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HAWAII COUNTY CHARTER COMMISSION

Transcript of Meeting of March 17, 1999

Hawaii County Liquor Commission Conference Room,

Hilo Lagoon Center

RAY: I’ll call the meeting to order. This is the second meeting of the 1999-2000 Hawaii County Charter Commission, Special Meeting, Wednesday, March 17, 1999, 5:00 p.m., Hawaii County Liquor Commission Conference Room.

Attendance, let’s let the record show that all members are in attendance other than Mr. Alonzo, at this point.

Minutes, the minutes were distributed. Do I have a motion to approve?

??? So moved.

RAY: Second?

YOSHIYAMA: Second.

RAY: Okay. Discussion?

IRVINE: Yeah, Page 23, under Sue Irvine, down at the bottom there, the second paragraph from the bottom, last line, I said, "Are we just going to tinker around the edges."

RAY: Oh, hanker.

IRVINE: Instead of hanker. I mean they’re both dumb words but, yeah. And on -.

HERKES: Tinker.

IRVINE: Page 23.

HERKES: Not hanker.

IRVINE: Yeah, tinker, not hanker.

HERKES: Sue wants to tinker, not hanker.

RAY: All right.

IRVINE: Can I just -, can I -, yeah. Can I just cross out, on Page 24, my -, the paragraph that I first spoke. I can’t make any sense of it. I know what I was saying was that even if one or two people show up at a public hearing, they go back to their communities and take input further, but, you know, if we can just -, it doesn’t make sense to me.

RAY: Okay. Well -.

IRVINE: So I probably didn’t say quite that.

RAY: Okay. She’d just like to -.

IRVINE: Strike it.

RAY: You know, I don’t think that’s material to anything.

IRVINE: Okay.

RAY: But if, you know -.

IRVINE: It’s -.

RAY: Procedurally, can you eliminate things from verbatim minutes?

SANTANGELO: I don’t think so.

BESS: I don’t think so.

IRVINE: Leave it. It doesn’t make any sense so it’s therefore -.

RAY: I would like to have taken back a few statements.

IRVINE: Yeah. But that doesn’t -.

SANTANGELO: Doesn’t work like that.

IRVINE: This doesn’t even make any sense.

BALOG: Even if it’s summarizing, you’d have a hard time taking something -.

RAY: Yeah.

BALOG: Off the minutes.

IRVINE: Okay. Yeah.

RAY: Okay. But your comment’s noted.

HERKES: If you said it -.

IRVINE: Okay, then let’s -, actually, in the third line from the bottom, I say, "Actually, one or two," I should say, "people," "or two" should be in. Or is in there but not two, people that show up do go back to their communities and we do have bigger effect, or better effect is all right, I guess. Put the "or two" in there. Two, add two.

RAY: Okay.

IRVINE: And then just say have to have one or people.

HERKES: Sue, can’t you just leave it?

BALOG: Hey, Mr. Alonzo.

SANTANGELO: And Sue, I would hope that when we get the person that’s going to be doing this on a regular basis, generally, there’s a lot of holes in this that are not normally in the minutes that I’m used to, because it is a lot of disjointed -.

IRVINE: Maybe it was the microphones.

SANTANGELO: Disconnected.

IRVINE: Or something.

SANTANGELO: Yeah. A lot of the sentences are like that.

IRVINE: Yeah. Yeah.

RAY: Okay, Sue, is there anything else?

IRVINE: No.

RAY: Okay. Other comments on the minutes? Anyone else? Okay. We have a motion to approve. All in favor?

COMMISSIONERS: Aye.

RAY: Okay. Minutes approved. Let the record show that Mr. Alonzo is now here. Okay. Hi, Henry.

ROSS: Do you have a list of speakers?

RAY: No, but you’re the only one, and I know you’re here.

ROSS: Okay.

RAY: Okay.

HIGASHI: In relation to the minutes, Mr. Chairman, is it up for discussion whether it’s verbatim minutes or -?

RAY: Yeah.

HIGASHI: According to what the action of -, I mean, this Committee is recorded?

RAY: Sure, I think it’s appropriate to take that up now so, Mr. Higashi, comments in regard to the minutes format?

HIGASHI: Well, I felt more comfortable if we record the actions of this Commission as part of the minutes because when we get into public hearings, I mean, it’s eight hours of testimony, four hours of testimony. Do we need to take those things in verbatim, also? If we have one standard, I think I’d feel more comfortable with it.

RAY: Okay. Other comments?

IRVINE: Are you saying that we’d have a tape but not do verbatim minutes?

HIGASHI: We can record the actions of this Commission when we have a duly made motion, second, and then whether it’s passed or defeated; that should be recorded.

RAY: Marni.

HERKES: So the way I’ve usually done it is actions, any group are usually put in the first of the minutes, highlighted in bold, and then repeated in the body of the minutes when they actually happen so that you can look at the first page of the minutes and you can see any actions that have been taken, that have been voted on. And then you can go to the body of the minutes and it’ll -, and it’s also repeated there. But I agree with Roland that any actions need to be voted, you know, need to be in the minutes.

IRVINE: Are they not?

RAY: Okay.

SANTANGELO: Point -.

RAY: Wait. Wait. Hold on. Hold on. Sue.

IRVINE: I mean, I agree, actions always have to be in minutes.

HIGASHI: Right.

IRVINE: But do we need a verbatim -?

HIGASHI: Verbatim, yeah.

IRVINE: Written record or do we just need a tape and then summarized minutes?

RAY: Okay. Well, you know, there are a couple of questions. Legally, I’m not sure, Steve, do you have any -?

BESS: I would prefer that the Corporation Counsel address this.

SANTANGELO: He’s supposed to be here.

RAY: We’ll have somebody from Corp. Counsel here momentarily, but other feelings? John?

SANTANGELO: I’m just trying to get a clarification, Roland. Are you saying that we don’t do everything verbatim, just the action and summarize just the general meeting?

HIGASHI: I think the intent, if people are looking for the intent of the meeting, of the motion, they can go to the tape, we have that as an archive tape,yeah, but I can see when our meetings get longer, we get more into issues, that these minutes will be a problem. If every word is correctly documented, I think it’s all right, but I think when they go through a tape and somebody’s sitting there and trying to transcribe what everybody said, it’s going to be a problem.

RAY: Okay. Kevin.

BALOG: When we did the Planning Commission, we did a -.

RAY: Yeah, well, since we are, you know, recording this, why don’t everybody try to use the mike since it seems to be we’re headed in that direction.

BALOG: When we did the Planning Commission, we did a test run of doing minutes summarized versus verbatim, and because the people transcribing the minutes off the tapes need to summarize what people say, it actually took them longer to do the minutes than it took them to type them verbatim. And the other thing, if you do summarize, your motions that are made and accepted or whatever you do pass, from what we understood from our -, when Corp. Counsel advised us, has to be verbatim in your minutes. And then your testimony from the public and the Commissioners can be summarized. But your actual motions that are made have to be verbatim.

RAY: Marni.

HERKES: I notice that later in the agenda we’re going to have an item on secretary, and I think some of this would come under that, because I would suspect that a really good secretary would not take longer to summarize and could take minutes, and I would expect a secretary to attend the meeting and do the minutes and not from the tape. And so I would think that there is something to be said to leaving some of this discussion until later, until we talk about the secretarial position.

RAY: Gary.

YOSHIYAMA: I think we should discuss it later when Mr. Wurdeman comes up because in the minutes, he addressed this about, you know, verbatim versus, you know, other types of information to put in the -. I can’t find it though. I know I read it when I reviewed it. Since this was verbatim, it’s hard to find.

RAY: Okay, John, just a quick comment and then let’s -.

SANTANGELO: A quick comment for consideration is I know some of the examples we’re giving are situations in which decisions and votes have a direct impact and are implemented. What we’re doing here are we’re coming up with concepts that will go to vote and be ratified by the voters, so what we’re doing doesn’t have a direct and immediate consequence. So I just wanted to put as a difference between what we’re doing here and what other people do and just wanted to put that out there.

HERKES: Thank you.

RAY: All right, well, let’s table that until we have Corporation Counsel. Henry, we decided to table the issue of whether we’re going to have verbatim or summary minutes until Corporation Counsel gets here.

