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HomeMy WebLinkAboutMinutes 2007Rules Coaniitts. Aleutat 2/5X7 APPROVED MINUTES OF THE RULES COMMITTEE MEETING MONDAY, FEBRUARY 5, 2007 6:00 p.m. Aldermanic Library Present: Aid. Hansen, Holmes, lean -Baptiste, Moran, Rainey, Tisdahl, Wollin Ik Wynne Absent: Aid. Bernstein Presiding: Aid. Ann Rainey Staff Present: Judith Aiello, Julia Carroll, Darlene Francellno, Herbert Hill, Gavin Morgan & Elky Purze Guest: Mary Morris, Mayor Morton lk Bill Smith CALL TO ORDER: Aid. Rainey called the meeting to order at 6:10 p.m. APPROVAL OE DECEMBER 4. 2006 MINUTES: Aid. Wollin moved approval of the December 4, 2006 minutes. Aid. Jean -Baptiste seconded. Minutes approved. BRIEF REPORT ON THf,§TATUS OF THE PROPOSED REFERENDUM RELATED TO THE Mary Morris reported that the period for filing for the consolidated election was Jan. 29 through Feb. 5. The petitions were filed in her office on Monday, Jan. 29, 2007 and If anyone Is interested in looking at them they are welcome to do so. The amount of signatures needed was 1,834 and almost 2,000 signatures were collected. The period for objections to be filed starts Feb. 6 through Feb. 13. If someone wants to object they must file in writing and submit it to the Cleric's office. That is then subject to motion the procedures for notifying the Mayor, who would be the chairman of an Electoral Board and notification to everybody that an objection has been filed. A meeting would they, have to be set up with Aid. Moran who is the senior most aldermen, the Mayor and herself to hear the objection and through It all it could be challenged In Circuit Court. There is a pretty tight time period to take care of this. She also made it clear that the Clerk's job is not to verify the signatures, they accept them, count them and look them over and they appear to be alright but she is not vouching that they are all Evanston residents. Aid. Wynne clarified that the objection would be filed In writing about something that Is defective In the petition. Ms. Morris stated that was correct. Someone would have to go through them and say this or that doesn't meet the standards. For example, somebody would have to go through them and look for people who are not registered voters. Mr. Hill stated that it is a very, very quick procedure. The electoral board will judge or review only that which is objected to in the objection petitions. The electoral board cannot on Its own initiative review the petitions. The format would be that if some entity or person Is to object they will file a written specific objection or objections to whatever it is they are objecting to. If that is filed then the whole mechanism kicks off where the City Clerk, as an elected official, notifies the Chairman of the Board which is the Mayor and the hearing would be held on that matter within a week of the filing of the objection petition. +/ir:o67 1100:SOAM Ruks carmttsa Aautss 2/5/07 ,APPROVED Aid. Rainey asked what the timeframe would be for a Council generated referendum. Mr. Hill replied he did not have the information. Aid. Rainey asked what would be the question that will be on the ballot. Aid. Wynne read "Shall the City of Evanston municipal government rehabilitate and continue to reside in the Civic Center located at 2100 Ridge". She wanted to know if that is binding. The response was no it is advisory. Aid. Wallin stated that she knows there will be an educational campaign to educate the community about why they think this should be done. Her question was other than their vote, do they have another position they would want to articulate In public. Ms. Carroll replied that it is up to the Council on what position they want to articulate. There is the Civic Center Committee that can make a statement. Aid. Rainey asked if there is a Civic Center committee meeting scheduled. Ms. Carroll said there is not one but she could get one scheduled. She has been waiting to get the report back that they had talked about at the last meeting and had not yet received it. Aid. Moran asked if Aid. Wallin was referring to position on the referendum. She stated that she was referring to the position on the Civic Center because there are two sides. She pictured some kind of a panel formation where both sides are able to present their position. And the question is who would articulate the position of the nine aldermen as vote. Aid. Wynne asked if they could as a Civic Center Committee take a position and Issue a press release and a statement. Mr. Hill said again it Is a very fine line. The role that the City plays In the referendum question would be informational only. Using the example of the 911 enhance fee, even though that was in the best interest of many people in the city all that the city could do with city tax payer money was be neutral and be Informational. So with respect to the referendum question what the City Council as a body collectively could do would be neutral and Informational. What the Aldermen would do on their own time without city funds is a different issue entirely. Aid. Rainey noted that they have a presentation, they've examined the cost to renovate and the cost to build new and she would imagine that kind of information could be put out. Her thought was that the referendum isn't clear and she certainly understands why they didn't want to make it clear. It is a feel good statement and she would have signed the petition if she hadn't been a part of it. Aid. Jean -Baptiste thought they should get an Informational statement out as they did for the Housing referendum because it to had two sides. Aid. Rainey stated the committee needs to meet quickly. Ms. Carroll noted that Aid. Bernstein would be contacted to get a date. Aid. Rainey thanked Mary Morris for the report. MCUSSION WITH THE LAW DEPARTMENT OF THE OPEN MEETINGS ACT: This Issue was asked to be placed on the agenda by Aid. Rainey based on a meeting scheduled on the Ridge Avenue Stakeholders and the Renovation of the reconstruction of Ridge Avenue. She explained that it was an evening meeting held In Room 2200 with people from St. Francis Hospital, St. Nick's, people from up and down Ridge, and people that have been involved in the street light issue. She was invited to the meeting as well as Aid. Hansen, Bernstein, and Jean -Baptiste and since It wasn't a public meeting Aid. Jean -Baptiste had to be uninvited because that would have meant that 4 Aldermen would have been there listening to the presentation. It is such a waste of staffs time to have a meeting with this little group and that little group and this can't continue to happen. There must have been 20 to 30 people at that meeting and In her opinion every meeting they have here has to be notified as a public meeting 2 41S1200711-14SOAM PALks conwNtt" lY jmfts 2/5/07 APPROVED whether it is informational or not. She had read all the information and It did appear that if 4 Aldermen would have been present It would have had to be noticed and it was not. Given the interpretation is so restrictive they've got to start making their meetings publicly noticed and call it a public meeting. This is the second time that this has happened for the Ridge Avenue project. Mr. Hill said the definition of a public meeting is a gathering of a majority of a quorum for the purposes of discussing public business. In order for four or more Aldermen to attend that type of meeting all that is required is the 48 hour notice and the agenda as is done with all the other public meetings. The public notice that Is now accomplished for the City Council meetings would certainty be public notice for any other city meetings. That might take it to a heighten level because the City Council, with respect to posting an agenda on it's webpage may not be the requirement for other committees of the City. But no matter what for any public meeting, a gathering of a majority of a quorum for the purpose of discussing public business is subject to the open meetings act and at a minimum would be the 48 hour public notice of the meeting. Ms. Carroll said for any kind of open public meeting you must post an agenda with the date, time and place in the elevators of the Civic Center and now it is required to be on the City's website. It has to be posted in the location of where the meeting is being held. Aid. Hansen's understanding was that just because 4 of them get together doesn't necessarily make it a public meeting, correct? Mr. Hill replied if 4 aldermen get together to discuss public business that constitutes a majority of a quorum and it becomes a public meeting needing public notice. Aid. Hansen said on the Ridge Avenue meeting, she would guess it is where the court would define discussion because, it was really a presentation and everyone, including Aid. Rainey, Bernstein, herself and everyone else there were asking questions about what they were talking about as oppose to discussing what they were going to do. Aid. Rainey added that it definitely met the standards for a public meeting because of the left turn issues. Those are decision that the Council is going to be making and it should have been noticed. She just wants to make sure that other meetings are noticed. Aid. Wollin stated she had looked In the elevator for the room number for the Youth Summit meeting being held tomorrow and there was no posting. Aid. Rainey said it has to be noticed otherwise if 4 Aldermen wish to attend they can not. Ms. Aiello replied that the idea for tomorrow is to go through the presentation of the youth engagement. This is the very first meeting and is only a planning meeting with staff and some of the youth from the community to talk about ideas before it gets started. Sheila McCorkle received about 700 surveys back from the high school on ideas of what youth want to see and those that she has been talking with have been asked to come and share their ideas. Talk about sort of the content and how should that be sustained and how do we want to look at sort of the big picture. Talk with the youth about what is a youth summit and if we were to have a youth summit what the goals should be. And at the "Partnering Toward a Safer Evanston" meeting a lot of youth issues came up. This meeting is really just to get a small core group of high school youth who have already started to work with them on the planning and some university students to get t%is going and get some ideas and then get more people Involved to really get into all the ideas and experts on the topics. Aldermen do not need to attend this meeting and when more information is available and Ideas are given the staff will bring the Coun. up to date. 3 415/2(W 1I:I0:SOAM kAu C.owrittra Mtn 2/5X? APPROVED Aid. Wollin and Tisdahl mentioned that flyers had been distributed to youth in their wards and they were planning to attend just for support. Aid. Rainey said she had not seen any flyers and would like to let people in her ward know about it. She also added that It really is a public meeting regardless If Aldermen are coming or not. Ms. Carroll said It is a public meeting but defined under the open meetings act technically an Aldermen is required to make it an open meeting. Staff will look at those meetings where they think there are going to be Aldermen involved. Aid. Wollin said she will be addressing a whole group of kids on Wed. night so if there is anything she can share with them she would like to know by Wed. morning. Ms. Carroll stated that staff will make sure they know all the criteria's regarding notifying public meetings. DI !CUSSION WITH THE BOARD OF ETHICS ON PROPOSED AMENDMENTS TO THE ETtf 1C5_CODE• No Report. NEW BUSINESS• None AD]OURMENT- Meeting adjourned at 6:34 p.m. Respectfully submitted, Darlene Francellno 4 41WON 1It10:soAM Puts Ccffwdtt" hUm tas 4/4/07 APPROVED 14INUTES OF THE RULES COMMITTEE MEETING WEDNESDAY, APRIL 4, 2007 6:00 p.m. Aldermanic Library Present: Aid. Bernstein, Hansen, Holmes, Jean -Baptiste, Moran, Rainey, Tisdahl, A Wollin Absent: Aid. Wynne Presiding: Aid. Jean -Baptiste Staff Present: Judith Aiello, Julia Carroll, Darlene Francellno, Herbert Hill, Gavin Morgan A Elky Purze Guest: Marva Berger, Ruth Lipschultz, Mary Morris, Chris Robuck, Robert Romain, and Bill Smith Q&U TO ORDER: Aid. Jean -Baptiste called the meeting to order at 6:13 p.m. APE!BQYAL OF FEBRUARY S. 29OZ MINUTES: Aid. Rainey moved approval of the February S, 2007 minutes. Aid. Tisdahl seconded. Minutes approved. DISCUSSION WITH THE BOARD OF ETHICS ON PROPOSED AMENDMENTS TO THE Members of the Board of Ethics introduced themselves: Robert Romain a 3 year member, Ruth Lipschultz a 5 year member, Chris Robuck In her 2nd year, and Marva Berger in her 2n° year. Nikki Pakkala was absent due to illness. Mr. Romain stated that a little over a year ago Aid. Moran came to them with a question on ethics and asked for an advisory opinion and with the possibility of actually changing a section of the Ethics ordinance that the Council modified a little over a year ago. Basically the premise of the Ethics ordinance in Evanston as is required by the state must meet the minimum of the state standards. Historically the City of Evanston has more than likely exceeded the state standards in some Instances and have not gone below. Basically the question was to what extend can an Alderman represent or advise a plan In a matter that is voted upon by the City Council, If the Aldermen abstains from voting on that particular issue or Item. After getting an example for clarification from Aid. Moran as to what this meant. The first thing they did was proceeded with their research to look at other ethics ordinance, statues and what have you from other states, cities, municipalities, other boards somehow representing various aspects, and even Industrial and private industries. The municipalities were Detroit, Seattle, Hartford, Chicago and Skokie. They also looked at the State of Illinois, Connecticut state ethics commission and State of Illinois National Association counties. In regards to this particular question their research says that it is very vague in every one they looked at as to where, if at all, you draw a line. It was obvious that this was a question that has been presented time and time again all over and in their opinion at that point they felt that nobody had reached a conclusion that was very definitive per say. That is the history. Ms. Lipschultz stated that before the question came in the Board had discussed looking at and revising the "Conflict of Interest" section on pages 6, 7 & 8 of the ordinance. In between there were some complaints the board had to handle and those complaints 6/5/2Nk}7 12:6S:51 PM Rules Convmitt" MfmOu 4/4/07 APPROVED made It even more clear that there were some pieces of the ordinance that were too vague and needed to be addressed. The purpose of addressing those parts and helping them be clear were twofold. One, first and foremost was really to be protective of city officials and city employees that In a way when things are clearer It really serves to be protective of everyone that is covered by the code. The second was to really enhance public trust. There are several sections of the ordinance that are similar and large portions were not changed because the Board didn't feel there was any reason to change it. To set the high standards for public trust and for the protection and clarity of what is expected for all the people covered by the ordinance was to add something new. Can page 6, Section 3a. "Definitions" is a beginning of "Personal Interest', "Private Interest" and "Family", these definitions were not In the code before and are meant to be more inclusive. Included is "domestic partnerships" in order to be specific In terms of what's Included in each of the other sections. Also in Section 3b, "Conflicts of Interest