Wynne said she didn't have a strong feeling on item #9 one way or another
regarding petitions. However, she was at a neighborhood meeting recently and
the group asked what were the rules on submitting petitions and what do they
have to do. She told them to get out there and get as many signatures and
present the petitions. She feels that the petition drafters and petition signers
think they have a lot more weight than the committee generally sees them as
having. And rule #9 is a lot more stringent in light of what they all have to do
when they put their own names on the ballot. A lot of times people carry
petitions around and pass them around at the Farmers' Market and to their
neighbors. Once they gather them and come in informally the Committee
discovers all these people are from Skokie who clearly signed at the Farmers'
Market.
Aid. Rainey didn't see why they were doing this. The big role the petition
campaign has is informing people that they are presenting the petition to for
signature, is a contact. She has no problem with people giving them petitions
In advance but not on the night of a vote or something. They don't use those
petition to perform any kind of act or take any action from, so why have it be
such a legal document. Aid. Tisdahl stated this is a democracy and in a
democracy you get to present petitions. Aid. Rainey thought that was well said.
For clarification Mr. Morgan noted that it basically sounds like you want it less
formal, more perhaps along the lines of this is how you can effectively
participate as a citizen in the process. Guidelines are making this easier for you
as a citizen, making it easier for Council to consider your input and stuff like
that. He noted that these guidelines are not enforced. Aid. Rainey stated that
they don't want people to take these guidelines more to heart than they need
to. Mr. Morgan agreed and said he was thinking of not only less formal
language but maybe a less formal format as well, more of a brochure system of
statement. Aid. Rainey said she would agree with something like that.
Aid. Bernstein suggested they use language similar to what Mr. Hill suggested
for #8, that they may be called upon to indicate whether they were present
when these signatures were signed. Because this process has already been
accomplished with the Zoning Board, they have to indicate that they were
present and they saw the writer, but again he doesn't think any of them count
heads and don't want to let people think that is the case.
Mr. Hill's suggestion for #9 was leave out the language after the word
"...signatures..." in the Wh line and just have a straight petition, submitted with
the names on it and the committee will give it whatever value It deems
appropriate.
a I2/7I:a16 11:401 17 AM
Rules C m"it a MJmrtas 11/6/06
APPROVED
Aid. Holmes asked aren't the petitions the same petitions that are presented to
the Plan Commission and Zoning Board and have already been through that
process.
As far as petitions go Mr. Wolinski stated that the only force of law under the
zoning ordinance as far as petitions go is for a map amendment. If 30% or
more of the property owners living within 250 ft. of the subject area sign a
petition against the amendment then it takes a super majority vote at the City
Council. That is the only petition of the zoning ordinance that has any force of
law and that would be reviewed way ahead of time and would have to be
certified, etc.
Aid. Bernstein said if they are going to in fact codify these guidelines then they
should particularize that this is not related to the zoning issue, because they
don't want people to get confused and they don't want any contradictions. Aid.
Rainey suggested they put that in there.
Aid. Wallin questioned #12 regarding removing someone from the meeting.
She was at a ZBA meeting when the chair asked that a person be removed from
the meeting and they all looked at each other wondering who was going to do
that. The gentleman ended up leaving on his own so it worked out, but
wondered what should be done when this occurs. Aid. Jean -Baptiste suggested
that if someone gets out of hand they would just call the police.
Aid. Rainey asked if they could move to accept the recommended guidelines as
corrected or as amended or modified. The committee agreed to accept the
recommended guidelines as corrected.
Aid. Rainey asked for a motion to accept the revised Rules of Procedure for the
Planning & Development Committee of the City Council for Consideration of
Recommendations from the Zoning Board of Appeals, Plan Commission and
Preservation Commission, and Certain Appeals.
Aid. Wollin moved. Aid. Holmes seconded.