Financial Status Report. Let me give a shot at this. I met with the Finance Director, Harry Takahashi, in regard to our finances, and what I learned was that there is a miscellaneous Charter Commission account which has $10,000 in it. The administration forwarded an appropriation to the Finance Committee yesterday for an additional $20,000, it was heard on the agenda yesterday, and that would be just to address the budget from now until June 30^th. Whatever money is not used would drop off, and then they plan on asking for an appropriation of $100,000 for the following year. There was some concern at the Finance Committee meeting because there wasn’t a budget, but I think they addressed that to some degree, but I talked to Aaron Chung, the Committee Chair, and he asked me to submit a letter just, you know, basically let them know that we’re -, in writing, that we’re organizing right now, we’re just figuring out what our budgets are going to look like, and just basically leave it at that for now. So I don’t expect that’ll be a problem.

Let’s see. We did -. We have incurred a couple of expenses, Rudy gave me the initial information on that, for letterhead and for the initial ads that were run in the paper, that I gave you a copy of, the notices, rather. Let’s see. I’m trying to decide whether we want to discuss this now or in budget considerations. I guess we are going to need to decide who is going to handle or serve as somewhat of a treasurer for the organization in terms of handling that paperwork. Right now, I met with the Accounting Department, and Dixie Kaetsu agreed to just open up an informal file right now, so she’s got our original, I mean these first couple of invoices which aren’t ready to pay for now, and we set up a system where she’ll just receive that stuff. But we are going to need to, you know, take responsibility for that.

And also, Rudy gave me, or the Finance -, no the Finance Department gave me authorization signatures, so we need to decide who’s going to be authorized to, you know, sign for these things, sign on the POs and basically, you know, process these funds. And the suggestions that I heard were myself, the vice chair, and our secretary, as possibilities, you know, however, you know, we want to handle that. We need to decide that and get something, you know, turned in because this has to be processed by the County; it has to go through the Finance Department and whatever, and then they have to, you know, certify names that are okay to sign off on the POs for payment and whatever. Marni.

HERKES: Are we going to have one signature, number one? Number two, are we going to -, why wouldn’t you have a treasurer as the signator?

RAY: I think, you know, anything that the group wants to do is the way we’ll do it, so I’m open -.

HERKES: I wondered if you -.

RAY: No, no, when I -.

HERKES: Thought of a new reason here.

RAY: Yeah, no. That’s just what I -, when it was brought up to me today, that was just what came out. It could be you, it could be Roland, it could be the secretary and -.

HERKES: The secretary is paid staff so, therefore, I would have a problem with that.

RAY: Okay.

HIGASHI: John, are we talking about processing paperwork for -?

HERKES: No.

HIGASHI: Signature to approving or -?

HERKES: Processing money.

HIGASHI: I mean paperwork.

RAY: Well, I think it is a position of some responsibility, you’ve got to -, somebody that needs to be, you know, track it monthly, right, and give monthly treasurer reports.

HERKES: Okay. You’ve brought up two issues. Do you want to deal with both of them together or one at a time? One is who is the treasurer? The other one is who signs the cards?

RAY: Let’s do them one at a time.

HERKES: Okay.

RAY: How about the treasurer issue first.

HERKES: Okay.

RAY: Rudy, has there always been a treasurer for -?

LEGASPI: Not to my knowledge.

RAY: Do you know how that was handled in the past as far as -?

LEGASPI: The secretary or the treasurer would submit the bills to the clerk in the County.

RAY: The secretary and the what?

LEGASPI: Would submit the invoices for payment to the County.

RAY: Okay. Kevin.

IRVINE: Is Dixie Kaetsu willing to handle this, do you think?

RAY: I think they would rather that somebody be responsible for -. I could ask her.

HIGASHI: John?

RAY: Yeah, Roland.

HIGASHI: May I suggest that the Chair or the Vice Chair approve the expenditures, and the secretary, who’s going to be on some hourly wages, whether it’s 19 hours or 20 hours, whatever, she can process the paperwork. Just that the person who authorizes the expenditure needs to be somebody with authority so -.

RAY: Okay. Kevin.

BALOG: I was going to say that, too, that I don’t think there’s any other board or commission that has a volunteer treasurer that serves as part of that board or commission, and it’s not so much the point of the staff processing the paperwork but for every board or commission, you have paid Staff. Oh, sorry about that. It’s more like Roland said that either yourself or Roland would have to sign off. And even if you’re not able to do it and they can’t get a hold of Roland, we should say that they could fax you something with an original to come in as back-up or something, you know what I -? But I can’t see us, one of us being a treasurer and coming every -, to every meeting and giving a treasurer’s report.

RAY: Okay.

BALOG: That’s not what I signed on for, and I don’t think too much other people did.

RAY: Okay.

BALOG: I’d rather get a report from our -, it’s not going to be that hard to get a report from someone else.

RAY: Okay. Any other comments? Okay, so do we have a motion that -? This is just specifically how we’re going to handle it, not the number of signatures, right, so -. Marni.

HERKES: Do you want to -?

BALOG: I’ll make a motion. I’m ready.

HERKES: Okay.

BALOG: I move that the Chairman and Vice Chairman authorize payments for the Commission and that the secretary handle the processing of all paperwork for payment.

RAY: Second?

MARTIN: Second.

SANTANGELO: Point of clarification. Okay, the motion is that the Chairman and Vice Chair. Could it be the -?

BALOG: And/or.

SANTANGELO: Chairman or -?

BALOG: And/or.

SANTANGELO: So they can be singular. As long as the intent of the motion is that they can either one, then I support that.

BALOG: That was the intent.

SANTANGELO: Thank you.

RAY: Okay. All in favor?

COMMISSIONERS: Aye.

RAY: Okay. Number of signatures?

BALOG: I believe in the motion it was clarified by John.

HERKES: Did we have a second?

BALOG: That there was one.

HIGASHI: Yes, George seconded it.

HERKES: Okay, George.

BALOG: One signature.

RAY: One signature, okay. All right. Okay, so that was -, the understanding is that’s already covered, included?

BALOG: Is that correct, Ms. -, Madam Secretary?

HERKES: Yeah.

RAY: Okay.

BALOG: Okay. Yeah.

SANTANGELO: And, to me, the -, between the two of you, if you work some system out, that’s just great, you know.

RAY: Okay. Anything else under Financial Status Report? Don’t forget, we’ve got budget down below, so we’ll be talking about the budget. Okay, Item No. 5, Communications. Any thoughts? I had a thought, in terms of just kind of public outreach or a way that we might, you know, initially go at is, I was kind of tossing around the idea of if we could develop some sort of a short, you know, probably just one-page description of the charter and the process we’re intending, whatever, and use that as a mail-out piece or work on developing that.

HERKES: Or a hand-out, yeah.

RAY: Or a hand-out or a mail-out, you know, something that we could send out to that list of all -, you know, different community and business groups and whatever. That might be a nice, you know, helpful tool initially to get the word out. This is what the charter is all about, you know, this is kind of the process, you know, we’re going to be looking at, just to give people a heads-up. And then, you know, we discuss lots of other ideas in terms of, you know, how we might communicate, but anyway, I’m just throwing that out as a possibility.

BALOG: More like what the mission of the Charter Commission is in general, yeah, and what the charter is.

RAY: Well, I was thinking of actually a description of the charter.

HERKES: The charter, yeah.

RAY: Because I think most people don’t even know -.

BALOG: Okay.

RAY: What the charter is, you know.

HERKES: Yeah.

RAY: So you start off real simple like the ABCs, you know.

HERKES: Yeah.

RAY: This is the County Charter and, you know, what it is and what it means and what it says, you know, the kind of things that deals with -.

IRVINE: This document could be sent to the newspapers as a public service announcement, as well.

RAY: Sure.

IRVINE: I would think.

HIGASHI: Maybe we can, Mr. Chair, we can kind of package that discussion with our goals and objectives, because I think at the end, it’s all going to kind of -.

RAY: Okay.

HIGASHI: Dovetail together.

SANTANGELO: I do have -.

IRVINE: And a -.