Prohibited" talks about this ordinance is meant to be construed liberally. The board looked at other codes and a code can never be all inclusive, so this language was put in with the understanding that it's the intent, not just the letter that it is meant to be construed liberally for the protection of those covered and for the public trust. It took a year because they spent a lot of time trying to be very careful on how to balance out, how specific do you get in the sense of not being vague. In the complaint cases, they saw that some of the vagueness created difficulty for the people being complained Against and they wanted to build in those protections. On the other hand you can't list every single thing because when you start to try, it becomes Impossible and unwieldy. They spent a lot of time trying to find that right balance and that is what this language is intended to do. Section 3b subsection li "Abuse of Power of Office- was in the previous code and they strengthened the language somewhat. In Section 3 ill, prohibition against "Representing Private Interests" has changed to include informal lobbying. This language is in no way intended to prevent, for Instance, any of the Council members from advocating for their constituents. It is completely focused on trying to spell out more clearly what represents conflict of interest. The only other thing that Is new that isn't just maybe a re -wording is a "cooling off period", for elected officials that are wanting to come and represent private interest in front of the city. There is a period of a year before that person would come back and represent a private interest. Otherwise the sections are pretty much either the exact words or very close wording to what was In the previous code. Aid. Wollin stated that an page 7, section b, subsection vil reads ".....If any elected official.............shail have a personal interest.......... Notwithstanding the foregoing, nothing herein shall prevent an elected official from voting an any legislation pending before City Council provided such legislation impacts the public generally, and the elected official's benefit or interest is similar to the average member of the public." That was her position on the alley. It took from being accused in September to being resolved in April for the Ethics Board to come to that same conclusion. This language Is so clear that she can't understand why it took that long to come to this conclusion. Ms. Lipschultz said this language clarifies it because this is a rewording and the rewording was done to make it clear. Aid. Bernstein turned attention to page 8, subsection x. "Transactions Involving Clients. No former elected official shall represent any private Interest in any transaction involving the City for twelve (12) months after his/her status as an elected official of the city terminates." He preface this by saying he no longer Is In the private practice of law and does not intend to be back In the private practice of law. But to preclude somebody from representing, supposing that person is a lawyer, for 12 months for any Is not appropriate. To the extent that a lawyer tries to represent a 2 dr; ,[Kr, I2AS:3k Fit Rvlss Camift" MErutss 4/4/07 APPROVED client whose case was before the Council when he/she was on the Council should be prohibited. But if It Is a new case it's a restraint of pre -trade if you will. They've had two situations where former Aid. Newman and Engelman have appeared before them and he doesn't think there has been even a panic in propriety. When people tali him he refers different people with special concerns because that individual has been there and knows what he/she is doing and it facilitates the City Council's actions if someone who knows the process brings the case forward. It is not to say that if an Individual has a part of legislation and knowledge of what has happened in a group or a closed setting and leaves the Council and then tries to represent someone because that Is a conflict of interest. But that's not necessarily for the same reason. This precludes people from earning a living and that is wrong. People who've served this community shouldn't have to veer that responsibility. He would suggest that It read "......No former elected official shall represent private interest in any transaction involving the City......" He would say "indefinitely" with respect to things he/she has voted on or been part of or has been to the Council during his/her term on the Council and that could be 5 years. For example, the Kendall College case began with the last Council and had any former Council member who had been part of their discussions about Kendall gone out In private practice and suddenly showed up representing Kendall College or the neighbors opposing Kendall College that is inappropriate. Ms. Upschultz noted that is the intent, because they would have privileged Information that would be inappropriate to use in that situation and that is the kind of situation they wanted to address. Aid. Bernstein did not think this language addresses it. This language tells him that if he is a City Council member and leaves he is precluded from doing anything with the city for the next 12 months and that is wrong. Aid. Moran stated this which is most frequently referred to as revolving door provision, has definitely been adopted by the Federal Government. At one time the Council had a discussion on this in terms of how many jurisdictions have adopted revolving door provision. There was quite a debate on whether the 'cooling off period" as it Is frequently referred to, should be longer. The clear attempt is to address the possibility that somebody can literally walk off the Council on May 1 and walk back in on May 2 doing work representing clients here. If it was some kind of perpetual description he would agree with Aid. Bernstein, but a year seems very reasonable. If you can't make a living by walking out one day and within a year have enough business other than going back lobbying and appearing before the people who are your colleagues either a year or less than your business is in trouble. Maybe it is something not before the Council, maybe a week after they've been off the Council a client needs a variance and has to go before the Zoning Board of Appeals and wants that individual to handle it. There is a very serious question, again address the issue of public trust and confidence In what is going on. They might be a great lawyer, insurance agent, real estate person or a consultant of some sort. Someone Is going to want to know why this person has been hired who is buddies with everybody and has been working with the Council up until last week. Mr. Romain pointed out that it is in the Council's hands as to what happens with anything the Ethics Board recommends or suggest, but stressed that the air of Impropriety is a great concern and should be to everybody. That is part of what this is aimed at if not a major part of It, so he would encourage bearing that in mind in discussions. Ms. Upschultz added that it Is also the intent to deal with the appearance of conflict of interest because it just destroys any sense of public trust. On a factual basis Mr. Hill stated that he thought it was within a year that Aid. Newman represented North Shore Towing in negotiations. The law department dealt with It and It was perfectly equitable In finding negotiations. 3 e-';120:7 12AH31 Pal Rutss C mmirhm fflimtes 4/4/07 APPROVED Aid. Rainey thinking was that it would be helpful to hear from the Board on how elected officials avoid "Political Activities" on page 9. Aid. Jean -Baptiste suggested that now that the ordinance is before them they have the ability to address any of these Issues. But tonight they need to focus on the "Conflict of Interest" section. To be respectful of the question Ms. Lipschultz said the "Prohibited Political Activities" section again was one that came through the State of Illinois where they mandated that all the counties had to be inclusive. And if the Rules Committee would like they would be happy to come back and go through that section and other sections point by point. In addition, Aid. Rainey stated she can only speak for herself, but she has no idea what the Board does, what cases they hear or the complaints that come In unless it involves the Council, then they frequently are notified. Mr. Romain asked if they receive the minutes. Aid. Rainey said she has never and has asked for them many times. Mr. Hill noted that he has been staff to the Board since approximately September of last year. Since that time the minutes have been issued regularly through the City Clerk's office and to all the members of the committee. Ms. Lipschultz believed It is vitally important for the Council to know what the Board does and the Board should be a resource to go through these sections and discuss the meaning and Interpretation and how they apply. As one of the longest standing members of this committee at this point she would really welcome and advocate the opportunity to come back and spend as much time as they would like. Aid. Jean -Baptiste noted that they would from time to time schedule the Ethics Board to appear before the Rules Committee. He also suggested putting the "Political" section on hold for the next meeting. Aid. Bernstein recommended devoting an entire Rules Committee meeting to the Board of Ethics. Mr. Romain requested they allow the Board of Ethics to get together at their next meeting to decide how long they think it will really take them to do this and then come back to the Rules Committee with a schedule when they are ready with something. Ald. Jean -Baptiste said that would be fine and maybe when they come back they can look at the ordinance paragraph by paragraph as to what is proposed so they can see where they agree and disagree. MPONSE TO LEAGUE OF WOMEN VOTERS LETTER DATED DECEMBER 11, 2006: Betty Papangelis the Observer Chair was not present but Aid. Rainey was sure that Ms. Papangelis would just be thrilled with them for the last couple of meetings. They have been very prompt and she feels that the letter has made a difference. Although an the other hand she does not think that the city's business should be rushed and many times the reason they are late is because they are giving citizens an opportunity to go on and on and frequently the last person speaking has a lot to offer. Aid. Wollin added that she didn't think they have had any large P&D projects and that does keep them behind schedule. Aid. Rainey's idea was that it might be wise to let people know that when large projects are going to be on the agenda the Council meeting will not begin until 9:00 or so. Aid. Moran noted the letter is an important message and they should try to adhere their ammunition and start meetings on time and do what needs to be done to start these meetings on time, particularly Council and standing committees meetings. It becomes a question of docket management as Ms. Papangelis mentions In her letter. If they've got a monster Issue on the PAD agenda they have to figure out ways to manage that 4 6/5/ZW712:0S:51 PM Rules COMWtia APUMUs 4/4/07 APPROVED Issue. Maybe it means having special meetings, a meeting on a Saturday or a Wednesday but they should be ready to start Council meetings at 8:30. As the soon to be chair of P&D, Aid. Tisdahl thought that when people come to speak to them at night it Is not a good practice to delay and say to people that they have to wait until the next meeting or a special meeting. These people have made an effort to come out that night an sometimes they can't always come back so it would be good to hear as many of them as possible then they come. The comments from Aid. Hansen were along the same lines. She acknowledged how they sit there listening to the speakers and watching the dock which is getting close to 8:30 and there are 10 people still left to speak and it is hard to cut people off. The additional problem is sometimes you get 30 people who sign up to speak and then there is no time for committee members to get a chance to talk about anything and It gets passed off to the next meeting. Then at the next meeting those same 30 people show up again and say the same thing. She thinks they need to do a better job of politely telling people that they have heard them already. They know when there is going to be a long meeting and for those particular situations Aid. Bernstein said they are going to have to have a special meeting and then manage the agenda for normal nights to get things done. Much of their business isn't impacted by crowds of people and that is why they have been so efficient the last couple of meetings. They just can't start something on a Monday knowing It Is not going to be feasible to finish. If they want to get it done all the way through they are going to have to start on alternate Mondays or whatever for special PaD meetings or PUD's. Aid. Rainey saw absolutely nothing sacred about 8:30 City Council meetings. Way back when, Council meetings use to start at 9:00 p.m. , always started at 9:00 p.m. and that's how they were published. She believes that citizens would much prefer to come out and spend more time at City hall on one night then forcing them to come out on Z or 3 nights. Staff is certainly capable of determing if an item is going to have a big turn out or not. And an those nights start the muting at 9:00 or 9:30 p.m. On the other hand if a special meeting is needed they will just call one. The whole key here is that 8:30 start times are not sacred. They are sacred when they say they are going to start at 8:30 but if they publish that on a specific occasion they are going to start at 9:00 or 9:30 she doesn't see anything wrong with that. Because if you want to see angry people come to a Plan Commission meeting where people have come and expected, after sitting there for an hour and a half, that their case is going to be heard and then find out at 10:00 at night it is going to be scheduled for the next month. Frequently these are not people who are just coming to blab these are people who have done an enormous amount of research and want to be heard. Although she does agree that duplication is too much. Aid. Holmes shared that last night she was at Jacob Blake Manor for a meeting and Mr. Bo Price complimented the Council on their last two meetings and that as a senior citizen he was able to see the Council meeting for the first time in years because it ended by 10:00 p.m. and that senior citizens, as does a lot of them, run out of gas at around 10:00. He noted he was often amazed how the Council is still thinking after 10:00. So they certainly need to take Into consideration the people that are here at the meetings as well as those watching at home who can't get through it. She stated that If they are going to say the start time Is going to be 8:30 p.m. or 9:00 p.m. then as close to whatever time they say they need to start and the same goes for the committee meetings. 