On page 4 under Public Comment Procedure Aid. Rainey thought there was a
mistake in "B", she was not sure what "Recommendatory Board's" meant and
asked that they fix it by using another word. On that same page "0" reads
"..Committee Members may ask questions of anyone at any time during any
speaker's statements and during their deliberations. The Committee may
request information from anyone to assist it........ After reading that she just did
not understand the purpose for all of that. And on page 5 under "Agenda
Items", the 3r' paragraph reads "Should the Committee be unable to
extemporaneously craft sufficiently precise....... She suggested it be amended
to read "The committee may amend the application." and leave all the other
stuff out, because it is just so wordy. Ms. Carroll said all it is saying is "craft
language" on the floor. Aid. Rainey then suggested it read "The Committee may
amend the application or it may instruct staff to prepare an amended
application/ordinance for future consideration." Then strike everything else
out.
9 12/7/2W611 w 17 AM
Ruin calxnittes 0IM(lss 11/6/06
APPaovEb
Aid. Rainey asked Aid. Holmes if she accepted the amendments as amended?
Aid. Holmes did. Motion carried.
For future direction Mr. Hill asked the committee if they wanted staff to develop
a generic set of rules to be considered for all boards and commission as well as
the other standing committees, based upon the generic concept of this as
oppose to specifics? Aid. Rainey like Aid. lean -Baptiste wanted to know what
was broken. Aid. Tisdahl noted she would not want to do that if they have to
ask each board what they want.
Aid. Bernstein said they should get the others and have a conversation with the
board and it might come as a result. Aid. Wallin stated she thought at some
point they were considering having a general meeting with ZBA and Plan, etc.
The response was yes they were.
Mr. Hill said they are working on the strategic plan and actually the group they
are working with deals with boards and committees. One of their objectives
was to look at a similarization of rules and that put that over to the side.
OTHER BUSINESS:
Aid. Rainey stated she would like the Rules Committee agendas to have a place
for new business, new discussion, nothing specific, just in case somebody has
something they would like to share or bring up. She also asked if members of
the Rules Committee would like to receive reports from the Ethics Committee.
Because she has no idea what the result of their work Is most of the time and
believes they deal with things that affect them.
Ms. Carroll said when the Ethics Committee has meetings the minutes are sent
out to the Council. Aid. Rainey thought that maybe it is just that they haven't
had a meeting because she has not seen any minutes in a long, long time. And
they never receive anything from the Parking Committee.
Aid. Rainey moved that regular reports from the Ethics Committee be sent to
them regarding their work. Aid. Bernstein seconded. Motion carried,
ADJOURMO
Meeting adjourned at 7:10 p.m.
Respectfully submitted,
Darlene Francellno
10 1I/V_N 11a6:17AM
Rtutes Committee Minutes 12/4/06
MINLTES OF THE RULES COMMITTEE MEETING
MONDAY, DECEMBER 4. 2006
6:00 p.m.
Aidermanic Library
Present: Ald. Bernstein. Hansen. Jean -Baptiste, Moran, Rainey, Tisdahl, & Wollin
Absent: Aid. Holmes & Wyrme
Presiding: Ald. Ann Rainey
Staff Present: Julia Carroll. Darlene Francelino, Herbert Hill, Gavin Morph, Rolanda Russell &
James Wolinski
Guest: Mary Morris & Bill Smith
CALL TO ORDER:
Aid. Rainey called tht meeting to order at 6:12 p.m
APPROVAL OF NOS EMBER 6. 2006 MINUTES:
Aid_ Wollin moved approval of the November 6. 2006 minutes. Aid. Tisdahl seconded. Minutes approved.
CONSIDERATION OF A SPECIAL COMMITTEE TO DEVFLOP GUIDELINES FOR IUTiLi7_ATION OF
HOUSING TRYST FL-\D:
Aid. Rainey stared this is her reference and she is referring to this special committee as a Blue Ribbon
Committee.
Aid. Jean -Baptiste seconded.