SANTANGELO: One question on that. In terms of communication, it was understood from the last meeting that Rock was going to get the charter up on the Web.

HERKES: It’s on.

SANTANGELO: It’s on now?

HERKES: That’s what -.

SANTANGELO: Okay, I’ve been -.

HERKES: I’m trying to say. The charter is on the Web.

SANTANGELO: Okay, I’ve been telling people it’ll be there.

HERKES: It’s been put up for about a month.

SANTANGELO: But I didn’t find it. Okay. What’s the address? It’s just www -.

HERKES: Hawaii-County.com.

HIGASHI: Mr. Chairman, in terms of agenda items in the future, communications is listed as communications that are received by the Commission, is that -?

SANTANGELO: That’s what I thought. It could be either way.

HIGASHI: What it’s going to be?

RAY: Excuse me. Probably so.

HIGASHI: Okay.

RAY: Okay, well we’ll -.

SANTANGELO: I just went with the flow.

RAY: Did we receive any communications? Actually, I did receive one communication, and he’s here in person, and that segues into our next item, Statements from the Public. The communication was from Henry Ross, who is here, and wanted to be on our mailing list.

ROSS: Just a reminder.

BALOG: You need to get to a mike.

ROSS: (Inaudible) I am -. It’s okay like that.

RAY: We are recording this.

ROSS: Pardon?

RAY: We are recording.

ROSS: Yeah, I’m aware of that.

RAY: Okay.

ROSS: Oh, yeah, that’s why you need the -.

RAY: Yeah, yeah.

ROSS: I hear nothing. Is it working?

SANTANGELO: It’s only being recorded, Henry, it’s not for the room amplification.

ROSS: It does record, even though I -?

SANTANGELO: Yeah.

ROSS: It doesn’t scratch. Oh, yours doesn’t scratch either?

HERKES: Mr. Ross, do you have a written copy of what you’re going to say?

ROSS: No.

HERKES: Okay.

ROSS: No, I have some loose notes, okay. I didn’t have more time, otherwise I would have.

My name is Henry Ross; I’m from Kohala. I think you should have at least one meeting in Kohala, too, you know, not have a hoard of people come down the mountain roads, you know, and so on. Of course, I realize that you would have to go down the mountain roads.

HERKES: I was going to say. I agree.

ROSS: Anyway, this is just by-the-by. I would like to tell you that I appreciate what you are going to do, believe me, and it won’t be very easy. I want to give, however, some constructive criticism, and please accept this as such, and I want to encourage you in your work. I want to tell you that I have run into some problems already, as public. I had to read in the paper, in "Dateline," that today there would be a meeting. They didn’t even give a time because you folks, in the last meeting, I read the minutes, in the last meeting there was a deliberation about the time, etcetera. Anyway, that is why this is called a special meeting.

Now, a special meeting, according to the existing charter, and you better live with that as long as we don’t have a new one, according to the charter for a special meeting, you have to give notice in the newspapers, I don’t know how much ahead of time, 24 hours or minimum or something like that. You can also do it by radio or TV or something like that, but there is -, and Corp. Counsel has pointed that out in the previous meeting, I saw in the meeting, in the minutes, that Counsel 13-20-something, section, gives it exactly. Everything that you do in the meeting that does not follow these rules exactly is null and void, actions, that means. You can meet, you can talk, you can do everything, but any action would be null and void. And I don’t want to be in a -, get into a situation where somebody has to take you to court because they don’t like something, you know, and they take you to court, you get the long court procedure, and so on, and then they call you all on the mat and things like that. You want to prevent that.

So, my question is, why am I the only public here? Because you didn’t properly announce it to the public, and I see in the minutes that you’re very much concerned, at least some of you, very much concerned with getting the public here, interesting them in your work and so on, and get feedback, and I agree with that, but the prime -, you have to be the prime movers if  there is no other way. And if there is a shortage of money, with which I don’t agree, by the way, I’ll get back to that in a moment, then there is always the possibility of getting this on TV or something like that or giving a press conference; that costs nothing. If you give a press conference, you will get a number of people here. You get the radio stations, you will get the newspapers, etcetera, etcetera. So don’t let it hang on the official notices that you must give according to the existing charter. And don’t -, please, don’t take them out of the charter because I think they’re useful. You cannot complain the public wasn’t interested or they are never interested, I heard in the previous meeting, Roland, I don’t know, you must have read the minutes, too. You weren’t there, but -.

HERKES: He wasn’t there.

ROSS: Somebody said something like well, they are not interested anyway. I think it was Mr. Bess.

RAY: Several of us did. Go ahead.

ROSS: Anyway, I’m not pointing fingers, mind you, that is not the idea. I didn’t write the name down. I could have, but why, you know? I’m trying to give constructive criticism, and please accept it as such. Okay. So there is a way to get public to your meetings. There is a way to have people write to you, you know, through a letter to the editor or whatever way, or a direct letter, or it doesn’t matter. I can give you PR instructions how you get public to your meetings, but I suppose, you know, that you, plenty of you, you’re a cross-section of the County’s business and so on here, you know how to do that. Some of you know, and then teach the others and so on. Okay.

Now, Mr. Legaspi told me when I asked him if this was published in the newspaper because this is not publishing, this is what the newspaper gratuitously, you know, wrote in "Dateline" and then I can say, if I, you know, go along the lines of what I read in some of the minutes, why? The public doesn’t read "Dateline." Of course, that is not true. I don’t read it every time, but I was, by accident on Sunday, you know, I read the whole paper and I read the whole "Dateline." There has to be an official notice, legal notice, and there are plenty of people who read the legal notices apart from the sports page that they may be interested in. When Mr. Legaspi tells me there was no money for an ad for this meeting, let alone the previous one, you know, but let’s forget about that one, that’s over, but for this meeting there was no money, then I want to tell you that you are enabled by the State law and maybe in the charter itself, I don’t know, to demand money. You can say we need $25,000 for a secretary. We need $75,000 for one or two attorneys. You may get to that point, you know, I’m talking about yearly salary, and it looks like you’re going to be busy for a year. If you have to make expenses, you know, in whatever way or form, you can demand money. You can tell -, Rudy Legaspi is filling in right now, so it’s not personally directed at him, but you can tell your secretary or Mr. Legaspi or whoever later is appointed to deal with this, we are going to expend so much money.

RAY: Henry, we do have funding, and we clarified that.

ROSS: Okay.

RAY: And addressed it earlier.

ROSS: Okay. It’s important that you know that you pull the ropes. You are not dependent, you know, on what the County gives you, because then they screw you. I tell you, you’ll get plenty of static from the administration.

RAY: Okay. Henry, I think we got that one in hand.

ROSS: Pardon?

RAY: I think we’ve got the funding in hand, so that’s -.

ROSS: Okay.

RAY: Good.

ROSS: But it also pertains to other things. I want to impress upon you that the charter, the County Charter is, so-to-say, the constitution of the County. It is comparable to State and Federal constitutions. It is on a smaller scale, but it is a form of constitution, so it is a very important document. And I’m just going through some things that I have already said.

I must tell you that I’ve read the 34 pages of minutes of the previous meeting, and I was not greatly impressed, but after all, you were just starting and so on, so I hope that there was no public, there were no publications and so on. And you are in a situation, I understand, where you have to learn, you want to learn and so on, you’re looking for sources, and there are sources. So I won’t go into that. You are willing. You feel obliged to do that already, so I don’t have to point that out, but it’s important.

Now, there is one more thing, procedural thing that I have to say after reading the minutes, as far as regular meetings go. You have to indicate a time and place. You cannot say, well, we do this or that or whatever. You can announce a special meeting by having the chairman announce it in the previous meeting plus publication in the paper. I see when you go around the County, I see a lot of special meetings coming up. I don’t know how you handle that. You can ask Corp. Counsel, maybe he knows the solution to that, because many committees, maybe the Planning Commission, Mr. Balog, can tell you, fill you in on that because they traveled around quite a bit, but when you meet in different places, there are special requirements that you have to meet, and you want the public from that location there because why would you travel half-way around the Island and then get one person or nobody or three people or something? So I think it’s very important.