6/;/:ai.; 3I:0SAII'M Was Cawmrf+ AA m is 4/4/07 APPROVED Aid. Bernstein thought the starting time should be sacred for those reasons, they are televising so people can become informed and Its not fair to people who turn on the television and it says the meeting is going to be delayed for a half hour or so. There seems to be no other way around it but to have more meetings especially for PUD's that are going to take time and then just do ordinary business, maybe they could even advance the start time to 8:00 pm to involve more people's ability. Aid. Jean -Baptiste recommended they talk with the City Manager in terms of what comes to them that can be handled in an hour and a half or two hours. His suggestion was when there is a difficult Issue on the agenda staff should talk to the chair ahead of time and the chair should be trusted to make a choice as to whether or not to propose a special meeting for that particular item. This way they keep the agenda light and when heavy items come through they will know that they will spend as much time on that one item as possible. So the sentiments are try to see if they can get a meeting that starts on time, finish on time and whatever they say they want to do, but at the same time they can't start and finish on time if the agenda is a bear. The message seems to be clear that if the chair gets in ahead of time with staff then the chair can try and balance the agenda and give some opinion. !CHAIRMANSHIP SCHED Mr. Morgan explained that the chairmanship schedule the Council approved 2 years ago didn't carry out the 4 years for the two S member committees, Human Services and A&PW committees. The problem Aid. Rainey had with the schedule was they have an agreement that it is not fair for an Alderman to chair 2 standing committees at the same time. So the Aldermen that comes up first becomes the chair, but what happens is the practice as proposed is that the Aldermen's other chairmanship goes to the bottom of the list and she doesn't think that is fair. What should happen is just skip to the next person and after the other chairmanship is up that person should become chair of the next committee. For clarification, Aid. Jean -Baptiste said so in other words his understanding Is that what she Is saying is the next available spot after the termination or one's chairmanship should be theirs. Aid. Rainey agreed that is what she is saying and moved to have that change made. Aid. Wollin seconded. Motion carried. Mr. Morgan stated that staff would try and figure out how to make that change. REFERENDUM_APVOCACY: Aid. Jean -Baptiste added this item to the agenda as an addendum to bring clarification on whether or not Aldermen can participate in public discussion regarding the referendum which they are facing right now. Mr. Hill provided section 1-10-4 and 1-10- S of the Evanston City Code to discuss what is restricted. In conclusion he stated that "Taking all these provisions into consideration, it becomes apparent that an Alderman may advocate for or against the referendum, so long as he or she: (1) is not on City property; (2) does not use City resources to do so; (3) and does not do so in the course of executing his or her official duties. It should be noted that none of these prohibitions apply to purely factual information. Aldermen may provide such Information to educate the electorate anywhere and at any time." 61;/XW IIA;:;1 Pit Wits Ca miltts Athwtu 4/4/07 APPROVED It was asked by Aid. Rainey that if she is at a meeting where the matter of the Civic Center comes up and she argues on behalf of her position and hands out the brochure that they generated, has she committed a violation of anything. Mr. Hill said the brochure can be handed out anytime, anyplace, anywhere because that Is an educational, informative, non -position, non -argumentative document. It sets forth the facts with respect to naturally two questions instead of one question. If an Alderman wants to advocate for a position, it can be done, but it can not be done on city property but an Alderman can not take an argumentative position to support and that is In the "Prohibited Political Activities" of the ordinance. Aid. Rainey asked if Aldermen could advocate a position at the EC'iV public forum that Is going to be televised. Mr. Hill said the position advocated is the Alderman's position, the City Council has no position. Aid. Jean- Baptiste said In other words an Alderman can introduce his/her comments as their personal position and state they are not speaking for the entire Council and then say whatever they want to say. OTHER BUSINESS: Ms. Carroll said they were not able to set the date for the City Manager's evaluation at the last meeting and if it would be possible to establish a date it would be appreciate it. Aid. Jean -Baptiste suggested their May 71h Rules Committee meeting in executive session and work it out with the Mayor so she can be a part of it. Aid. Holmes noted that they have to vote and form a committee and see if the same form should be used. Aid. Jean -Baptiste suggested they discuss the form at the April 10 executive session meeting. Aid. Rainey said they must put personnel matter on that agenda so they can have a short conversation on it. The committee agreed. NEW BUSINESS: Partnerina Towafd a Safer Evanston Aid. Holmes asked the Aldermen if they would be willing to serve on one of the 9 convening groups for Partnering for a Safer Evanston because their presence is needed. Aid. Jean -Baptiste suggested that they be provided with a letter bringing them up to date and explain what is going on and include what needs to be done. Aid. Holmes agreed that that would be done. I i cabs outside of Evanston: Another matter brought up by Aid. Jean -Baptiste was that there will soon be a call for a meeting the taxi cab policy in the City of Evanston. Both In theory and practice as to what they are doing because it has come to his attention that their enforcement is lacking. Taxi drivers and companies that are licensed in other municipalities are able to come into Evanston and pickup passengers without any restriction whatsoever and yet our drivers are getting tickets when they go in other municipalities to do pickups. Some of the companies are assigning calls to drivers outside of the municipality. The inspection process seems to be one that Is lacking for whatever reasons. He has already spoken to Aid. Rainey about the need for a meeting to hear the drivers. He remembers in 2001 or 2002 they had an open public meeting and at that time it had a lot to do with service to the community and a lot of people had issues, the handicap community and others. Recently, there have been 3 drivers robbed so they will be looking for a date and hopefully it will be a public call so any Alderman can come and he would encourage them to come and hear what the issues are. Aid. Holmes suggested maybe they should have licenses like funeral home directors have to get licenses to come into Evanston. APJOURMENT: Meeting adjourned at 7:1S p.m. 7 6/S1iou7 U-0s:3I PM Respectfully submitted, Darlene Francellno kin CamWtt" A WjM 4/4/07 APPROVED 6/S/XW, 12:QS:S1 Pal FhAks toRwi"" Wftn" 6/4/07 APPROHm MINUTES OF THE RULES COMMITTEE MEETING MONDAY, JUNE 4, 2007 6:00 P.M. Aldermanic Library Present: Ald. Bernstein, Holmes, Jean -Baptiste, Moran, Rainey, Tisdahl, Wollin A Wynne Absent: Aid. Hansen Presiding: Aid.3ean-Baptiste Staff Present: Judith Aiello, Julia Carroll, Darlene Francellno, Gavin Morgan, Elke Purze A Rolanda Russell Guest: Marva Berger, Sue Calder, Ruth Lipschultz, Mary Morris, Mayor Morton, Bob Seidenberg and Bill Smith CALL TO ORDER: Ald. Jean -Baptiste called the meeting to order at 6:10 p.m. APPROVAL OF APRIL 4. 2007 MINUTES: Ald. Tisdahl moved approval of the April 4, 2007 minutes. Aid. Wollin seconded. Minutes approved. DISCUSSION WITH THE BOARD OF ETHICS ON PROPOSED AMENDMENTS TO THF. ETHICS CODE: Aid. Jean -Baptiste suggested they sum up their discussion on Section 3 of the Code of Ethics on "Conflict of Interest" from the last meeting. Ms. Lipschultz stated that the question in front of the committee tonight is really to consider the changes the Board of Ethics made in just that one section on "Conflict of Interest" that were based on numerous events in terms of Aid. Moran's request. The Board could see where some areas were too vague and not really adequate in terms of primarily protecting Aldermanic interest as well as being fair toward the public in setting kind of an example of the highest standard for ethics for the City of Evanston, especially given everything that has been in the news. In reviewing this section, the Board spent many, many months going through it and making revisions. They looked at a lot of other ethics codes of other communities, both locally and nationally, and several other cities, Seattle was one. They went through it and kind of looked at what pieces seemed clear and what pieces weren't. The Board is asking the committee to consider whether or not they want to adopt it and if not give some feedback. Then they can do more work on it based on the feedback. In terms of the other sections, if the Rules Committee would like, they could maybe put together a seminar where they could review the whole code and be able to answer any questions. The "Prohibited Solicitation and Acceptance of Gifts" and "Prohibited Political Activity" sections were revised a few years ago. There is not a whole lot of wiggle room there because it was done based on the fact that there is a state law that was passed that gave pretty specific and non flexible verbiage to what every community in the State of Illinois had to have. It was approved unanimously at that time. They would be happy to answer any questions about it, but can't really do many revisions to them. Aid. Rainey turned attention to page 8, Section 3, paragraph xi "Use of City Property". During the last election she had inquired about renting the Levy Center for a fundraiser and was told that she could not because it Is city property and Aldermen can't use city I /'; IN117 9.11 4: ill Ruks Co mwrtM Wmtu 6/4/07 APPROVED property for political purposes. She then found out that if you are not an Alderman, but are a candidate for Alderman running against the Alderman that can't rent the Levy Center, you can rent the Levy Center for a fundraiser. That is a bit unfair and they ought to look at that. Deborah Shore used the Ecology Center at one time as well as other candidates. She was called and begged on hands and knees to please allow the Levy Center to stay open later because they were going in the dumpster financially in terms of their rentals and needed to be able to stay open later. People said they would be quiet and would not bother her constituents. Isn't $100 or $300 dollars an hour to rent space just as good money from a candidate for office as it is from people who want to rent the space for a sock hop or birthday party that isn't even for fundraising purposes? Ms. Lipschultz said that is a really good point and would want to hear from the Law department about this. She stated that a representative from the Law department was In their meetings when they put this together. The reason this was written up, in terms of the second part of paragraph xi Is that this is not to be construed to "...prevent the private use of City property that is available on equal terms...". In other words anybody can rent out the Levy Center for whatever the cost is "...to the public generally ....... or the use of City property in accordance with municipal policy...". Aid. Rainey said that is the theory but not what the recreation department implements. Ms. Lipschultx said it seemed to her that is a separate Issue. If the Law department construes this to mean anybody can rent out the center, as Aid. Rainey was wanting to, for the full amount as any other citizen of Evanston she should have had the right to do so. The Law department needs to be dealing with the Recreation department in terms of how they Impose the power. Aid. Rainey asked that the Law Department provide an opinion on this matter. Aid. Jean -Baptiste stated his position was they could also make some logical kind of conclusion that if they didn't rent the space on equal terms and other candidates can do the same it Is not unethical for an Alderman to do that. Aid. Moran had two points, one was it has always been his understanding that their facilities are not available for political events and he has been told that numerous times over the years. He didn't know if this rule is derived in the city and villages act and/or In the state statutes or from some other general principles. He was surprised to hear that whether people are sitting elected officials or candidates for an elected position they are allowed to use city facilities for political rallies and events. He didn't know If that meant that somebody screwed up and let something happen that wasn't supposed to happen. But maybe as part of their Inquiry to the Legal Department they can find out and maybe find out soon. His second point Is whatever the answer to the question Is this wouldn't follow it up because paragraph xi basically says what one person uses It for another person can use it for. So it would actually solve the problem being highlighted, if in fact these facilities can be used for political events. Then it would say everybody can get in a poll if they wanted to and he questioned whether that's correct or not. Mayor Morton had a question that has been asked many times and thought this would be a good time to clarify it. There is a section on page S, "Entities Doing Business with the City". During the election time people in the community had given money to Aldermen and the Mayor for campaign funds or whatever. The understanding is the campaign funds are a matter of public record. She was thumbing through some papers she had and found an article from the jEvanston Review about the firefighters and their support of Aldermen. The point that Interested her was what was in this newspaper article that the firemen said they wanted. She wanted to know if an issue comes before the Council and a group or individual has publicly given funds or help or 2 V7i:079i L L42 AM Rules Canrrttsa airu a 6/4/07 APPROVED whatever, does the Alderman have to recuse themselves from voting? Ms. Lipschultz's response was no. Mayor Morton wanted to know why not because people in the public really want to know and she can't answer it and Is not going to attempt to answer It. She requested that the Legal Department bring back an answer to that question. Aid. Moran moved that the committee recommend to the City Council approval of the amended Section 3 of the City Code of Ethics on "Conflict of Interest". Aid. Wynne seconded. Aid. Rainey questioned paragraph x on page 8, "Transactions Involving Clients", she didn't mind restricting people who were part of a situation maybe. But say an Alderman voted on a new zoning code in the first 6 months of their term and it passed. Then 4 years later they leave office and in the Sr'' year they can't represent a client to the city on an Issue? You've got a person whose given either 4, 8, 12 or however many years of their time to the City and then you say for the 12 months after they leave office they can't represent people who had an issue before the Council during their term of office. She was uncomfortable with that. Ms. Lipschultz stated the reason that was in there is because it really is standard operating procedures, both in local districts and nationally. On every level you have privileged information and it is considered a form of conflict of interest. Aid. Rainey asked how they came up with the 12 months, why not forever because that confidential Information Is never going to be eliminated from the brain. Ms. Berger stated that they had debated longer periods and decided to just come down to some period, some cool off period, for lack of a better word. A period where people would have some distance between the time they were making decisions and the time they are representing people who benefited from those decisions. The Board of Ethics Is giving a recommendation of what the Board's opinions are. Aid. Moran said the thought here is less about privileged information but maybe more about privileged relationships. In other words, when a person comes out of an elective office they have close relationships with some of the people they've served with over the years. That fact can not exclude that person from ultimately representing a client before the city. The fact of the matter is that when a person