Aid. Rainey went on to explain that the Evanston I lousing Corporation has some eery reputable people not
intimately involved it the workings of the city who really know the business. There is a lot of competition
among people a ho a.: participants and are active in the community regarding any funds that go into the
affordable housing find. She got to thinking about it and how it takes them a long time to do things when
they're involved and when a board or commission is involved. It would be an important step for them to discuss
having a Blue Rrbbor_ non city involved Committee, with people in the business and in the profession who can
oversee or recommend to them a way to spend this money. By professionals she mcans somebody in the
mortzate industry. ir the development field, in real estate and people like that. When she started talking about
this Mary Pat l cm=n, who is so smart. popped into her mind and other people like her. People that are so
neutral and intcr eswd in just doing the right thing and the best thing for the moment and she would just love to
have somebody like :--.at, a group like that afro will bring back to Council what they have come up with.
Council can re;crt it- but they ought to give it a try. Council knows all the ideas that people have talked about
and she knows :here _*e people in our community who want to build affordable housing. It is just such a waste
of money in her mir-,�_
Aid. Tisdahl :d sf:e �kouid love to have sornz-body on this Blue Ribbon Commission who understood
somethinL ago;:: mcn �v because that is a hays been a lack of more out of their di�ussions. She very much
agrees with tt:e direcnon that aid. Rainey is heading.
Aid. Jean -Batiste riled if Aid. Rainey could talk about why not the Housing Commission or would she see this
committee working :a concert w ith the Housing Commission? Aid. Rainey said she would see this committee
holding a couple Of meetinus, one with the public to get their ideas and one with the Housing Commission. She
does not think that t�,ev are unfamiliar with what the Housing Commission thinks. When the llousing
Commission was do:ng the Inclusionary Housing they immediately went to the Business and Professional
People for the Public interest (BPI) so they don't have all the answers. She is looking for people who already
Faults Comm ttee Mfrutes 12/4/06
know how to do this, who are going to corn: to them Kith some options and maybe a series of things that they
can do. As site said before they can reject thin all, but it can take another year or two to come up with a plan.
They should have had a plan in place a year ago and have been asking for it. This isn't a new idea to conic up
with a plan for spending affordable housing finds.
Aid. Moran stated he has been talking to people about affordable Housing Trust Fund and most of those people
who are experts in that area think that it is not an overwhelming burden to prepare an affordable housing trust
fund ordinance. In fact he is told there are Ym) plus housing trust fund ordinances out there for their
consideration and they might even think of other Chines beyond a hat's within the limits of those 300. But there
arc people like BPI, who literally have a cataiogic grasp of housing trust fund ordinance perimeters and they
have models and paradigms. He thinks the Housing Commissior should get the first crack at this in companion
with all the groups, including BPI and be gig en an opportunity to draft a framework for them for a housing trust
fund ordinance. It seems clear to him that after they arc given a recipe for an affordable housing trust fund there
will then have to be some policy decisions [I .:1 need to be made that will fill in the blanks, if you will, in the
affordable housing trust fund. For example. where are the priorities, how much, and which direction should
they take. In other words get a template then make some policy decision. It would be his suggestion that when
the I lousing Commission gives them a model to work with they then consult with this Blue Ribbon Panel on the
policy directives that would be inherently the Council's domain to fill it out, complete it, and make it be
reflective of what they want it to be. But at t_.at point draw upon the advice and direction of the professionals
that they are referring to. lie is confident that the housing Commission would be able to put together such a
paradigm or template in s try short order. Tht Housing Commission as they are all familiar w ith handed up a
bunch of recommendations to then years ago and, not to cast dispersions in any particular direction but, if
anybody has taken a lone time to do this it h=s been the Council, not a Commission or Board. fie thinks they
should have faith in their volunteer core as it's comprised and the Housing Commission to give them a good
template for this. fie also thinks it makes se: cc to have an advisory or Blue Ribbon Panel to give them input on
the policy once they get it and see what thinks they have to finally decide together on the full document.