I mentioned the TV already. The County Council put its work on TV. These people started doing that for nothing; I don’t know if they’re paying right now. Maybe they are, because there’s more coverage, but in the beginning, they did it at no cost. And I think that you can get them, you know, to do that. And people can watch what you do on TV, at six o’clock it starts at night, you know, in Kona a couple of days later than Hilo, and so on. Anyway, I leave that to you; I just mention it.

Now I want to call some items and you don’t have to make notes because they’ll appear in the minutes, but I want to call out some items that I think are of importance for you to look at to either change or put into the new charter, and I’ll just run through them -.

RAY: Henry.

ROSS: Very quickly.

RAY: Henry.

ROSS: Yes.

RAY: This is really -.

ROSS: This is -.

RAY: Wait, wait. An organizational meeting, at this stage and, you know, we appreciate but we’re not soliciting input on, you know, changes to the charter at this time. You know, this process is going to be going on for -.

ROSS: Mr. Chairman?

RAY: The next 16 months, and you’re going to have ample opportunity to, you know, to have input -.

ROSS: I understand.

RAY: To this committee.

ROSS: I won’t have a chance to be here each and every time and I don’t plan to.

RAY: Okay.

ROSS: But I want to point to your Item No. 8, New Business. You’re going to speak about goals and objectives, and that is why I have some suggestions, because you’re going to speak about it in ten minutes. So if you put it on your agenda, and I was very careful looking at the agenda before I put this down, otherwise I thought, oh, let them swim, you know, they’ll learn to swim. But I want to point out a couple of things that are of real importance that you may not come up with by asking around and so on.

I would like to see, for instance, and it’s just a suggestion, to have something in the charter about shoreline setback. The Council has just seen fit to reduce it from 50-foot to 30-foot. On Maui, which is much smaller than this Island, it is 300-foot. It is a very important thing. Of course, the shoreline setback varies here and there, but within limits it should be more than 50-foot that we had in it, and certainly more than the 30 that the County Council wants to put in it.

HERKES: So is that a definite recommendation that you’re making?

ROSS: I would like to see 200-foot, basically.

HERKES: Is that what you -?

ROSS: Where it’s possible.

HERKES: Is that your recommendation, 200 feet? Because I’m taking the minutes for this meeting.

ROSS: Yes.

HERKES: And I want to know if that’s what you want me to put in there.

ROSS: Yes. I would say -.

HERKES: Two hundred feet. You recommend 200 feet.

ROSS: I don’t want to go as far as -.

HERKES: Shoreline.

ROSS: Maui, because maybe next time they will change their charter, but let’s say 200-foot, you know, ideally. Where you have houses already built on the shore, you know, you can’t, but -.

HERKES: Thank you.

ROSS: Okay.

SANTANGELO: Mr. Chairman? Excuse me, Henry, I rise to a point of personal privilege here. As I understood it, our rules are that statements from the public have to address the agenda. We’ve got a year ahead of us, and I think we’ve got to set some precedence of those rules. If this is where you want to go, I’ll support you in that, but I don’t see where Henry is going right now is germane to goals and objectives. These are specific changes to the charter. Henry, we had planned to get somewhere around there in June. We’re still trying to get our organization together so that we can start to move on these kinds of things. And if we make exceptions here, are we going to make exceptions at every single meeting? I’ve seen the Council go totally haywire because we adhered to -, we didn’t adhere to our rules, so I bring that up as a -.

ROSS: Okay. But I want to point out -.

SANTANGELO: This is to the Chairman.

ROSS: Yeah, I want to point out -.

SANTANGELO: Mr. Ross.

ROSS: That I was asked to be specific. I didn’t say, you know, I didn’t start out to say it must be this or that. I was very general, and I want to keep it general.

RAY: Right. But, okay, the -.

ROSS: And I’m still speaking to an item on the agenda.

RAY: Well, the item on this agenda, goals and objectives, are the general goals and objectives in terms of the process we want to undertake in terms of organizing, you know, our approach.

ROSS: Then you should -.

RAY: Not particular items we’re looking at, specific items is not what we’re discussing here.

ROSS: Well -.

RAY: And we probably won’t get there -.

ROSS: Yeah, Mr. Chairman, I won’t be long, believe me, because I said I’ll run through this. Now if you don’t interrupt me, I can just read them down and that is all; then it’s in your minutes. I want to call your attention to the fact that you did, in that case, if you have -, if you find fault with me, then you ought to be more specific on your agenda. Chapter 92, the Sunshine Law, says the public has a right to know and the public has a right to speak. Now if you start, you know, turning that off already, yes, the public will have -, will not be interested and say, you know -.

HIGASHI: Mr. Ross, how much more you got? How much more testimony do you have?

ROSS: I have about -.

HIGASHI: Three minutes?

ROSS: Five minutes more.

HERKES: Until a quarter of.

RAY: Henry, but you know, this -.

IRVINE: Okay, at a quarter -.

RAY: Okay.

IRVINE: Quarter of, we cut off.

RAY: Go ahead but -.

HIGASHI: I mean, you can bring it up again later on, Henry, but if you want -.

ROSS: Yes, yes.

HIGASHI: To put it on the record now-.

ROSS: But I want to stay general. I mean, if we go on the footage shoreline setback, that takes two minutes.

HIGASHI: I think all you’re saying is address shoreline setback.

ROSS: Address the shoreline setback.

HIGASHI: That’s all you’re saying, not 100.

ROSS: Yes.

HIGASHI: Two hundred.

RAY: Mr. -.

ROSS: Okay. Now -.

BALOG: I just want to ask one question.

RAY: Okay.

BALOG: Has he submitted the testimony in writing?

RAY: No.

BALOG: Okay. Just one comment before he keeps going is I think what should be done is, as Roland has said, to keep it to very broad goals and objectives, not specifically to any one item. And although the secretary asked how many feet, she asked how many feet because it was part of the person’s testimony. So if he would continue to be general, I wouldn’t feel bad letting him testify, but if he’s going to get specific at this point when we’re trying to organize the Commission, then I would raise my hand and object to that testimony because we’re trying to organize and find out what goals we want to do. We aren’t trying to be specific on what’s contained in the charter right now, and that’s what the minutes -, the agenda states.

RAY: Okay. Henry, are you comfortable -, did you hear that?

ROSS: Yes, I didn’t quite understand the portent of it but -.

HIGASHI: Go ahead.

ROSS: I told you that I will be brief. Now if you’re going to interrupt me -.

HIGASHI: It’ll be longer, yeah.

ROSS: It’s going to last three times as long, you know. I have -.

HIGASHI: So if you’re going to take five minutes, I’m willing to go ahead.

ROSS: I have conducted -.

HIGASHI: I don’t know about the other members.

ROSS: Many -. I’m almost 80. I have conducted many, many meetings in my life.

BALOG: Start your testimony then.

ROSS: Pardon?

BALOG: Start your testimony.

ROSS: Okay.

HERKES: Continue.

ROSS: All right. Let’s get on with it, please. Okay. General item, no more draft bills in the County Council that the public has not seen. Now is that general enough?

RAY: Sure.

ROSS: If you don’t know what it is -.

HERKES: What’s number three?

ROSS: Find out from the Council Members, previous Council Members that are here; they know.

Try to regulate, in the charter, how far people can go, I mean the administration and the Council, in land use, with land use. It ought to be -, there ought to be more in the charter about land use.

HIGASHI: Land use?

ROSS: Land use, yes.

HIGASHI: L-a-n-d use.

ROSS: Yes. And not let the Council regulate it in the County Code because, I’ll tell you why, we have a new County Council every two years; they can change the County Code, they cannot change the charter. So some principal things, some very important things you put in the charter.

RAY: All right.

ROSS: Chapter 343, State EIS Code Requirements, should be in the charter.

RAY: Okay.

ROSS: And not the County has its own way of doing an EIS, as they have been doing. Chapter 343, HRS EIS requirements.

HERKES: And number five?

ROSS: Pardon?

HERKES: Go ahead.

ROSS: Okay.

HERKES: Number five.

ROSS: Please get something in there to enable elected neighborhood boards. Honolulu has that, and they are willing to come over and clue us in, Council or here. They’ll appear before you and give a whole speech, the man who leads it.