like that comes in, particularly when they first come off their term, and say It is a contested situation where they are coming into the Zoning Board of Appeals. You've got the north half of the Mock in favor of some zoning proposal and are being represented by a former Alderman. And the south half of the block opposed and being represented by someone who has never been on the City Council or hasn't had a direct relationship with the city. Aid. Moran went on to say that he has been approached many times by constituents who've said one person has the ear of these people and the other person, based on perceptions does not necessarily have the ear of these people. The question Is how do you inspire confidence in the citizenry about the fairness of the proceedings? Because when you have that kind of a situation, people have a tendency to feel that they are going to get run over by a truck because somebody who has the ear of the decision makers has assumed one side and the other people are going to lose. He thinks one year is meant to be a discrete period, but it would be totally inappropriate and probably Illegally to say forever. Actually when they had this debate they had talked about possibly a 2 year cooling off period. The discussion was somewhat controversial and then folded back to one year. One year would be fair and would promote the sense of confidence within the citizenry that a person can not literally one day walk out from being a member of the City Council and the next day come back as somebody's advocate to take the other side of a scenario that someone is on. It would inspire a �, 7r �.r..'4:13:42 AM Rules Coffmttte Mautss 6/4/07 APPROVED little bit more confidence in people, It doesn't completely eliminate the problem because yes 1 year and 1 day that person could still have the ear of people on the Council and come back and exercise that influence however he or she might. Aid. Rainey asked if there is an actual situation where people are not having confidence in the Council's process because she doesn't see that happening. Aid. Moran didn't know of any particular case that this fits but it came up In the Ethics Board's discussion about how they could best avoid both real conflicts of interest and perceptions of conflict of interest. In the context of their discussions they talked about this revolving door policy which has been broadly debated within the federal government context. It Is in effect and he thought they should not settle for less than what Congress would require. Aid. Bernstein's opinion was there is no basis for comparison between a small municipality and the Congress of the United States of America. This Council is here and they know each other. The reality is that some of the Aldermen don't have the other Aldermen's ear currently, so the perception that people have may not be the reality. The idea that there is any private interest in any transaction is just overbroad. He didn't think that any Aldermen who had a discussion or has been privy to any Information with respect to any given issue should ever be able to represent an Individual with respect to that issue. This is a community that is not like Southern Illinois where every lawyer goes golfing with every judge. People come to know that there is no impropriety because they are judged on the merits of the findings. He is no longer practicing the law and doesn't Intend to and will never represent other individuals before the City Council or any where, but to him this Is absolutely overbroad. It also limits the finder of fact from getting information from somebody who has a greater knowledge of process. This body makes Its decisions based on the facts in front of them. People don't like their decisions but that's not necessarily because of how they feel about improprieties. They may not like their decisions because they think they make the wrong decisions. Paragraph "x" penalizes someone who has served this community in a way that others don't and that is unfair. Now, If you are talking about precluding contact with a representation with an individual about something that has previously been discussed by that same person in a different capacity, absolutely no way should he or she have an opportunity to represent somebody in that situation. Aid. Wynne thought a year for a cooling off period wasn't inappropriate. There is potentially a perception problem, maybe not with this Council, but with future Councils. She lived in Washington and worked on Capitol Hill and it Is standard that you stayed away because of a very strong sense that someone who left Congress has much closer ties to their former colleagues. Her question was besides Congress what are other communities doing. Ms. Upschultz replied that this is actually the low end, they compared a lot and a year or two is very common in a lot of communities. Quite frankly, Aid. Wynne thought that when Aid. Engelman came before them 2 or 3 years after he left office, she was thinking he must be beyond the period of time when he could come before them. She didn't think this was going to be used that much and it is good government and didn't think they were impinging on anybody. She completely agreed with Aid. Bernstein on the point that if 5 years from now something is resurrected and you are beyond this one year period and have seen privileged Information then you are barred forever from coming before the Council on that issue. Aid. Jean -Baptiste also agreed with Aid. Bernstein that In Washington, DC everybody seems to be bought, there is a bunch of money floating around from the lobbyist to the elected officials and that seems to be the culture there. In the City of Evanston most of them are donating time, energy and money to represent their constituents and they 4 % 7 Rr, 4 t 142 AM Rides C*Rm"ea Maufts 6/4/07 APPROVED work together, but they don't agree all of the time. So a former Alderman who comes before them a year or six months prior doesn't necessarily have their ears. They would have to bring something to the table to convince them as to their position. He agrees that if it is privileged information they should never be able to use that information to advance any interest. But in the context of coming before the Council to discuss the merit of a particular statute or to influence those who make the decisions as to which way they ought to go, he didn't see the problem. Because when talking about avoiding appearances and in proprieties they really are talking about people ought not be Influenced for personal gain. When the Mayor talked about campaign contributions, he didn't think anyone was buying anybody by making a contribution to their campaign. When someone comes before the Council to advance a particular agenda he certainly doesn't look back and think that person gave him $500.00 so he'll play him up. The campaign is not that expensive where you are so influenced by a contribution that you want to cater to that person. Ald. Rainey said the fire department has always supported her in every campaign where she needed support. Obviously their support didn't buy a solution to their problem. Secondly, maybe the issue they ought to be working on is transparency in government if after 5 years there are Aldermen who have retired from office who have Inside Information that has never been revealed. Then they are in real violation because they have a requirement that all open meetings, unless a lawsuit is still Involved, have to reveal in public the minutes of those closed session meetings. If they want to restrict people from representing people who have or had lawsuits against the city, that is a different matter and she would certainly support that. And to imply that if you are opposed to this you are against good government is just plain wrong. She thought that this began as a personal vendetta and ended up here. Aid. Wollin didn't think it was a personal vendetta. The most elementary student In political science 101 would tell you that the revolving door policy is in fad something that merits some close investigation and that a cooling off period or a revolving door policy Is expected of the elected officials of whatever level they serve. She does agree that money Is not the issue, however, the perception is as the Ethics Board mentioned In the many ethics charges that were made against her. One was that she took a campaign contribution from someone who was going to have an Issue before the City Council. It is totally legal under the Illinois Election Law and was the first point that was struck down. It was fully disclosed and there was nothing illegal about it, but the perception is there. If someone can bring an ethics charge against her, the perception Is out there that Aldermen will make some concessions or judgment based on the donations they received. She would support at least a 12 month revolving door policy. It is expected of all elected officials throughout the state and she didn't think they were unique in that area. That is why they have to be very clear, that's why they have full disclosure, that's why they have state laws that insist on disclosing contributions and expenditures. Aid. lean -Baptiste said there is a motion that has been seconded to support the entire section of "Conflict of Interest". He had one issue with item vii on page 7 ".....If any elected official or employee or a member of his/her family shall have a personal Interest In any legislation pending before City Council,,......" He wasn't sure what those were because they have speed bumps, alleys and this and that. He didn't know whether there was a category of legislation that is being suggested that they ought not to vote on. Ms. Lipschultz stated It is really meant to be something that is truly personal which would not be the same as something that is available to everybody like the alleys, speed bumps, lights, etc. a 17/1aa-*L1142.M Ruks Coemittss MJmfts 6/4/07 APPROVED Motion carried (5-3). Aid. Jean -Baptiste thanked the Board of Ethics very much and suggested maybe scheduling them to return on a quarterly basis. Ms. Llpschutlz said they would be happy to do that. Aid. Moran added that he really wanted to thank the Board of Ethics who worked for a long time on this. The Board of Ethics really is a very good body and worked very hard on this. It was very thoughtful and policy oriented and the discussion was very well centered, he was just sorry everybody wasn't present tonight, but individually and collectively they all did a great job. The question was asked by Aid. Rainey if the Board of Ethics had a meeting since their last meeting with the Rules Committee to discuss this and if so how many people received the minutes of that meeting? Ms. Purze said the last meeting was cancelled and the one before that the minutes haven't been approved. Aid. Rainey noted they can have draft minutes. Mr. Morgan added that they had requested that the Law department send a summary of actions immediately following their meetings and thought it had been done. It was stated to make sure that the Council gets all minutes of the Board of Ethics meetings even if it is in draft form. DISCUSSION OF STANDARD PROCEDURES FOR COUNCIL DISCUSSIONS WITH DEVELOPERS (E.G. KLUTZNICK AND HORNERI: This Item was placed on the agenda by Aid. Jean -Baptiste because he thought there was some confusion as to why there were one set of protocols with one project and not with the other. They need to standardize the process in order to not run Into any perceptions that they are treating one group more favorably than another. Aid. Wynne said it is good to clarify this for the public's sake because she has been In two meetings where people have questioned her about private meetings that they've had. With respect to the initial briefing they had, there was a reason for it to be In executive session because it involved the city participating In a real estate purchase. In the second 37 story building there was no request for the City to participate In anything that would cause the discussion to be in executive session. Aid. Bernstein said yes there was it was the acquisition of land, the Same as the first one. The distinction was drawn because they apparently had been to the Site Plan & Appearance Review Board first and it was deemed at that meeting to be out in the public. But there was no difference. Ms. Carroll noted that there were two differences. The first was the city was being asked to acquire property and the second was the developer was asking to either purchase or lease city property. The difference was Horner never came in to the staff to formerly file anything and they didn't put anything in the record. Unbeknownst to her office, Horner came in and did their request for a zoning analysis at Site Plan & Appearance Review Board. Originally staff had scheduled the executive session as discussed so that the treatment would be similar. But once Horner applied for the project the information was out in the public. So what staff did on the Planning & Development Committee meeting was scheduled an executive session to allow Council to talk about the use of the city's property. The Planning & Development Committee voted not to do It at that time because all of the Council had not seen the project. In 6 117120U7 9:11-42 04 Auks Com Wit" AAGuta 6/4/07 APPROVED the other case she believed that all of the Council had some exposure to the project Individually. Ms. Aiello added that the difference is Horner never Indicated, at least when she saw the project before the Site Plan Ik Appearance Review Board that they wanted to buy the city's land. It wasn't until the Planning A Development Committee that it was very clear that they wanted to buy the city's land. Typically, a developer of a project of this magnitude would come to staff and ask what the process is. Staff would then lay out the process. Aid. lean -Baptiste said they need to take a look at how they handle all of that and how proactive do they get to make sure that everybody is treated the same. Aid. Bernstein didn't think that it was appropriate that they meet in private with anybody before a project. There are some municipalities that allow developers to come In front of the Council or some group for a sort of "what do you think". The city doesn't allow that so if they didn't allow it for one, they shouldn't have allowed it for the other. The perception was out there that all of a sudden Klutznick came In. Even he hadn't seen the KIutznick project before that night that they came in and he wasn't exactly sure why they needed an executive session. He now knows the reason, but there was a similar executive session planned for the second project that was cancelled for one reason or another and that may have been in their best interest. To the extent that they allowed the first one, they should have done exactly the same with the second one to avoid any potential impact or possible impropriety. They have previewed projects at City/Chamber meetings where they are part of the community and if people want to take it, open It, God bless. But what happened with the second project sort of preempted the whole process. They got in front of Planning and Development when people have been waiting 6 or 9 months to get in front of Planning and Development. They didn't get a decision, but he doesn't know why they went forward. His thought was that they probably shouldn't meet with anybody. Aid. Jean -Baptiste said his thought was that Horner thought they were going to get the same treatment as Klutznick. In all fairness Aid. Bernstein said he didn't even know if the second project was In existence when they saw the Klutznick project, but Horner should have been given the opportunity to sit in the room as did Klutznick. Either be good for both in the same way without