Aid. Wollin thought it w; s important to put a time limit on it because as was just said, there is just so much
information out there. She will be attending the League of Cities tomorrow and one of the keynote speakers
who is now doing work for affordable housing in urban ncighborhoods will be there. But it is a problem that is
across the nation, there are 35% of city officials who have said that their affordable housing was going down
and 39% said that the availability of housing is one of the 3 most deteriorating conditions in their community in
the past 5 years. The reduction ofCDBG money has made it harder to fund affordable housing. So she thinks
they could learn from others and put together some other situations, Evanston is not unique in every way, there
are some ways that it is, but if somebody els: has already come up with solutions that are workable or
suggestions they should Lie them. Her feclLng is that they should put some time limit, whether it is 90 days or
some reasonable time limit on this, because she doc-sn't want it to drag out. They owc it to themselves and to
the Community to put this criterion in place. So she does not drsagree with bringing in experts that are within
the community to help but would like to see :.hem do it in a timely fashion.
Aid. Rainey said Evanston is unique in same respects and ha; done a lot of affordable housing. One thing she
has found during her rese:sch of other peop'.es business and on other municipalities is that Evanston is unique in
another sense in that w e Jc n't has a 300 vac_nt lot,, or 140 boa. -Jed up homes, and we don't have the massive
deterioration of slum hou,;:-sg that some cor-munit:es has e. Es ansion is not spending a portion of every Council
meeting with annexatior. Issues, so they are a little ditTerent. I :hey only have so much to wort: with and that is
their question to keep in :and. She really ',%csn't care she jus: feels that there are people in the community who
think this is going to drag on forever and es er and she is just trying to place a sense of importance an urgency on
this by making this recorrunendation. By row', going: with a bi_ punch right at the beginning she feels they are
going to slow down the press. She certa=J\ has no problem with the Housing Commission being involved in
some way, they can es en send a representative. or however the Council wants to do it but if they all think that
the Housing Commission should take this and deal with it that is fine with her.
Rules Gemmi"ee Minutes 12/4/06
Aid. Bernstein thought the difficulty with getting a Blue Ribbon Commission is that it is going to take them a
long time to select such a commission. Aid. Rainey said she's got a whole list of people already. ,did. Bernstein
went on to state that he thinics Evanson is unique and in the sense that the Housing Commission has been
dealing with their problems forever and should be more than just involved. fie would like to see a model with
the Housing Commission u-ith other people coming in to add and supplement their knowledge. He added that
Aid. Wollin had a very Lood paint. it isn't the Housing Commission that slows them. "rbey have had
perspective ordinances for over _' yea.-s and BPI's Lot them today. BPI has been wonderful in terms of
dedicating their knowledge anJ their time to this and they would continue to be of counsel to them. But he too
thinks that they've Lot to Let Loine. They have Sonic money but not enough to really worry about yet.
Aid. Rainey suggested they Let some projection of money. They had a report from the City Manager that they
had 800.000 then realized it was only 30.000 of somethine. She would like to see a timeline of when they think
they are going to get this money, because if they are not getting this money soon then there is no rush. If this
money doesn't come to them until temporary occupancy certificates are issued or something along those lines
then they've tot a while. Ms. Carroll said she will have Community Development put together kind of an
estimated timeline for receiving the money but many of those projects that they've received commitments from
haven't even started to build vet. As of the other day they had about 90.000 in the demolition tax fund and some
other money in the Mayor's Special Housing Fund. But staff -will put together a complete report and give a
timeline for all those other or:s because Mr. Wohnski has got sonic idea as to when most of those projects are
going to strut. Aid. Rainey asked that they also fill in the blanks as to what the source of the money was. like
what address or for example the affordable housing demolition tax. She asked if the 90.000 was for 10.000 a
house making that 9 house. Ms. Carroll's response wasyes,
Mr. W'olinski reported that he did some projections over the weekend and will certainly provide them with that
information. But noted that all of the planned dc% elopments that have been passed over the past couple of years
they are projecting over a rrullion dollars in contnbuiions to the affordable housing fund. That is based on the
fact that all those projects actually get built. And quite frankly, the Kendall College project is a contribution of
25,000 a year for d years with 100.000 totals, so they are looking at over a million dollars in commitments that
they have in ordinances right now.