Another general thing, no jail here for Honolulu because more than 50 percent of the people are against it.

HERKES: Here, you mean on the Big Island?

ROSS: Pardon?

HERKES: By here, you mean on the Big Island?

ROSS: Yes, on the Big Island. Honolulu kicks it back.

HERKES: Thank you.

ROSS: Why do we have to put up with their garbage?

HERKES: Number seven.

BALOG: Okay, keep going.

HERKES: Thank you. Number seven.

ROSS: The police has to have at least a high school education and not an eighth grade, as now.

HERKES: Number eight.

ROSS: Pardon?

HERKES: Number eight. Go ahead.

ROSS: Okay. State the -. I have to tell you that there is a lot wrong with the police because the police, as it is laid down in Chapter 52(d) of the Revised Statutes was designed, it was the old Police Code was -.

HERKES: Recommendation, what’s the recommendation?

ROSS: (Indiscernible) I’ll come up with that.

HERKES: Please do.

ROSS: I have to tell you what the basis is, too.

HERKES: No. Okay.

ROSS: It was, no.

HERKES: Recommendation.

ROSS: So that you’re not led astray. Chapter 54(d) was designed and accepted by 50 of our representatives without a word, without criticism. It was designed by the four police chiefs, by the union, the police union, one man, and one special man from the Honolulu Police Department. Now, that is not in the public’s interest.

HERKES: And your recommendation is?

ROSS: I leave that to you. This is a general -.

HERKES: Oh, you don’t have a recommendation on that?

ROSS: Remarks that you have to nail -.

HERKES: Thank you.

ROSS: Down the police.

HERKES: Thank you, then I won’t put it down.

ROSS: Okay? Nail down the police, general. If you want to know more, I’ll come and give you a whole speech on police.

HERKES: I’m sure.

ROSS: You have to make this a little more specific in the charter than it is now, and that goes for the Police Commission, too, because the Police Commission is holding kangaroo courts where the public is not allowed and the minutes are never -, or the minutes of those hearings, whatever, are never given out to the public.

HERKES: Do you have a recommendation?

ROSS: They don’t do that. I think it’s wrong.

HERKES: Is your recommendation to give the minutes for the Police Commission out to the public?

ROSS: After they are not actual, of actual interest anymore in a court procedure or whatever, yes, they can be given free because that is what Chapter 91 and Chapter 92 of State law say.

HERKES: Thank you.

??? Excuse me, as a point of information, excuse me, Mr. Ross, how much longer do you have to go?

HERKES: One minute.

??? How much longer will -?

HERKES: One minute.

ROSS: Okay.

HERKES: That’s how much longer.

ROSS: I’ve had this -. I’m almost through.

HERKES: That’s right.

ROSS: I think that you have a conflict of interest in your minutes where Attorney Bess is the -, was mentioned as the leading man for the three-man committee for attorney search. I don’t agree with that. I think it ought to be an outsider who looks for an attorney for you because I -, not that I don’t like Mr. Bess, I don’t even know him, but the point is he can come up with recommendations of all his friends without you knowing it, so this is a clear conflict of interest.

HERKES: I know who your friends are. Do you feel that way about the secretarial position, also? I have a lot of friends that are secretaries.

ROSS: No, the secretary -.

HERKES: I have a lot of friends that are secretaries.

ROSS: Your secretary ought to be, well, like other -, Police Commission has a secretary, you know, she’s on the County payroll.

HERKES: Oh, no. Okay.

RAY: Okay.

HERKES: Is that a recommendation?

ROSS: Yeah. Not that you do it. You have to have -.

HERKES: No, no.

ROSS: Somebody here that you pay for that kind of work.

Local police should patrol all parks, State and County. The people in this building, and I stay here from time to time, old people, you know.

HERKES: Like me.

ROSS: That live out their lives, have to listen to the unbelievable loud music where these eight-inch concrete walls vibrates and so on at night, Saturday nights, Sunday nights, Friday nights and so on, until two o’clock at night because the State does not enforce or patrol anything. And there should be no drinking in the parks at all.

HERKES: Mr. Chair?

RAY: Okay.

HERKES: We are time -, time is up.

RAY: Okay.

HERKES: We gave Mr. Ross until a quarter of.

RAY: Can you wrap it up, Henry?

ROSS: I’m at my last point, and maybe I said it already, and then I’m done so -.

HERKES: No drinking.

ROSS: I -.

HERKES: No fun.

ROSS: I have one more point. I talked about the police. We have to be more specific in the charter about the prosecutor. I have the Honolulu prosecutor in court, at present, because he did not qualify in the elections; nevertheless, he was elected. We have to have determinations what the different officers of the County, the department heads -.

HERKES: Qualifications.

ROSS: What their qualifications are. It doesn’t only go for the prosecutor. Honolulu says the prosecutor has to have three years immediately of the ten years immediately before the election experience in criminal work. We don’t have that. We say as long as he has been five years and so on, that’s enough. That’s nonsense. There are plenty of attorneys who have done nothing but wills and testaments and things like that. You can’t, you know, just because -.

RAY: Okay.

HERKES: Thank you.

ROSS: Okay.

HERKES: Now, Mr. Chair?

ROSS: That is all that I have.

HERKES: I would like to make one -.

RAY: Thank you, Henry.

HERKES: Correction. I have a clipping of a February 24^th, 1999, article from "Big Island Briefs," from the West Hawaii Today, and I can give you a copy of it, and it says the next meeting of the Charter Commission is scheduled for 5:00 p.m., March 17^th in the Hilo Councilroom, but we changed it to the Liquor Commission, so it might have been -, I’d like to stick up for the County, who put in the notice, because the Tribune-Herald may have been the one that took the time out, but I know the time was in the West Hawaii Today, because I have a copy of the clipping.

RAY: Okay.

ROSS: Yeah. I haven’t seen it in the Hilo paper.

HERKES: They are reading the wrong newspaper. What can I say?

ROSS: Joke.

RAY: Okay.

BALOG: There was a notice in the Tribune.

RAY: Thank you.

ROSS: Thank you very much.

RAY: Okay.

HERKES: He says it didn’t have the time but I -.

ROSS: And I apologize, you know. You thought it was long. You could have had ten people public here and then, you know, you would have lost an hour.

RAY: Okay. Thank you, Mr. Ross. Moving on to the Deferred Unfinished Business, VII A, Selection of Commission’s Attorney. Mr. Bess, do you have anything to report in regard to that?

BESS: Well, nothing other than what you have in front of you, which gives you the notices that have been posted in the newspaper. And so what’s going to happen is that all of these applicants will -, applications will come in by April 12^th, and then I anticipate that the meeting -, that the committee would have a meeting shortly thereafter to review the applications.

RAY: Okay. Mr. Santangelo.

SANTANGELO: Mr. Bess, so contrary to some of the things that have been said, your search, the way you’re leading this up is to publicize this, receive applications at large. Your not -. In addition to that, are you specifically approaching anyone or are you just going with the -?

BESS: I am responding to the -.

SANTANGELO: Applications.

BESS: The notice for application here, and it is a committee decision.

SANTANGELO: Sure.

BESS: It is not a decision on my part.

SANTANGELO: But you’re not querying your friends, you’re -.

BESS: No.

SANTANGELO: You’re waiting for applications to come in as a result of a public notice.

RAY: Okay. Any other comments on the selection of the Commission’s attorney?

IRVINE: I don’t see any problem with trying to encourage attorneys to apply if we know somebody that might be appropriate.

RAY: Well, I’ve had a couple of people mention to me they might be interested.

IRVINE: Oh, okay, good.

RAY: And I just explained that, yeah, it was going to be an open -.

HIGASHI: I think as long as -, I mean whether they’re informed or what, as long as they apply and -.

BESS: Right.

SANTANGELO: That’s right.

HIGASHI: Comply -.

IRVINE: Sure.

HIGASHI: With the minimum requirements here.

HERKES: Yeah.

HIGASHI: They can be considered. Whichever way you recruit them.

SANTANGELO: Sure.

HIGASHI: I don’t think that’s a problem.

SANTANGELO: I don’t have -.