kind of losing distinction or don't do it over again. And he opted for the second. Mayor Morton said she thought she read in something that Ms. Carroll and Ms. Aiello and someone else had met with some of the businesses downtown about the Klutznick building. Ms. Carroll's response was this is typical. when somebody is going to come In with a project staff shares with them the concept and talks with them about the process and then the developer will meet with individual Aldermen. The thought from Aid. Bernstein was that it is absolutely appropriate and necessary for staff to meet with these people to shepherd it from the beginning through the end. It is a vast difference to talk to one or two Aldermen or all the Aldermen individually than to sit all of them In a room and make a presentation. There were no decisions made in that room and there were no decisions in the second situation because there was no jurisdiction for them to make any decisions. Ms. Carroll said In the second case staff didn't even have enough Information and that Is why they had a meeting with the developer of the second project. She called them and told them that staff needed to know what they wanted and what they were V7IM179:13:42 ANS Rules Comiittee !Minutes 6/4/07 APPROVED thinking because staff can't take anything to executive session to talk about the real estate unless there Is something in writing first and staff didn't have anything. Aid. Jean -Baptiste said a decision needs to be made that either all projects come before them to have an initial view or none. From so much feedback Aid. Rainey's observation was that the public has these projects approved, in the ground and built. They're screaming about it and in their minds it Is their perception that Council has approved both projects and they are being built and there is a disaster. They are going to block each other's views and everybody else's views. Then there is another perception that the city is giving preferential treatment to one over the other and that is a definite perception. Neither is true in her mind but it is important what the community thinks. If Council thinks that perception Is important enough to write ethics legislation, she thinks the perception of their development process and approval process is very important. This was handled differently. They were brought in for private meetings with the first developer In small groups so they could understand the complexity of it and in the other case the developer called up each Alderman and invited them to presentations. She asked if when Horner went to Site Plan & Appearance Review Board did they bring a model or the stuff they brought to Planning and Development. Ms. Aiello said they brought what they brought to Planning and Development. Ms. Aiello explained where things are now. Both developers have come to SPPARC to talk concept. They both have submitted for a zoning analysis. The Klutznick, Anderson, Focus project has their pre -application processed. The Horner Maple project or Tower Z has not had a complete zoning analysis yet. There is some additional data needed to complete it, once they submit it they will then get scheduled for their pre - application. To give equal treatment staff has asked them to help them schedule a meeting with Design Evanston, the Preservation Commission, and the chair of the Plan Commission which is what Tower 1 had to do. EXECUTIVE SESSION: Aid. Jean -Baptiste asked for a motion to go Into executive session to approve executive session minutes. None ADJOURMENT• Meeting adjourned at 7:10 p.m. Respectfully submitted, Darlene Francellno s S/7/ 2= 9:13:42 AM Ruins Ca Mtt" Nlin,tss 9/6/07 APPROVEb MINUTES OF THE RULES COMMITTEE MEETING MONDAY, AUGUST 6, 2007 6:00 P.M. Aldermanic Library Present: Aid. Bernstein, Hansen, Holmes, Jean -Baptiste, Moran, Rainey, Tisdahl, ilk Wynne Absent: Aid. Wollin Presiding: Aid. Jean -Baptiste Staff Present: Judith Aiello, Julia Carroll, Kenneth Cox, Bill Dunkley, Darlene Francellno, Mathew Grady, Herbert Hill, Gavin Morgan, Elke Purze ik Rolanda Russell Guest: Mattie Amaker, Annie Bates, Frances Bishop, Clarence Surts, Suzanne Calder, Jordan Cramer, Nancy Fuller, John Fuller, Susan Greene, Delols Maxwell, George P. Mitchell, Mary Morris, Mayor Morton, Theola Murphy, Ben Schapiro, Bob Seidenberg & Bill Smith QLL TO ORDER: Aid. Jean -Baptiste called the meeting to order at 6:0S p.m. Aid. Tisdahl moved approval of the June 4, 2007 minutes. Aid. Bernstein seconded. Minutes approved. •Ict•JI:LI.[•���� . � .:i�. •-isI��.��-t�:�7_��t•1:[•L•]•]�t•»�!�•J•.•�1•)l:Y MEETINGS l THE A► COMMISSION: Aid. Jean -Baptiste asked for a motion for approval. Aid. Bernstein moved approval. • Tisdahl seconded. Aid. Jean -Baptiste asked when the Zoning Board of Appeals or the Plan Commission has any Issues that concern a property under the Preservation Commission's jurisdiction, how do they currently Interact? Jordan Cramer, Chair, Preservation Commission explained that in the past it has been difficult for the applicants because they have to navigate through three separate sets of meetings. It has also been difficult for the Commissions because the project may have changed since being presented to the Preservation Commission. This process would pertain to planned developments and would be an easier process. He believed the Preservation Commission is one of the first stops In the process. The idea is that Instead of doing it in succession they would all sit through the presentation and each would have their opportunity to ask questions pertaining to their particular part of the ordinance. The Preservation Commission would ask questions regarding preservation, zoning would ask questions regarding zoning and the Plan Commission would ask their questions. This process would allow them to hear the whole presentation and any changes that come about in the process. When all is done each commission would take their separate vote. They need to meet with the other commissions to discuss the protocol. Aid. Rainey asked would all commissions sit with the Plan Commissions. Mr. Cramer said that is the way they envision it right now. They are trying to set up a meeting with the chairs of the various commissions to discuss how this can be done in an orderly 1-'-07712:42:1 i FM Rule Cott" Akmrtes 8/6/07 APPROVED way, because there are 11 members on the Preservation Commission with a quorum of 6 which would be a large meeting. Aid. Jean -Baptiste asked if in other words the process itself would be a Plan Commission agenda and ZBA agenda but Preservation would have a right to intervene and give their opinion as to which way to vote. Mr. Cramer said they envision that there would be one presentation addressing issues appropriate to Zoning and Plan Commission. Each Commission would address all of their respected issues that would be part of the agenda and they would deliberate in front of the other bodies and make their decision. In his opinion this would work efficiently for both the applicant as well as the Commissions. In other words the Preservation Commission will do the preservation recommendation and the Plan Commission and Zoning Board will do its recommendation. They are just combining the meetings to preclude the need for two separate meetings and to let everybody know where they are going. Aid. Rainey asked how many cases have there been in the last year that would have required this type of meeting. Mr. Cramer said only a handful and the way the ordinance Is written it Is not compulsory, it could be if there were a project of a certain magnitude it would make sense for the application to do it all in one process. The process probably would not happen very often, but it is to accommodate those Instances where it would apply. Aid. Wynne thought it was a good idea, but wondered if the Plan Commission had to vote first how that would work. Mr. Cramer noted that the Preservation Commission would probably be the first to deliberate in front of the others and would state that they think the planned development meets the criteria in the ordinance as to preservation. Ultimately the Plan Commission is going to decide whether to approve it or not. Ms. Aiello added that the Plan Commission makes its recommendation after the applicant meets with the Preservation Commission. Aid. Jean -Baptiste stated he did not think they had any problems substantively but asked that the Commissions report back to the Rules Committee on how the process is working. Motion carried. CHAIRMANSHIP SCHEDULE: Mr. Morgan stated that this schedule was developed and brought to the committee In April and did not get approved at that point. Aid. Jean -Baptiste commented that the schedule for A&PW did not reflect reality because it shows Aid. Wollin as the current chair which would throw off the rotation. He suggested staff take a closer look at the schedule and maybe talking to the committee chairs to help understand the rotation. Aid. Rainey asked that they be provided with a list of the chairmanship since the beginning of the 2005 term. Secondly, when there is a conflict with the chairmanship she has always been opposed to moving that person to the bottom of the list Instead of just moving them down one to the next spot. The analogy that always reminds her of this is the schedule for garbage collections. About 10 or 12 years ago they use to have the hardest time figuring out when to pick up garbage when there was a holiday during the week. If the holiday was on a Monday the Monday pickup would maybe get picked up on Friday or something. Then someone had the brilliant idea that if the holiday falls 2 n.74;1::+2:1S PNt Ruses CamW"se Minutes a/6/07 APPROVED on a Monday they would just push everybody down and collect garbage for Monday on Tuesday and Tuesday on Wednesday, etc. and it all worked out fine. Mr. Morgan said staff would work on the schedule to straighten it out and bring it back to the committee. He noted that given the fact that everyone rotates and can not chair two committees at the same time makes it a bit difficult. The Rules and Planning & Development schedules were set for the fuo'l 4 years after the 2005 election which also makes it difficult to move around the rotation for the 5 member committees. Aid. Rainey said she was the one who proposed not having two chairmanships of two standing committees at the same time because it is very burdensome. But she thought that maybe it would help the rotation if they excluded the Rules Committee from that rule. Even though the Rules is a standing committee it is not a burdensome committee. Aid. Jean -Baptiste said they would not be adopting the schedule tonight because changes needed to be made so they would hold it until the next meeting. Aid. Wynne noted that even though the Economic Development Committee is not a standing committee the schedule needed to be looked at because currently she is the chair and Aid. Jean -Baptiste is the upcoming chair. REAL ESTATE TRANSFER TAX REFERENDUM QUESTIQN: Aid. Tisdahl's reason for supporting this is that they need to find a way to pay the pension deficits and she doesn't want to pay all of it with bonds and have huge interest payments. She thinks this is a reasonable referendum to propose. The reason she 1!:,a ,Id like to discuss it now while the schedule is in front of them is to be able to explain to the community, during a presidential primary, why they should vote for an Increase in the real estate transfer tax that politically Is a difficult thing to do. if the Council agrees her thought is that this is a reasonable way to proceed. Aid. Tisdahl moved approval. Aid. Rainey seconded. Aid. Rainey agreed and supports It wholeheartedly. Her only concern is that they are going to be able to campaign for It and explain to people that maybe you have to pay Into this once or twice during your stay in Evanston or see It on your tax bill. Aid. Tisdahl thought that would get thrown in the slammer and didn't know that that would be campaigning for it. Aid. Rainey replied that they've gone through this once before and she was just wondering If they can get all the parameters laid out In advance, because it is going to need explaining. Aid. Bernstein said they went through It with oppositions and this is different. This Is a question of either pay it now or pay it later. He felt there wasn't going to be as much concern and maybe their Counsel could get them out of some of that. He wondered if they wanted to do that or maybe try the affordable housing again. Aid. Tisdahl said they have a pension problem that she'd like paid. At this point Aid. Moran thought it would take 120 years to take care of the pension problem and if anybody thinks this is going to fix it they are wrong and people need to think about that. Next month they are suppose to get a proposal that is meant to be something in the nature of under this treatment approach to the problem. Ms. Carroll noted that she is going to be sending out an email giving options and they should be ready with all of their recommendations. Aid. Moran said it is really pre -mature to start rolling the ball on this now. They should find out what the proposals are going to be for a holistic solution. He was sure there 6:?,12.42aSI'M 9wks Ca vWttes Aoim ss 6/6/07 APPROVED was comprehensive analysis that has to be made on the best way to approach this problem. They need to know what all the proposals are, what they are up against, and what the best solutions are. He would suggest they hold off until they get the proposals next month before voting on this tonight. He went on to respond to Aid. Bernstein's question on affordable housing. Affordable housing is really trying to get its feet on the ground in terms of financing. What $800,000 a year would do for affordable housing, from his perspective, is much more significant than what it will do for their pension deficit. They need the affordable housing fund as oppose to tossing a stone in the pond on the pension situation. If this was to be proposed on the referendum and passed all of the hard work that would go into it to campaign or education as the case may be seems to be off kilt. Aid. Holmes did not think that this is meant to be the solution. It is a good faith effort on their part to try and meet this obligation that certainly is going to have to be met. Having the citizens be a part of that decision is very important and the education of helping them to understand why it is important they will have to do. She also thought that waiting for the recommendation of the staff, and assuming for the budget for next year, or making some other recommendations certainly will not be an "all" solution as well. They are talking about a whole lot of money and any effort they can put forth to try and rid or help rid this debt is important and having citizens input is very Important. She certainly supports it. Aid. Rainey asked if it would be allowed could $800,000 generated by the real estate transfer tax pay for an 8 million dollar bond. Ms. Carroll's thought was yes, her understanding of the bond laws is that you could dedicate it as a source to pay GO Bonds which would keep from having to raise property taxes for that length. Before proposing this Aid. Tisdahl said she had talked to the City Manager and city staff and everyone told her that this was not a complete solution but a good partial answer. She did not think that any plan coming out in September would be in any way opposed to this. They have an enormous pension debt, major cost to the Civic Center and to Robert Crown and it Is about time they start addressing those. She would love to have millions of dollars for affordable housing but at this point affordable taxes for this community are part of the affordable housing problem. This is not meant to be a total solution to