Ald. Sloran felt that everyone was aware that one of the most discussed difficulties in passing the affordable
housing referendum was the fairly frequent invocation of the notion that they were not telling people how they
were going to spend the money. He thinks the referendum is still fairly present in people's minds from hearing
people around town talking about it_ It may be that they are not going to have that much money for awhile but
he feels personally a sense of urgency to move forward with the blue print of how they are going to spend this
money whenever they _vet it. What then do with the 90,000 they have now or what is going to come in later he
feels that the community is IN -)king for them to now come up with a recipe of what is going to be done with the
money. Aid. Rainey said her initial request was based on that yen' urgency, so they are on the same page.
Aid. Moran moved that they refer this in the initial phase to the Housing Commission and give them a
timeframe of whatever people- think is appropriate, to bring to them a template for a housing trust fund
ordinance. Fie would sug_e=:sooner rather than later. 1n the meantime, they can go about the business of
testing people's interest in ;en in-, on an Advisor Panel and hopefully have something by the time the Housing
Commission has handed com.thin into themand then go from there.
Aid. Bernstein seconded.
Aid. Jean -Baptiste stated that the ideas that ha-.- been put on the table looks to hint like they are looking at them
sort of one in place of the other even though they are saying that the Blue Ribbon panel will play some kind of
advisory ro:c to whatever pmpasal --ould come from the Commission. He would like to see it the other way
around. While the Housing Commission is road.- up of some real hard core, activist committed volunteers,
bringing more minds around Lhe table, around t. ose who has some expertise that we go out and try and recruit is
important to bring another perspective to them is not in lieu of what the Housing Commission will help them
decide. Because they get to participate in the process of reviewing whatever that proposal is, they -zzll
3
Q�_,ses c=, mitt" Mir%. -es 12/4/06
participate in reviewing that proposal and ultimately th.^ enteral pubic will give some feedback. He thinks new
minds and new ideas on the table will help them see this from in a different perspective, he is not saying that it is
abetter perspective, but it helps bring more people in :he discussion. It broadens the interest so that when they
go back out, there is greater credibility to what it is &..at they are puninL out to people to possibly vote on. This
is not casting any dispersion on any existing kind of bodies that are already in place but the process of Letting
the referendum passed ultimately is also one of trying to manage people's perception that you know µ e'ye
reached out and gotten expert vie%; s. These are the experts along with the Housing Commission that have come
forward ar i this is what they think. Because after all :hey are the elected officials and people didn't have that
much trust in their judgment c%en though they %oted t:�r them. So adding sortme'-expert'to their list of
credentials, so to speak, helps them convince people Cnc necessity of this and perhaps the actual ideas. People
can grass and feel that those ideas were tested o%er to discussion with different groups and different experts. He
agrees with moving as quickly as possible but would like to see that special panel take the lead and gi%a some
perspective and then take it to the Housing Cornmiss:on or engage them in Some %%L ay.
Aid. Bernstein did not necessarily think they µ ere gone to re -invent the wheel here. He thinks they have
experts and R'hat they are probably going to do is come up with a model or a series of models then tailor it
specifically for their needs and at the end of the day thry are not going to do anything unique other than what is
unique to Evanston. 1-he people don't necessarily ca. that they go out and get experts because they h 3vc on the
Housing Commission people µho are running housir.i for the City of Chicago so experts are in place. His
thought %►as that the community was upset bec3usr t1h6r concern was rather than a particular method 1 y which
they are geeing to spend that money they were going to somehow get it back into the general fund. Alm Jean -
Baptiste added that wasn't true. Aid. Bernstein said t2hrre was no question, they were talking about nt,a-taging
perception. lie is talking about just creating a methtx3olog} for spending out those funds and certainly Mary Pat
Kerrigan can tali: to them about using some of the fuada to leverage other funds, which is what she his been
doing for them for years. Those kinds of people are Important, but that is just to implement. Right now they
are in the first stage of what they arc going to do wide their money and again they are unique but he th:nks the
models out there have to be tailored or modified to the specific needs of Evanston.