HERKES: I’ve actually called a couple to look at this.

RAY: Okay. Any other comments?

SANTANGELO: Thank you, Steve.

RAY: Okay. VII B, Selection of Commission’s Secretary.

HERKES: I’m the chair of that committee, and I’m having a problem because I need to have the Commission decide whether we need a full-time person or a part-time person, whether we need a staff kind of person. I’m -, I have to tell you, I come from an electronic background now. I’ve fought this for years, but now that I’m hooked up to my laptop permanently, I don’t feel the need for an office. I don’t feel the need for space set out. I don’t think that -, you know, I just don’t feel the need for that kind of stability that used to be -, used to come along with that secretarial position. So I’m having a hard time trying to figure out what -, whether the rest of the Commission feels the same way I do or whether they feel we need a full-time person with a space, a specific space, whether they can deal with email and voice mail and those kinds of communication tools rather than seeing somebody face-to-face and having a place.

RAY: My understanding is that the past Commissions have retained secretarial help part-time on a contract basis. I have not seen that represented in terms of any budgets or, you know, but verbally that’s been, you know, communicated to me. I, you know, I don’t know just what we need in -.

HERKES: Could we spend five minutes kind of talking about what we want the secretary to do, what we see our -?

RAY: Sure. John.

SANTANGELO: One thing I’d like to say, I have no problem and would like to have this board consider an electronic office, I mean, email, voice mail, a P.O. box is fine. I mean, this secretary is not, in my opinion, being in direct contact with people; that’s our job. And, you know, if -, and it may be part of the prerequisite is they have a laptop and they’re able to connect electronically, but an electronic office, I think, is a way of saving a lot of money, I think. God only knows there’s how many people in government trying to do that right now, and we can certainly set an example. And a lot of time is wasted getting to and from and office, you know, so I don’t have a problem with it.

RAY: Okay, what -? Kevin.

BALOG: I think the secretary will evolve into a part-time position, but part of what we talked about at the last meeting was trying to get the files from the last -, before I get mis-quoted.

HERKES: The last Charter Commission.

BALOG: One, two, well, two or three or four Charter Commissions all in one place, categorized, and if we need to go in and reference down the charter, what was changed in each Charter Commission, it would be at our fingertips in trying -, instead of trying to call someone like Mr. Wurdeman and him tell us I don’t know nothing, call this person, I don’t know nothing. So I think what Marni’s saying is true. In the beginning, it might well be more strenuous job, so you’re going to need someone who has filing skills and someone who knows -.

HERKES: Research skills.

BALOG: Yeah, research skills. And then also somebody who is able to have computer background, and they can do it from their own house and have a number that they can just call in and leave messages. But in the beginning, I honestly feel it’s going to be a lot more than 19½ hours a week. So I think we should just lay out what Marni is saying, what we’d like them to do, and then put that out and let the people apply according to what -.

HERKES: Yeah.

BALOG: We want done.

HERKES: I talked to Rudy about the files. They’re in the basement of the County building, and there’s room to work in the basement. He agreed to set up a table down there and a light and things. I have not gone down there. I just haven’t had time to go down there and look at what it looks like, but he said there is room to work down there, and that’s where the files are. So I think that if we find somebody that’s skilled in research and we give them the right questions, they can go find the information for us.

RAY: Yeah. Let’s assume they do that and they do a good job. Let’s make sure that the next Charter Commission doesn’t have to do all that again.

BALOG: Yeah, that should be the -, well, that’s what I mean. That should be the goal, because it was represented that the files are in three different places at the last meeting.

RAY: Yeah.

BALOG: So if they are, we want to get them all in one place.

HERKES: Yeah.

BALOG: And everything up to snuff and -.

RAY: Or at least all the summaries and -.

BALOG: Yeah, and as we go through our stuff, if we do make a recommendation, that will go right in that file, and what happens to that after the voters vote will go right behind that, so the next Charter Commission will just go to one spot, everything will be there, and that’s that.

RAY: But, you know, we don’t know -.

HERKES: Yeah.

WURDEMAN: I’ve worked with those files and, for example, like what Mr. Ross said, if you -, if tomorrow you want to talk about police and you told somebody go find everything in the previous minutes about the police, they’re going to have to go through hundreds and hundreds of pages because they’re not indexed.

HERKES: And they’re not on a computer. And that’s what you ought to have them done is scanned in a computer so you can push a button and say find me police and find all the stuff out of there.

RAY: Okay. So -.

HIGASHI: Mr. Chair?

RAY: Yes.

HIGASHI: I’m kind of searching in my mind that we have a charter that’s been reviewed four times. I mean, how much time are we going to be researching files? I don’t see that we’re going to spend that much time doing that. I think we need to kind of have somebody who can move us forward, you know. Maybe that’s the most critical, somebody who has some writing skills, research skills, who can follow instructions explicitly; that’s the kind of person that I would find.

RAY: Yeah. I’m sort of that mind. I really don’t see the necessity of somebody going through, you know, literally thousands of pages, you know, to itemize every discussion on every topic, you know.

HERKES: Well, times change. This is ten years ago. I mean, are we going to dredge up everything that was done ten years ago?

HIGASHI: I hope not.

RAY: Okay, so we’re trying to define -.

HERKES: I hope not, too.

RAY: We’re trying to define, you know, some sort of a job, not only description, but some sort of sense of the time involved here.

HERKES: Yeah.

RAY: So we’re, you know, we’re going from, you know, somebody down in the tombs, you know, maybe for weeks and going through ta-da-da-da.

HERKES: No, we’re not.

RAY: To -, well, I don’t know, you know, so -, you know, that’s what we need to get a handle on, and we don’t know -, Richard said those files aren’t organized. You know, maybe there are some summaries.

WURDEMAN: Well, they’re chronologically organized.

RAY: Okay.

HERKES: They’re chronologically organized.

WURDEMAN: Chronologically.

RAY: Okay.

HERKES: That’s not a bad way.

RAY: Yeah. John.

HERKES: And we could get them scanned.

RAY: Okay.

HERKES: We can use some of our money.

SANTANGELO: In part of the consideration, it occurs to me that if going back to the minutes and what kind of minutes we’re going to take, I think a rule of thumb with the Council was eight hours transcribing for a one-hour meeting. So, you know, depending on what kind of minutes we have and how much we’re going to wrap these people up in that time, because it seems like there’s going to be an awful lot of time devoted to keeping just track of the record of this meeting. And so, you know, I certainly start leaning towards abbreviated statements as much as possible in a minutes. But just, you know, we’re talking about research. What is the lawyer going to do, defining the difference between those two responsibilities?

BALOG: I mean just for discussion, that’s what we’re trying to do now is we’re not -, we don’t, per se, have a lawyer, so we’re trying to get a job duty of what we’d like our secretary to do, and then if we don’t want the secretary to do research, or if just say we don’t want them to do research, then that would be something we would put under the lawyer’s responsibilities, so that’s what we’re -, I would think that we should be trying to do right now.

RAY: Okay, what does anybody envision? Okay, we got what, three past Charter Commissions, right? I think. You know, so what would we like, as a body, to receive in regard to, you know, what happened the last three times they reviewed the charter? I mean, what is it, you know, you’d like to see? I mean, at the very least, you know, the charter proposals and the, you know, and the complete language around that, at the very least, right?

HERKES: And I think that’s at most.

RAY: And, you know, that’s in the front of the charter.

HERKES: Yeah.

RAY: You know, they’ve got two sets of, you know, charter proposals, you know, already, so -, but, you know, they don’t contain complete language and whatever, so, you know, at least what was proposed and what was, you know, language -, the full proposal language, right, so you understand that, not in an abbreviated form.

HERKES: Well -.

RAY: But what, you know -, so we -, you know, so you take a specific, you know, Proposal 6, 1979, dealing with the Department of Water Supply. I mean, do we want somebody to go through and, you know, all the files and do a summary of all the discussion around, you know, that led up to that proposal? I mean, just what is it we want? Or do we just want, you know, what the -?

HERKES: What I found really helpful is to go and ask people that were on those Charter Commissions, what did you guys talk about when you talked about this? What was the background on this? Some of it is not published.