all of their problems but if they don't start coming up with some pieces to the puzzle they are not going to be able to act on anything. Aid. Jean -Baptiste suggested they move this out of Rules because Council will have to vote on it and continue their discussion there. It seems that the majority feels that this Is a good idea. The vote was 7 to i. DISCUSSION OF THE USE OF PRIVATE WEBSITES By ADLERMEN; There was a reference made at a Council meeting to put this: on the Rules agenda because of a perception that some of them have websites, particularly Aid. Rainey that carries the authority of the City of Evanston. Aid. Sear. -Baptiste asked if anyone else had a website? Aid. Wynne explained that she has a 3rd Ward News and Announcement list serve that was set up through Donna Stuckert. She wanted to be able to announce her town hap meetings without walking the ward. She also puts on it news announcements, meetings, the crime list, any information going on at the Civic Center that she thinks Is Important and anything pertinent to the ward. It Is not two way, the Information Is sent from her from mwvnne0cityo evanston.ora to everyone who has agreed to sign up 4 1-7-0712:46Z:I S PSI ihi1as Canrritt" Ndmrtes a/6/07 APPROVED on her list. There were several people in her ward trying to organize their blocks Into making sure no landscaper used leaf blowers and someone sent her some very good scientific data linked to scientific websites from the National Foundation. She had urged people to read It and pass it on to their neighbors. She was not sure whether that violates the policy and wanted to understand the disclaimer about hyperlinks a little bit more. Aid. Hansen mentioned that she also has a list serve that was setup through Donna Stuckert. Aid. Rainey stated she got and paid for her website when she paid for her domain name, annrainey.com and the City of Evanston does not pay for it. The first page is a link to her message board, the next is a picture of her cat that says "My main supporter". The third page has the Howard Street progress which shows 2 pictures of the artists rendering of the Howard Street "L" station reconstruction and the June 2007 picture of the Howard Street apartment building that is being built. The purpose of her website is simply to refer people to her message board. The message board is a very private space that she pays for that has numerous segments to it. In other words the message board is supposed to be primarily Sw ward issues. It has been expanding when issues pertinent to the 8"' ward come up and then she would add other Issues such as big buildings in downtown and zoning issues. Other people would ask her how do you do this or that and they would start their own message boards and she would have a link from her index page to all the different message boards. The message boards are not all hers but there are links from her index where people can pick and choose. Aid. Jean -Baptiste asked if it says City of Evanston. Aid. Rainey said she identifies herself as Ann Rainey Alderman 8"' Ward City of Evanston, Evanston, Illinois and gives her address and home phone number. She is an alderman no matter how you look at it and that Is very, very important to her. Since this issue came up she did put a disclaimer on that front page saying that she bought the domain name annrainey.com when she was not an Alderman and has paid for it all these years. Mayor Morton spoke on the fact that this was her reference to the Rules Committee and It came about as a result of what was said before the Council by the President of the NAACP. Specifically, it does not deal with a lot of the present discussion but Is specific to one major issue. She read the exact words ".......He stated that private and personal Internet sites identified by wards are Inappropriate if they contain the "brand" and Identifier "City of Evanston- and additionally are used to influence other entitles. He was not trying to restrict the First Amendment rights of anyone, but to put some reason to the use of these sites. Identifiers by political entity and names with "The City of Evanston" can be easily confused as an official City site. He thought it Is Improper. However, use, is a decision that Council should affirmatively make or disclaim after deliberation. Forwarding items to others from the site is improper. The Council should address this issue as well as the use of "City of Evanston." She suggested that George Mitchell speak for himself. Mr. Mitchell said the with him was that if you put "City of Evanston" on a private and personal site it takes on the aura of being "City of Evanston" as opposed to being a private site. He understands and 1000/a agrees with Aid. Rainey when she says that she pays for this. He had no problem with that or with people saying what they want to say on her website. But if it is her website, then it Is her website and not the City of Evanston. When you put the "City of Evanston" on there it can be easily confused as being an official site of the city, particularly when you have links back and forth. He 5 3-71W r 2 i:. r s PM kites C4meittss AAiM.s 8/6/07 APPROVED stated that when you put the "City of Evanston" on there to him it becomes a market for governmental and he thinks that is inappropriate. Aid. Wynne asked if people are required to identify themselves on her message board. The response from Aid. Rainey was absolutely. She will delete and post a message saying that they may not post unless she knows who they are and no one is allowed to post on her website. It is controlled by a very complicated password and only she can make any changes or additions to her website. Furthermore, on the front page of her message board where people write and she responds no where at all does it say "City of Evanston". Aid. Moran's concern was that there are legal implications to maintaining a website. There are legal implications of what you say that can be imputed to the City. Some years ago they had some litigation with Northwestern. There was a theory in their compliant that was filed in federal court against the City that Dennis Drummer had had conversations with administrators at the University and that he was the City's representative. Northwestern sued the City and it was not a correct statutuai statement. The fact of the matter is that if something like that were to happen there are legal implications for the City. If somebody or any of them were to maintain a website and for example it said Aid. Moran, 61h Ward Alderman, City of Evanston and he lied about someone or something he and the City could be sued because he said it. If he says it in the median it somehow conveys that he is speaking in an official capacity for the City of Evanston or speaking for any other Council member. There is the Supreme Court decision Tenny vs. Brandel that says you can say all kinds of crazy things when you go in that court room. You are immune from being sued and the city would be immune from being sued. But there are plenty of decision that has construed Tenny vs. Brandel where your spear of immunity dissipates as you as you walk away from that room. The further away you are the quicker you are at risk of losing that legislative immunity because it attaches to what you say. He would suggest they get some direction not only for this Council but for future Councils so they will know what is there and what is dangerous. It was pointed out by Mr. Hill that the website in question Is privately funded. There is a disclaimer on the website now and It has been purchased with private funds. The suggestion of Is there an appearance of the website being an official arm of the City somehow. The website does not have the City seal and is not represented to be a spokes entity for the City itself. If there is a disclaimer that so and so is an Alderman of whatever ward in the City of Evanston that is correct and they do not limit when the Alderman can say that. He would Imagine that in telephone books there could be that title and a phone number where they can go and call an Alderman which is not exactly the same open plenum but there is that opening. One suggestion to look at first Is when do you draw the line between a site that is funded with city dollars, in part or in whole, and a site that is completely privatized. The next question would be what limit, If any, to the Aldermen would be posed upon them when they represent themselves as Aldermen with respect to the website. Maybe one suggestion would be that they add another sentence to the disclaimer that "this site does not constitute the official policy of the standing of the City of Evanston of the City Council". Those are just questions and there is still pretty much a policy issue as oppose to a legal issue. There has to be a distinguish between private solely funded websites and actions of individuals, as opposed to a list serve that is going through the City and being sponsored by the City. No one can use a City connected website unless they are an official and no one can ever use it for campaign purposes. But on a privately funded website that Is no violation of their Board of Ethics or Code of Ethics. 6 1-7,417 I: +:: I S PM Rules Ca mi"" Nn fts W6/07 APPROVED Aid. Tisdahl said she would want Aldermen to have freedom on a website as they are now fighting the polluting of Lake Michigan by British Petroleum. She would want to be able to influence the State of Indiana in terms of law overturns on a website to try to Influence another political entity because that is technology and it is wonderful. Aid. ]ean-Baptiste noted that the criticism was raised because of the apparent authority of the City of Evanston being behind Aid. Rainey's site, she has put the disclaimer in and he thinks they have resolved that. Aid. Moran's concern is something they need to get a legal clarification on. His sense Is if they have statements to make and they make them in the capacity as a City official that harms the reputation of another person then that person may have some criticism for them. People do make good criticism which is what brought them to this issue. Ms. Amaker said that she read on Aid. Rainey's website that they were called meddlers. They are citizens that you want to be involved in the community that you want to care about children learning. These people will ask for different ways to help to teach these children to read and that is a concern of every black person that she knows. Why Is it that they are tailed meddlers? That should not have been put on a public website with the City of Evanston attached. Mr. Mitchell stated that an easy way to solve this would Just be to take the words "City of Evanston" off. It was noted that messages put on her message board can be read by others before Aid. Rainey gets a chance to remove them. After a lengthy discussion it was requested that the law department contact the ACLU and gather further information regarding the use of websites by elected officials. AD]OURMENT: Meeting adjourned at 7:18 p.m. Respectfully submitted, Darlene Francellno 7 9-74711h42.- iPM Was CORMTtes amtss 9/5= APPROVED MINUTES OF THE RULES COMMITTEE MEETING WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 5, 2007 6:00 p.m. Aidermanic library Present: Aid. Bernstein, Hansen, Jean -Baptiste, Moran, Rainey, Tisdahl, & Wollin Absent: Aid. Holmes & Wynne Presiding: Aid. Tisdahl Staff Present: Judith Aiello, Julia Carroll, Darlene Francellno, Herbert Hill, Gavin Morgan, & Elke Purze Guest: Suzanne Calder, Mary Morris & Bill Smith .CALL TO ORDM Aid. Tisdahl called the meeting to order at 6:10 p.m. APPROVAL. OF THE AUGUST 6. 2007 MINUTES, Aid. Bernstein moved approval of the August 6, 2007 minutes. Aid. Jean -Baptiste seconded. Minutes approved. CHAIRMANSHIP SCHEDULE., Aid. Rainey moved approval. Aid. Wollin seconded. Chairmanship schedule approved. ADJ URMENT• Meeting adjourned at 6:17 p.m. Respectfully submitted, Darlene Francellno Rules Catvili"" Knutes 10/1/07 Apprared MINUTES OF THE RULES COMMITTEE MEETING MONDAY, OCTOBER 1, 2007 6:00 p.m. Aldermanic Library Present: Aid. Bernstein, Hansen, Holmes, Jean -Baptiste, Moran, Tisdahl, & Wollin Absent: Aid. Rainey A Wynne Presiding: Aid. Tisdahl Staff Present: Judith Aiello, Julia Carroll, Darlene Francellno, Herbert Hill, & Gavin Morgan Guest: Suzanne Calder, Mary Morris, Bill Smith & Bob Seidenberg AU TO ORQ P Aid. Tisdahl called the meeting to order at 6:10 p.m. APPROVAL OF THE SEPTEMBER 5, 2007 MINUTES: Aid. Wollin moved approval of the September 5, 2007 minutes. Aid. Hansen seconded. Minutes approved. Aid. Wollin congratulated the committee on having a short meeting. 2008 CALENDAR OF MEETINGS: Aid. Holmes moved approval of the 2008 Calendar of meetings. Ald. Jean -Baptiste seconded. 2008 Calendar of meetings approved. LEG15LATIVE INITIATIVES: Ms. Carroll stated that legislation was Introduced last year to define "catastrophic Injury" in the public safety employee benefit act (PSEBA) as Senate Bill 1475 and they'd like to see some support behind that. Another area is that both police and fire at sometime want to introduce a concept called DROP, Deferred Retirement Option Plan. DROP will allow police or firefighters to retire and work for 5 more years and put their pr ision benefits into an account that they will get at the end of the 5 years If they are still there. If this were to pass the city will be paying them their pension and their pay. This was defeated once and we're just saying that we want to get in front of It and make sure that we keep opposing it because of the cost of doing that. Also, there were no benefit increases passed in 2007 but it could be an Issue again. We think It is going to continuously be brought up so we just want to be In front of any of those kinds of issues. As for AT&T we have a statewide bill on cable. At the next Council meeting we are bringing forth a new right-of-way ordinance that will help regulate the urie of our right- of-ways a little bit better than what we have there right now. It Is based upon the Illinois Municipal League and a whole bunch of people working together on trying to put together a policy that will be beneficial to the municipalities so that we're not having to fight with the cable companies and other people on what their rights are versus our rights. Those are the main issues that come up repeatedly. We would also want to fight any legislation where the state would try and take away a share of our revenues. A few years ago they tried to change the Income tax formula and reduce our share of that. 10-30071:2444 PN Was C4"mtts4 Wmjf z 10/1/07 Appro►sd She noted that the Mayor Is on the Northwest Municipal Conference Legislative Committee but because her office gets emails on a daily basis from the Conference they will go ahead and respond quickly if there is something proposed that we have to share an estimated cost or whatever they will give the factual information backing up their position, because they can't always wait for the Mayor to respond. Aid. Holmes said she received information in one of their packets regarding Comcast Increasing their rates. Her thought was that the whole thing with AT&T was to make things better. Ms. Carroll replied that Comcast does have a right to increase their rates if they notify us and every time she gets one of those letters she shares it with the Council. Sometimes it is just a little tweak of this or that piece of the rate. Aid. Holmes said this was a big tweak. Ms. Carroll said she did include in last Friday's packet the fact that AT&T contacted her saying that they had filed before the ICC for their authority to build in Evanston. AT&T has come in requesting right-of-way permits and right now they have 6 permits. After those permits have been reviewed AT&T can start building but they can't