Aid. Moran felt that the experts who can give them t.5e discussion points are not the standard mortgage lending
community or the North Shore Board of Realty people, etc., he thinks they need to start with the Affordable
Housing Experts and then mix in. He said Aid. Jean- Bap tiste's concept is good and lends creditability and
maybe some creativity, but they need to get the menu first and the people who can give that menu is the
Housing Commission working with groups like BPI. BPI probably has a cop), of every, housing trust fund that
exists in the United States. So between BPI and the Housing Commission they could give them sornin ling to
work with and then bring all the hot shots in and. hta%e a discussion on how they think they ought to bc spending
that money. Let's keep in mind that this is a trust fu-n3 ordinance that is being discussed and hie thinks they
should go to the Housing Commission and get 9 mo-a.l and then trek that model as µe go forward inc:uding
others.
Aid. Rainey asked'*1r. Bill if their recommendation had to go to the Council to go to the Housing Commission
since it's not a standing committee. %fr. Bill': resp-o-tse they could just send it.
Aid. Jean -Baptiste asked if the Blue Ribbon Rznel going to N. included in the motion. Aid. Wol::n added
that she µ ould like to amer.,f the recontnienda::on t,, ada a tint: limit of 90 days to the moron.
Aid. Moor n accepted the amendments and re;--ated i=.; ::lotion to send this to the Housing Commission for a
recommendation with respect to an Affordab:; Hot_-:ng Trust fund ordinance to Eye returned with a
recommendation in 90 days and in the meantzmc ti:n can explore establishing a Blue Ribbon Comm ssion who
will work: with Council in relation to the recommer., :anon that the Housing Commission gives them.
Aid. Bernstein - seconded. %lotion carried
pISCUSSION OF FSTAR ISHiNG A START -TIME OF NO FAR1,lFR THAN 5:30 PM FOR STANDING
COM%tVT7EES ON COUNCIL NIGHTS:
4
Runs Committer Minutes 1214/06
Aid. Rainey stated that 5:00 p.m_ is too early to first of all expect the public to be able to observe them and
second for people w ho come from dorti-nioun like Aid. Moran. Jean -Baptiste, Bernstein, Tisdahl and others. I f it
means that their Council meetings ha%a to start just a little bit later to accommodation that then they should
make that happen_ She knows that is difficult to believe. out if they could at least be honest with people and tell
them they are not going to be starting at 5:30 p.m. but will stun at 9.00 p.m. or so. They have an hour and a half
for ASPW and an hour and a half for P&D. She stated t_'-...at they do get extra credit for last week.
Aid. Wollin moved that they begin no earlier than 5:30 p-m. for ASP V. Aid. lean -Baptiste seconded. Motion
carried.
DISCUSSION OF TELFVISING OR STREAMING Ot TR THE WER VARIOUS CITY BOARD AND
COMMISSION MEETINGS:
AId. Rainey asked that this item be placed on the agenda because it is so important that they on television either
live or maybe on the next night or some other night. For example, the Plan Commission meetings, the other
night she came to hear about the Central Street item and t-'sere %vas a complexly full house and it w-as a terrible
night. There u ere people who «ouid have loved to ha%a seen that on television. nen there was the Chicago
Avenue meeting «hick he couldn't stay for but it would :have been nice to have been able to watch it on
television. Those are things that are chanting character to our community and it mould be nice if people could
see it on television. She is aware that then is a cost and vvas not sure if there was a difference in tents of
personnel doing them live or not line_ Various commun:acs have available on their websites \\-here you can
click on a date and watch their a bole Council meeting.
Mr. Morgan added that they are also indexed -where side by side you have the meeting being broadcasted and
thy• agenda is next to it and you can click a spot on the agenda and it will take you to that part of the meeting.
But he apologized for not having the samples he promises but the computer wouldn't cooperate.
Ms. Carroll said they would just have to budget for payt".g someone to do that. And if they are looking at the
streaming there will be a little more cost initially. She asked if they were looking to do both. Aid. Rainey said
no she would just prefer the televising first.