RAY: Yeah, but that, you know, that’s 30 years ago, in the case of this.

HERKES: But there are still people alive who were on that first one.

RAY: I know there are but -. Sue.

IRVINE: Yeah, charters are kind of like a constitution, I mean, that’s what they are, and they don’t necessarily change all that much. I mean, you shouldn’t start probably putting in shoreline access -.

HERKES: Well, we can get into that later.

IRVINE: And things, but I mean, so I don’t think the proposals change all that much but we -, it might be easier than going though all this past stuff to just go out to the National Civic League and see, you know, what their stuff is on forms of government and what not if we’re thinking of really changing something in a big way. Or like here, the Water Department, I don’t think there’s -, I haven’t heard any noise about putting them back under the Mayor or something, which is what -.

SANTANGELO: Oh, yes, there has been.

IRVINE: They were doing the last time.

HERKES: You will.

IRVINE: Is there?

SANTANGELO: Oh, yes.

IRVINE: Okay. Well, then we would need -.

SANTANGELO: It doesn’t mean you go with it.

IRVINE: I would -.

SANTANGELO: But, yes, there’s a lot of that.

IRVINE: Yeah. Then I think we’d need -.

RAY: Okay.

IRVINE: What was said the last time.

RAY: Okay. Steve.

BESS: Well, number one is that even though we may have the technology to be scanning all of the past minutes and then indexing them, I don’t think that’s necessary, and I think it’s beyond the scope of this Commission.

And secondly, you know, if you have an issue that you say, hey, this is worthwhile researching, then we can direct someone to go back and pull up all of that on a specific issue basis. So I think we’ve got to play it by feel rather than, you know, come up with a set policy about what we’re going to do. But I would definitely be against indexing all past minutes, even though it might be kind of nice for Mr. Wurdeman but -.

WURDEMAN: It would be nice for the future.

BESS: Yeah, it would be. It would be nice.

RAY: Yeah. Yeah. George.

MARTIN: Yeah, I happen to agree with Mr. Bess that as things come up is when we’re going to have to look at them, and if, in fact, there is some precedence set that it wasn’t passed the last time or it was passed, that’s when we should look at it. And as far as touching on putting everything into a scanner and put in the computer as was being mentioned earlier, doesn’t really come under our jurisdiction to do, but it should be done by the County at some time because it is information that possibly could get lost and/or wasted and that would be a shame, yeah. But I don’t think we should be addressing that.

RAY: Roland.

HIGASHI: Okay, should we get back into kind of forming what kind of person we want? I think we all agree, I think that the majority agrees we don’t need to go back to the old files as much as possible but -.

HERKES: Yeah.

HIGASHI: Kind of frameworking what kind of person we want.

RAY: Well, I’d like to see -.

HERKES: Go ahead.

RAY: You know, somebody with, you know, some independent thinking skills that could, you know, kind of take a, you know, commonsense approach at, you know, kind of looking at what’s there and kind of figuring out, you know, at a first pass, you know, what’s, you know, a way to get a synopsis, a feel, a summary of it or whatever rather than, you know, somebody that’s just going to say, you know, January 1976, da-da-da-da. You know, that really goes through. And then also somebody that maybe we could, you know, give them the initiative, you know, we mentioned, you know, talking to other people or, you know, figuring out who they might contact or kind of gather information and get a feel for this stuff because, you know, there are people around and accessible.

HIGASHI: Somebody who would be computer literate and modern-day technology literate.

RAY: Yeah. Eddie.

HIGASHI: Would be somebody that kind of deal with that.

ALONZO: Mr. Chairman, part of the secretary’s job, you know, to notify the public our meeting place. Like Mr. Ross said, he mentioned about TV, try to find something, some information about television coverage, notice in the radios. Sometimes newspaper can be misleading or some people don’t listen, I mean, have newspaper, but they listen to radio. I think radio is a more effective communication towards the people out there, especially in the rural area where the paper delivery is limited and they only by radio.

RAY: And so we make sure we explore all those.

HERKES: So let’s say two-hour -, for a two-hour meeting, I would have a fit if anybody we hired took more than two hours to do the minutes. So -, and for a voice mail and email, I would think one hour a day would take care of answering email and generating email. So let’s say that’s 30 hours a month and four hours for the meeting minutes, to go to the meeting. And probably another two hours for travel time, so we got to build some travel time in there, wherever this person lives. So we’re talking about those kinds of things, and that’s -, maybe we have 20, 40, 60, 80 hours a month to work with. That leaves another 50 hours a month to do research. Public relations are tough to start and easy to sustain, so once you generate those press releases and those PSAs, you’ve got your line, you’ve got your fax modem set up, you just need to write them and you push a button and they go out. And you can do that. Often you arrange for interviews with charter members, you can -, and then the public accesses probably take some arranging and setting up, but they do most of that. So, you know, in that 50 hours that you have left a month -.

RAY: Where -?

HERKES: I would think you could generate that.

RAY: Now run by the hours again, where you’re going.

HERKES: Nineteen hours a week.

RAY: Okay, so that’s -.

HERKES: Right?

RAY: Your 80.

HERKES: Twenty, forty, sixty, that’s eighty.

RAY: So where’s your other 50?

HERKES: So that’s what’s left is 50 after you do the voice mail and email of 30.

RAY: Oh, okay. So, yeah.

HERKES: And there’s four hours and maybe -.

RAY: Eighty less thirty.

HERKES: Yeah.

RAY: Hey, that’s 50.

HERKES: So it seems to me that there’s -, that out of 19 hours a week, we got tons of time -.

RAY: So you -.

HERKES: To do almost anything.

SANTANGELO: Are you writing that down?

HERKES: I did it. I added it up, too.

RAY: Roland.

HIGASHI: I think that we should hire somebody with the idea that the work is going to evolve into more time as this Commission -.

RAY: Yeah.

HIGASHI: Has more work. She comes on board tomorrow, she’s not going to have 19 hours of work, but I think as times moves on, she’s going to have more time. I think that’s the kind of agreement we need with the person coming in.

ALONZO: Minimum time is -.

HIGASHI: Whatever work needs to be done, will be done.

SANTANGELO: Yeah.

RAY: Kevin.

BALOG: Just another thought. If we really wanted to be efficient is what we should have done was when Mr. Bess sent out his legal notices, most attorneys have quite competent secretaries, and if you really wanted to -, for the people to work together.

HERKES: Or hire a package.

BALOG: If they’re only going to -. No, that’s what I’m saying, really, because most of them can do shorthand, most of them are computer literate, and they’ll already be working with the attorney who is going to be advising them. So it might be a cheaper deal to package the secretary with the attorney than it is to go out and look outside and have the two guys somehow work together and evolve into more work. And I just would see it being a better marriage because I think it would work out a lot better. They’ll both be at the meeting, they go back, she does the minutes, the minutes get circulated. To me, it’s going to be a lot easier. Then they can divide up the work. If he -, if we want something researched that he wants to tell the secretary go do it or whatever, that’s up to them; it’s a packaged deal. All we’re going to say, any Board Member wanted something, to say go do it.

RAY: Okay. You know, what -.

HERKES: Is -?

RAY: Comes to mind is then you are asking your attorney to, you know, actually supervise, you know, some other staff person and, you know -.

HIGASHI: When it gets down to a paralegal, the wages are $75.00 an hours.

IRVINE: I was going to say we might end up paying more under those circumstances.

RAY: Yeah, I think so, too.

HIGASHI: A paralegal is expensive.

HERKES: Is that normal for an attorney to kind of bring your secretary along?

SANTANGELO: I don’t know that it’s normal. In terms of a Charter, you know, Commission, I don’t know, but I can see that that might lead to increased cost.

HERKES: Okay.

BALOG: Aren’t you going to -, when you hire the attorney, right, you’re putting out this ad, who’s going to do the attorney’s paperwork?

BESS: Well, I guess, you know, we have to make sure that we are -, are we hiring a secretary or are we hiring a paralegal?

BALOG: Well, that’s -, I’m saying a secretary.

BESS: Yeah.

BALOG: And most law firms have a secretary. And I mean if -, we only want them to have a place to call, a computer at their desk, and to answer email, how hard can it be?