provide service until they get ICC approval. Under this new legislation Aid. Moran wanted to know if he was correct that the city has no authority over that and basically they can do what they want. Ms. Carroll said that is correct. The city has no authority over how the franchise Is operated because they are applying for a statewide franchise. It is not like with Comcast where the city had an Individual franchise. Actually the reason for the right-of-way ordinance Is that It gives some protection about what the city can tell them about where those boxes can be placed, regarding line of site, traffic safety and aesthetics. She has met with Kenneth Cox from the law department, David Jennings and John Burke on this and they are recommending Council adopt this model ordinance from the Illinois Municipal League because it has been worked out by a lot of municipalities that also have all these concerns over the AT&T legislation. There are 2 other ordinances that are related to the AT&T legislation one sets customer service standards and the other she couldn't remember what it was, but its related to what was basically an agreed to deal by the legislators with the Municipalities when AT&T was trying to get their statewide franchise issue resolved. All of this will be coming forth at the next Council meeting and staff will recommend that Council suspends the rules to adopt that right-of-way ordinance in order to have it in place as they are reviewing the permits. It will give some protection that she doesn't think they would otherwise have. Aid. Wollin asked where the sample AT&T boxes are located. Ms. Carroll said the locations were Hull Terrace, Hartrey Avenue, in the S' and 61h ward, and one In the alley off of Brown and Church. She believes they have been removed. Aid. Moran said his guess is that they would put them between fences and garbage cans. Ms. Carroll said first they have to review with them in the field the locations. That is going to require a lot of work on our part and unfortunately, under the telephone act we can't charge them any fees at all for these permits so a lot of staff time Is going to be spent on this. But if we can get through the right-of-way permits they can build us out in 3 months time. Aid. Moran asked Herbert Hill if under the home rule statute can the legislators override home rule with a provision in the statewide franchise legislation. Mr. Hill said yes there Is always a way to preempt home rule. Ms. Carroll stated that at Monday night's meeting Mr. Cox can explain more about how they did put in much of the customer service and consumer protections that they had with Comcast, which Is what the municipalities were fighting. They didn't want to lose that ability. They also wanted to have the franchise fees and the PEG payments that they were getting from negotiating their own franchise agreement. There Is some 2 10. li)- U7 1::4:i+ P%1 Rules Ca VW"ee Akin ! 10/2/C 7 AMrvmd protection If this right-of-way ordinance is adopted that allows us to work with AT&T and In fact all of the utilities where they are locating things, which they hope will overcome some of the objections of the large boxes. They first are going to ask them to locate the boxes in the alleys if there is room. If there is not room, then they will have to be in the front yard right-of-way. So they are not going to be super attractive on the parkway. Aid. Bernstein stated that the people who came and gave the pep talk some time back refused to show them a picture of the boxes. They were talking about some distances requirement that if you are being served the box has to be not more than maybe 500 ft. Ms. Carroll said it is either 300 ft. or 500 ft. and It may be longer for some kinds of things but it's really from their other telephone box. What they are doing Is using their copper system with some fiber from these bigger boxes to the smaller box and that's picking It up and running it through their telephone system. Aid. Bernstein asked if the legitimacy of the statute has ever been tested. Mr. Hill said he had no information on that. Aid. Bernstein asked if he would find out. Mr. Hill said the Issue with litigation with respect to AT&T has been throughout the contract. With the specifics with respect to this statute he was not aware of any violations. Aid. Bernstein said that he didn't know the nature of the right-of-way ordinance that they will see next week but with respect to how they can govern their parkways, but if they can govern a little bit why can't they govern a lot. It may be an issue to fight. Mr. Hill said the presentation will be at A&PW and he can debate on it then. Ms. Carroll noted that the A&PW agenda is light so they will be able to allow AT&T some time. They may actually want to talk to both chairmen about changing the starting time for A&PW and PAD. After she sees the final agenda she will call both chairs. If there is anything else let them know. Ms. Carroll stated that Mr. Morgan had talked with Aid. Tisdahl about Inviting the legislators to a meeting. Ald. Tisdahl said yes he did and she would like to Invite them to the November Rules Committee meeting. She suggests they have the legislators first and then discuss the website issue. Aid. Moran said he knows there has been some work done in Springfield on affordable housing Issues, but hasn't been getting information that tells him where that is at. He thinks they have a number of legislators who believe in affordable housing and It would behoove them to advocate with the legislators in November or earlier to establish whatever it is that they might establish that would Influence their ability to produce affordable housing or acquire it. They have the potential for Intermodal transportation In the city and he'd like to cover that with the legislators as well. The notion of what we can do to provide connects to various forms of transportation, commuter or whatever, that we can to get some help from the state. RTA has a lot to do with that, but RTA he thinks has their budget set to a large degree by our state legislators. Some years ago we got the Central Street Metra Bridge painted because we had some leverage on the RTA at that point and time and they paid for it. But it came through a state legislative allocation. Aid. Tisdahl asked for an example of intermodal transportation. Aid. Moran's response was a parking lot on Central Street is one. Aid. Tisdahl suggested that he not assume there is agreement on the Council on that. Ms. Carroll's thought of the concept of the Intermodal is getting commuters out of the neighbors and down to the train stations could be one way to do it. There are a lot of different things that we could do, It could be between lots to different train stations. Her thought was that they should have their transportation people here to talk about that more so we can understand what you are looking for. 3 10, W u71-.4 i4 PM RLks commutes Ajmfts IWI/07 AWvved Aid. Jean -Baptiste said he thought they had talked about trying to get some assistance with the waste dump stations and the north shore. Maybe they need to discuss that with the legislators. Ms. Carroll said yes, she hadn't talked to the legislators about that but it could be discussed. One of the ways to deal with that Issue would be to make everyone who is currently grandfathered go through the same regulatory process. Aid. Holmes said that is what they talked about with Brooke Beal and he was to follow up on that. Ms. Carroll said he did and they met with a person who gave some recommendations about how to follow up. Basically the legislative route or there is other ways to go about that. We need to prepare a report for you on that. Aid. Jean -Baptiste asked if she was going to put that on the agenda for that meeting or do they need to send some kind of memo to Jeff Schoenberg and Julia Hamos ahead of time? Aid. Tisdahl thought It would be a good idea to send a memo of all the things they would like to discuss. Aid. Jean -Baptiste suggested giving them 2 weeks notice because they probably will need to have somebody investigate the Issues. Ms. Carroll said staff would do that. WEBSITE USAGE BY ELECTED OFFICIALS: Aid. Tisdahl said they would not be discussing this issue because Aid. Rainey is out ill. OTHER, Ms. Carroll shared with the committee that they are working on the education piece for the referendum. She has a draft of it but hasn't had a chance to review it. Once she has reviewed It and the law department has reviewed it she will share it with the Council for their input. Aid. Tisdahl noted that Matthew Grady, Finance Director, has been very helpful and Mr. Morgan on working on the pro referendum piece from the community. Ms. Carroll asked if once it has been reviewed would Council want to do a postal patron mailing before the election as was done the last time. If so Donna Stuckert needs to prepare for that. The committee agreed to do It the same way. ADJOURMENT; Aid. Jean -Baptiste moved adjournment. Aid. Moran seconded. Meeting adjourned at 6:33 p.m. Respectfully submitted, Darlene Francellno 4 10- W07I:24: i4 Pat Rules Committee Atimtes 11/5/07 DROVED MINUTES OF THE RULES COMMITTEE MEETING MONDAY, NOVEMBER 5, 2007 6:00 P.M. Aldermanic Library Present: Aid. Hansen, Holmes, lean -Baptiste, Moran, Rainey Tisdahl, Wollin >Ik Wynne Absent: Aid. Bernstein Presiding: Aid. Tisdahl Staff Present: Judith Aiello, Julia Carroll, Darlene Francellno, Herbert Hill, Gavin Morgan, Rolanda Russell, Donna Stuckert Guest: Mattie Amaker, Suzanne Calder, Mary Gavin, Elsie L. Liddell, George P. Mitchell, Mary Morris, Theola D. Murphy, Bob Seidenberg, Bill Smith & Judith Treadway, CALL TO ORDER: Aid. Tisdahl called the meeting to order at 6:20 p.m. APPROVAL OF THE OCTOIcR L 2007 MINUTES: Aid. Wallin moved approval of the October 1, 2007 minutes. Aid. Hansen seconded. Minutes approved. WEBSITE USAGE BY ELECTED OFFICIALS: Aid. Tisdahl welcomed everyone to the Rules Committee meeting for Monday, November S'h. She thanked Herbert Hill for all his research on the website usage. She asked George Mitchell, President, NAACP if he had anything to add. Mr. Mitchell said that he just wanted to emphasize the fact that the Council has the power to make the rules and maybe this ought to be the time to make the rule concerning the use of the website. He'd like to see the removal of the city link to private websites that have the potential for being viewed as governmental. For clarification on the comment made by Mr. Mitchell, Ms. Treadway stated that they were not there to impede free speech. They were there to clarify whether or not a website that is privately owned and privately funded should be linked from an official City of Evanston website that normally would only have one way links to public services or other services related to economic development of the community. Basically the message board, which is the focus of their complaint, is related to the nature of what has been posted on the website. The fact that it Is linked from the City of Evanston's website gives the appearance that it also is a sanctioning of comments or statements that are made on that website because it is following an elected official's name and link. And no other Alderperson has a link that has interactive posting on it, most are just strictly informational for public services. Aid. Tisdahl thanked the NAACP because she thought they have been helpful and now there is a disclaimer which she thinks they will all use on websites and message boards. Aid. Moran said he, like Ms. Treadway, would say there shouldn't be anything suggested here that would impinge on anyone's first amendment right to free speech. The question Is how do they structure that in such a way that, not that a person is 11.27•071 ix: i9 PM !Elks Cwwittsa AA miffs 11/5/07 APPROVED denied free speech, but that the city Itself is represented correctly and that it does not run into hazardous territory, if it is not represented correctly. This is an issue that lies in the domain of not a question of what one can do legally, but what one should do, what is prudent to do. He is not opposed to anyone doing what Aid. Rainey has done, which is to create a website to explore ideas and to communicate. But there can be difficulties for the city In that regard and they should have some guidelines for doing that. If there is an Ann Rainey website that is fine but if there is an Aid. Ann Rainey of the 8u' Ward website that is different. He went on to say that the memo provided by Herbert Hill attempts to provide them with some comfort in terms of potential liability for the city based on what's communicated on an ancillary website but he had some concerns about it. It states ^.....the State of Illinois Local Governmental and Local Government Employees Tort Immunity Act....." which essentially exempts employees from libelous or slanderous statements for the purpose of city liability. The memo also sites the case of the City of Elmhurst where it says "...it would appear that the City of Evanston would not be liable for defamatory statements....", he was not real comforted as that statement would appear. In first amendment issues in his own practice he has had to confront questions of immunity from, for instance, civil rights liability. He Is aware of other Appellate Court decisions where they do not have license to go out anywhere, anyplace, anytime and the further they get away from that room, the greater the exposure is for potential liability. The basic point Is if people are going to have a website that says this is Aid. Moran's website or this is the 6" ward conversation piece or something like that, they need to have a little bit more definition about what is fair game on that website and what Isn't. The fact Is they are discussing this because of a perceived difficulty, whether it is a real difficulty, a legal difficulty, or a societal difficulty. It would be wise If they can find a way to avoid these difficulties which might involve developing some regulations about this. This Issue brought to mind the lawsuit they got involved with NWU on the Northeast Evanston Historic District and there was a count in that lawsuit that suggested that some conversations that Aid. Drummer had had with officials of the Northwestern Administration were representative of the city's position. He thought it was an impudent and misbegotten effort on the part of NWU to put that count in the complaint, because clearly Aid. Drummer's conversations was not representing the official position of the city on anything. Nonetheless the city was defending a count in a major civil rights complaint against the city and from his perspective a misguided effort, but nonetheless an effort on the part of NWU to impose some liability on the city for things that he thought Aid. Drummer had a perfect right to do. But it suggested that there are implications to these forms of speech and they have to pay attention to those implications and be cautious about this stuff. Part of that caution can be exercised by developing some guidelines around satellite websites including those that would be maintained by City Council members. Aid. Tisdahl asked if he had any suggested guidelines. Aid. Moran's response was for example stick to city business, avoid commercial speech meaning to not inject material that is not directly related to public policy issues or policy of the city but to get off on collateral circumstances like who is the best carpenter in the neighborhood or something like that. There might be other ways where they can give some form and depth definition to what would be appropriate discussion on websites like this. Aid. Tisdahl then asked if he would have the city monitor all the websites to which they are linked. Aid. Moran said no because obviously they have