Aid. Wollin asked why the 14.000 dollar estimate for the start up of streaming is so expensive. Mr. Morgan said
you have to buy special equipment to convert it into a dicital signal and so forth. And then there is a 1.000 a
month fee for maintenance and the company that they K ould work with to do this would maintain the website
and keep it up and running and that is the trninthly maintenance fee.
Aid. Wollin personally thought %ideo taping and repla} hag the Plan Commission and even a P&D meeting is
tine because adding another 26,Xi 0 for strtarrung is too expensive.
Aid. Rainey absolutely agreed for th_ time being becau_� it might get cheaper. Ms. Carroll asked if they were
looking to tape lisc or tape and replay. Aid. Rainey sat,::f it is the same price to tape it live then it should be
done live.
Aid. Bernstein notc-d that lovis::gaily right row they can only tape from the Council Chambers, so of those
meetings are there any os erlapr ,r.g. .-old. R_:ney rephce; :hat the only thing that overlaps is CDBG when they
do their allocations and hear the r ropo&als d they ha% = no reason to alter that now. but could video tape them
because they don't necessarily ha,6e w be loc. They cc_ld go in on another night, but does not ser- that that
would be a problem.
Nis. Carroll asked Mr. Morgan if he though: they could Let that in place for the January Plan Commission
meeting? Mr. Morgan thought that they could.
F
Rvks Cer..ntttee Minutes 12/4/06
Aid. Tisdahl said she thoc zht that was a good idea and agreed with Aid. Wollin that the cost to the other is too
much. There are a lot of -ptople who would have liked to have seen how the Plan Commission came to the
conclusion that they did tag other night because people are still calling and asking what happened.
AId. Bernstein thought tha: if they are talking about increasing the service capacity on Evanston Community
media then they should a_':o talk to them about their continued residence to not advertise. Ever%. other cable
company has advertisc=e-n s for local people on political campaigns and things of that sort. so it is a source of
revenue and he doesn't know why they don't do that. Several years ago he asked about a specific campaign and
was told they that they j::_: don't do it. lie thinks Eitan Kushner told him that a hundred }ears ago and Steve
Bartlebaugh has just cor.: -.ued it. Ile would like to have that investigated. It is not big money but it is a
revenue stream. Aid. Ra::cv and Ald. Tisdahl thought that was an excellent idea.
Nis. Carroll asked if they were looking at any kind of advertisement. commercial or other -wise? Aid. Bernstein
said yes, they could put Invitation if they want. He wouldn't necessarily think they could advertise cigarettes or
things of that sort. Aid. R ;ncy suggested restaurants could advertise. Ms. Carroll said they would need to do a
little research with fir. Bartlebaugh and then bring it back to the committee.
Aid. Wollin said she thin•: P&D is a good one to add to that list but knows Oiat Aid. Wynne doesn't like to
move back to the Council Chambers. So her motion would be to tape and televise the Plan Commission
meetings.
Aid. Bernstein seconded- Motion passed.
Aid. Rainey stated that s*c thought that P&D is very interesting but maybe they should start with the Plan
Commission first. Became it is going: to be very confusing televising the P&D meeting on Central Street
without televising the Plsn Commission. And they probably need to talk to the ECTV staff to find out what
availability they have.
Ald. Moran asked if they need to tape the Plan Commission meetings as a blanket thing or should they do it
selectively. Because there might be a Plan Commission meeting where there is really nothing. Ald. Wollin
thought they should just t3.pe them all.
The Committee agreed to have all PIan Commission meetings taped for now.
DISCUSSION OF ME%fBERSIIIP INMAYORS FOR PFACF ORGANIZATIONS;
Aid. Jean -Baptiste moved approval of membership in the Mayors for Peace organization. Aid- Wollin
seconded. Motion passed
New Business:
None
ADJOURMFNT:
Meeting adjourned at 6:5 S p.m.
Respectfully submitted.
Darlene Francellno
6