citizens who monitor that. Aid. Rainey stated this all started because of objections to commentary made on the Oakton School message board over which she has absolutely no control. The Oakton School message board Is owned and operated by a man name Richard Engling who once had Oakton students. There were comments that were offensive to the NAACP 11-27-u71 P4:39 PAI Rules Canerttee Minutes ] M07 APPROVED and therefore because Oakton School is in the 80 Ward and because she links to all the "Quick Topics" Including the downtown zoning message boards, plan development, etc. and she wants everybody to connect to everything where they can get information. She does have a website, annrainey.com and when you go there It shows her name, address and phone number. There are all sorts of disclaimers now and a couple of pictures of the Howard Street building, and that's it. There is absolutely no political commentary and nobody can post anything on this website other than her. It Is a simple address so that people can click on or link there to go to the message boards. And in "Evanston Now", under this system of message boards called "Quick Topic" you can find fascinating stuff. Links to all the planned development transcripts, links to every city committee and board, etc. It is a fascinating road map to what goes on in the City of Evanston. On her message board there are 3 or 4 that are active and there are thousands and thousands of posts. There are about 10,500 on the 3rd round of posts. It is all about the city, the best carpenter, the best electrician, good restaurants, where you can get coupons to go to the restaurant at Howard & Dodge, and more. It is the most informative, fascinating message board that she knows of around town. She monitors them almost every other hour if she is home to make sure nobody is offensive. She did not believe that the NAACP has one single complaint about things written on her message board. Mattle Amaker said her complaint is that on the website annrainey.com Aid. Rainey called Judith Treadway and Terri Shephard who were representatives from the NAACP meddlers. Aid. Rainey said what might have happened is there was a reference to another message board which can be gone in 2 minutes If that Is offensive. This is about free speech because this all came from the posting on the Oakton message board that she called Judith Treadway and Terri Shepard meddlers. It really had to do with the commentary about Q.T. Carter and the devastating situation they find themselves in at Oakton School, which by the way still persists. Aid. Holmes said she doesn't understand the message board or any of that and she doesn't do any of that. But asked if people have to link into Aid. Rainey's website In order to hook Into the message board? Aid. Rainey said only If they come there for the first time because that would be an easy way to find it. But 99.9% of the people have bookmarked the message boards, which means they have on their screen a direct link and you don't have to do anything but click on it. The other way you can get to it is by going to Google and typing in annrainey. Aid. Holmes asked if she had a vehicle to all these other message boards. Aid. Rainey said not really, she has an index that people can go to. Aid. Jean -Baptiste asked for clarification that Aid. Rainey stated that the message board on which that comment was made that she does not have control over. Aid. Rainey said that was correct. Aid. Jean -Baptiste then wanted to know how is it that It Is linked to her website if she does not have control of it, because that seems to be the crux of the question. Aid. Rainey replied that she does not have any control over the city's website but a million different services link you to the city's website. Aid. Jean -Baptiste said he understood that and maybe Mr. Hill will need to weigh in on this issue because he thinks it is linked to what Aid. Moran Is trying to say. It Is not so much whether or not they want to stymie people's ability to circulate information. He thinks Aid. Rainey is doing a fantastic job, he could never have the time, facility, and skills right now to get Into all of that but that is great that she Is doing that. She may not see meddlers as being an attack, others may see it as being an attack, especially those who have committed a significant portion of their lives to get Involved and try to fix things that they see need some fixing. Their level of sensitivity might be one thing but other people have certain levels of sensitivity. He personally would not have called 3 II ?drl:N19i'm Ruks Campritts4 Wmaes 11/5/07 APPROVED somebody a meddler in a situation where it would be published to others, especially to those who he is calling that because they might be offended by that. He asked Aid. Rainey if she would explain the distinction between a message board and a website. Aid. Rainey said the website Is really sort of a road map to the message board. The message board is where people communicate with one another. They communicate with her and they tell her what to do, how terrible they think she is doing, what they think she needs to do, what the Council should do, and so on. People in the community have started their own message boards and tell her about them and she can look at them and post on them just as anyone else can post on them but she has absolutely nothing to do with them and has no control over them. She added that on her personal message board she does not allow anonymous posting and if someone does post anonymously as soon as she sees it she deletes it because she requires that people have to identify themselves. Aid. Jean -Baptiste clarified that she has control over what she allows to come through her message board. Aid. Rainey said she does. Mr. Mitchell said he thinks Ald. Jean -Baptiste brought up the fact that there is control over this message board. He has heard from Aid. Rainey that she does not control this message board but she does have control and by being able to delete and link to other things is control over her message board. The linkage to those message boards is very easily made by going to annrainey.com and the message board is the big portion of annrainey.com, it is the central portion of it. Her name, address, phone number, title and other things are on there and the easiest way to get to the message board is annrainey.com, click, message board click, and you are there. You don't have to remember anything. Aid. Moran said the discussion tonight exhibits the fact that they need to give some thought to how this gets rolled out and how this is conducted. There is a need to address that in some way. Maybe they need to think about guidelines in relation to circumstances where people who are directly involved with city government and policy making by the city, need to follow. Aid. Rainey added that when you go on the city's website there are links to other websites that have nothing to do with the City of Evanston. Those websites are advertisements for everything from restaurants to real estate companies, or whatever, so if you impose this rule that the city can not in any way link to Aid. Ann Rainey or annrainey.com, then they need to look at wiping all of those links off. She would hope that if they as Aldermen are going to make a decision on this that they familiarize themselves with what it Is they are talking about. It is just people communicating with one another to get things done. Since this issue came up Aid. Jean -Baptiste said that he feels they have made some progress. When the criticism was first raised to Aid. Rainey before the Council, the aftermath was very bitter. There was a lot of criticism and he is not sure if all of it was really meant, but feels that people were just defending their position. Their last full discussion on this was at the August 6, 2007 Rules Committee. He requested copies of those minutes for the committee to refer to if they wish. At that meeting Aid. Rainey slid come back and say that she apologized to Ms. Treadway. Ms. Treadway is saying that she did not, but he heard Ald. Rainey say it on the Council floor. He also heard Aid. Rainey say that she was going to put a disclaimer on the website that she didn't have before. He did not go through all the links but he did see the disclaimer and that she has on there that she paid for It. Aid. Jean -Baptiste went on to say that what remains is that for some there is a legal question here and the freedom of speech is one thing. Defamation of character is another and essentially what it does Is damage reputations when you publish it to a 4 11.27•071:04:0 PM Ruks Committee Mw " 11/5/07 APPROVED bunch of other people. How do other people perceive it and what does it do in terms of the things that you do. Does it ruin your reputation if you are a lawyer and somebody calls you all kinds of names, if you are an activist in the community trying to provide leadership and somebody defends your character, what does it do to you. So when Aid. Moran was talking about what our links should do, whether they should open it up to address any and every thing or should it be limited to city business or other matters that are directly relevant is an important issue that they need to look. Because you don't want anybody coming back and saying they were called this and that on this particular link and this particular link is tied to your website. And while technically somebody may be able to appear before the court and say the commuter law says this, that and the other, the reality is people who see the authority of the city behind a particular website or behind one of them as an individual who represents the city, they wuuld have standing to be able to bring some kind of action to say that the city damaged them. He does not agree with dropping the links from any one of them to the city's website because that means you would have to drop the links on everything that they have. It is a question of trying to utilize more discretion and hopefully the criticism that has been raised In this process informs all of them in terms of how to carry out the process. Hopefully they can have a discussion to focus on what should be the perimeters of any kind of website that they put out that could guide future Alderman. If they have future Aldermen who want to go off and advocate all kinds of stuff that Is not in the best interest of the city, perhaps those kinds of guidelines can help limit and control what is put out. The next phase should be to discuss parameters, he does not think they can control all contents, but contents within certain kinds of categories. Aid. Holmes restated that she does not understand the whole message board etc. and that is by choice in terms of the fact that she just doesn't care to get that involved with computers. But she heard Aid. Rainey say there are all these other links to the city whether they are insurance companies, realtors or whatever. She remembers from the August meeting that one of the concerns from the NAACP was that her website had the city emblem. Aid. Rainey said it never ever had the city emblem. Aid. Holmes said if she remembers correctly what NAACP wanted was for her to simply make sure that it was not perceived as a city website. Is that not correct? Aid. Rainey said that is correct. Aid. Holmes said the simple question to her is what can be done to make sure that It does not conned to the city, if that is possible. Certainly, Aid. Rainey is an Alderperson and if she wants to write Alderman she can do that. But it seems that would eliminate the problem. Aid. Rainey said she never had the city seal on her website. The city has a policy regarding using the city seal. What she did do which never occurred to her until the NAACP complaint came forward was put a disclaimer on there and even put on there that she pays for it and that It Is in no way an official city website and that the city in no way pays for her website. Aid. Holmes asked so what is it that connects and maybe Mr. Mitchell could answer that. Mr. Mitchell clarified that their issue has never been what is actually said on the message board. One thing he thinks that they can accept is when you go on the city's website and go under the government section and you click down and it has the list of all the Aldermen and you can click on there and it tells you how to communicate with an Alderman by name. It gives the email address for that particular Alderman and that Is cool, it is quite appropriate and when you click on it an email form comes up that you put your message on and send it to the Alderman. On Aid. Rainey's site there two links. There is that one that gives the email form that you can send to the Alderman and the other is the link between the city's website and annrainey.com which links to the message boards. If you take that link off of there that would go a long way in resolving 5 11-27-MEN 49PM kiks coereirt" aawfts 12/5/07 APPROVED some of the issues. You can still contact Aid. Rainey by way of whatever the email address is, it still works that way and those who know about annrainey.com will still be able to do that, but it doesn't make it open to the whole world to know about annrainey.com. The other thing Is in Aid. Moran's comments about having some kind of discussion about controls or how you go about finding what is appropriate and not appropriate is really a good idea. But a step forward would be to take that link off. Aid. Jean -Baptiste asked Mr. Hill to take a look at that website, take a look at the fact that it says "government" and under "government" each of them are listed and under Aid. Rainey her website is listed and links to the various message boards. Comments that have been made may be relevant from the standpoint of the liability of the city and the leveraging of the city's grand name and authority. Aid. Rainey noted that if you go to the city's website to the Library that you can be linked to any message board or any organization that exists in the City of Evanston simply by clicking. So they will need to think about that because those people weren't even elected and that is very Important. Also as you look at the link to annrainey.com, she would also like them to look at the sign up form to receive newsletter for any Alderman who has a newsletter, because she'd like to know what the difference is getting city information from a newsletter than from a message board. But equally Important is all of the links you can get from the city's library website. Aid. Tisdahl stated that it is clear to the Rules committee that they want to pursue this issue further. Aid. Jean -Baptiste said he thinks Mr. Hill has the responsibility to address some of these issues and bring back some answers. The committee agreed that Mr. Hill should come back with some answers. Aid. Tisdahl replied that she would concur with Aid. Rainey that they need to look at more than just the links to her website, they have to consider an enormous amount of Information from their website, because if they permit advertising then they have to look at that as well. §KOCHURE ON REAL ESTATE TRANSFER TAX REFERENDUM: Aid. Tisdahl noted that Donna Stuckert did a great job on the brochure. Aid. Moran pointed out that under the paragraph titled "Question on February 5, 2008, ballot" the word "one" is spelled "on" in the 41" and Sth lines. Aid. Tisdahl stated that she would like to add "to fund police and fire pensions" at the end of the sentence "Should the City increase the real estate transfer by $1 for every $1,000 of property value to establish a new transfer tax rate of $6 for every $1,000 of property value?". She wants to always say the reason that they are doing this. ADJOURMENT: Meeting adjourned at 7:17 p.m. Respectfully submitted, Darlene Francellno 6 11 -: 7 -0i 1 -0+39 Phl