BESS: You know, I would say if, you know, that situation existed and the attorney we hired could accommodate that -.

HERKES: Not -.

BESS: That might be great, but I don’t think we can guarantee that whatever attorney is going to have necessarily an extra, you know, 20 hours available in their secretarial pool and going to be willing to do all that.

HERKES: And that’s the main thing, is the secretary has to apply as a separate entity.

BESS: Right.

HERKES: Because the secretary is our secretary.

BESS: I mean I -.

HERKES: Not the lawyer’s secretary.

BESS: You know, I hear what you’re saying. I mean if it worked out that way -.

??? No, and you’ll have a problem because if they’re from a busy law firm, they won’t be available for you when you need them. They -.

BALOG: Well, I -.

HERKES: Yeah, and that’s -.

??? May or may not. In any busy office they will not.

BALOG: In all honesty.

HERKES: That is a problem.

BALOG: I think the kind of pay we’re going to pay, when we were talking about pay, you ain’t going to get a high cost attorney to -, applying to serve -, to advise this Commission, in all honesty.

RAY: I -, you might be -, I’ve talked to -.

HERKES: Chris Yuen did it before.

RAY: A couple of pretty high powered attorneys that expressed -.

HERKES: Yeah, really.

RAY: Interest for it.

BALOG: That might impress some people; it might not impress me so -.

RAY: Yeah, okay. Gary.

WURDEMAN: You’re going to get good people because I think work is hard to find right now.

HERKES: Because it’s fun, yeah.

RAY: Gary.

YOSHIYAMA: Yeah, I shared with a couple of my fellow sub-committee members what the County has come up with as far as a secretary to boards and commissions so, you know, I thought it was a good outline for, you know, whatever we needed, then we don’t have to reinvent the wheel because everything, I think, what we talked about here is contained in, you know, that class specification, and the minimum qualifications, you know, including what Eddie talked about, you know, being familiar with the public notice, public information process, okay.

I would say that I agree with Roland that -, well, let me put it this way. I don’t think we need a 40-hour a week person at this point in time, but I would disagree with Marni that it’s like 19 or 19½. I wouldn’t like to start out that way, okay, because I think we’re going to add on, and I think it’s to the disadvantage of the person that we hire and to us if we just start, you know, at 19 and start increasing from there. What I would like to -, but I want to touch upon some, I guess, related stuff at this point, John, if that’s okay.

RAY: Sure.

YOSHIYAMA: So I checked with Civil Service Department downstairs as to what happened 10 years ago, and I’m not suggesting this, but 10 years ago, there was -, the Commission had a full-time secretary, okay. She was administratively assigned to the Mayor’s Office. If we do hire somebody, I suggest that we go that route, because it’ll save us time and money, because somebody else can do the paperwork as far as, you know, payroll and other stuff like that and we won’t have to be bothered with that. But in any case, administratively assigned to the Mayor’s Office. This person was a secretary/administrative assistant at an SR-20 pay rate, okay. I would say that’s too high for, I think, what we want, okay, because what the County has subsequently developed was a secretary to boards and commissions as a SR-18 pay rate, okay. I’ll just set that aside. And, by the way, this position is still within the Mayor’s Office. It is a vacant position, I checked with Rudy, but is not funded. And I’m not suggesting that we use it, I’ll just throw that out for your information.

What we -, you know, so we’ve talked about some things like, you know, duties and responsibilities, knowledge and skills of the individual, and, you know, and Marni and I talked a little about -, she talked about, you know, this virtual office or something, electronic type office, and I agree somewhat but with, you know, like -, but I agree with Kevin that we need, you know, a central location for whatever information we have. But I’m also concerned with supplies and equipment. We’re going to, you know, have the need for supplies, and where are we going to keep it? Equipment, like a computer, you know, where is this computer going to be located and stuff like that? That’s why I’m suggesting that we do have a physical office but attach it to one of the County departments already. So, you know, hopefully, we don’t pay rent. You know, somebody else does our administrative paperwork for us and stuff like that, okay. I’ll stop there.

RAY: Okay. John.

SANTANGELO: Well, just to come back. We kind of went far afield, and I just want to make it clear where I’m coming from. The attorney and the secretary, I see that secretary working for us. The attorney’s going to build into his or her fees their responsibility. I don’t want them connected. That secretary shouldn’t be -. I don’t see that secretary working for that lawyer. That lawyer’s going to be dealing with a whole another set of tools. And so -, and I don’t have a problem with some of the things that Gary brought up either. But, and 18 is what, around 22? Is that what you’re saying? What’s the pay?

YOSHIYAMA: SR-18?

SANTANGELO: Yeah.

RAY: Salary.

IRVINE: Salary.

YOSHIYAMA: Salary range, oh.

BALOG: It’s about 26.

SANTANGELO: It’s 26?

YOSHIYAMA: Was it 26? Yeah, I -.

HERKES: Plus benefits?

YOSHIYAMA: Plus benefits if it’s -.

HERKES: So it gets about 35 by the time you get through with everything, retirement benefits and all that jazz.

SANTANGELO: And a 20, and a 20 was what? That was more like -.

YOSHIYAMA: That’s -.

SANTANGELO: That was like 33 base or -.

YOSHIYAMA: That might be ten percent higher.

SANTANGELO: Okay.

YOSHIYAMA: That’s too high.

SANTANGELO: But that was full-time.

YOSHIYAMA: And that was full-time.

SANTANGELO: Yeah, so you cut that in half.

RAY: Okay. Sue.

SANTANGELO: So I see -, so I just want to make that clear. The secretary works for us, and I think we got a little far afield; I thought we had it pretty focused there for a while. And 19 hours a week at some pay rate, and that was my question is what is that pay rate, because that’s going to directly relate to the quality.

HERKES: Can we do the job first, job description first and then we’ll go to the pay rate?

HIGASHI: Why don’t we -.

SANTANGELO: Okay.

HIGASHI: Stick to the job description and then -.

SANTANGELO: Okay.

HIGASHI: Move on.

RAY: Right.

HIGASHI: It’s going to have a (indiscernible).

SANTANGELO: Okay, that’s a good way to do it.

RAY: Okay, so let’s try to stick to the job description. That’s where I, you know, need to start from. You know, I just don’t have a sense of the time requirement.

HERKES: Well, that’s why I tried to lay it down and tried to figure out hours. As far as equipment goes, Gary -.

YOSHIYAMA: Yeah.

HERKES: I have -, the Chamber manages -.

HIGASHI: Wait, wait, wait, wait. Before we do equipment, are we going to -?

HERKES: The Chamber manages several contracts. Oh, before do equipment? You don’t want to do that now?

HIGASHI: Well, I want -.

SANTANGELO: The job description.

HIGASHI: Job description, yeah.

YOSHIYAMA: Just in the same thing.

HERKES: Okay, job description, okay.

YOSHIYAMA: Can I pass this out?

RAY: Yeah.

YOSHIYAMA: I have -, I don’t know. Okay. You can use this. This is from the Civil Service Department, Secretary to Boards/Commissions.

SANTANGELO: And that has job descriptions.

YOSHIYAMA: Yeah, it’s pretty (indiscernible).

RAY: Roland, you got any thoughts on that as far as the -?

HIGASHI: This or getting back to -?

RAY: No, just a gut -.

HERKES: Job description.

RAY: A gut feeling about, you know, are we talking about a part-time or a full-time and what’s the best way to -?

HIGASHI: I’m thinking about a part-time person, whether it’s -.

RAY: So Gary, what -, as far as a part-time person, suppose we want to hire somebody half-time. How does that work?

YOSHIYAMA: We got several options, I think. You know, we can go contract, you know. You can hire -, contract meaning, you know, private contract. I think Mr. Wurdeman is familiar with that. You can go, you know, hire a public employee, you know.

RAY: I guess, okay, I was asking for your input on a public employee more from wearing, you know, your other hat, how that would work. You know, if we were looking at the scenario of, you know, the kind of position you spoke to, being attached to the Mayor’s Office, but we only wanted that person part-time.

??? It’s possible to go permanent part-time, isn’t it?

YOSHIYAMA: Yeah, you can go permanent part-time. You can get a person, depending upon a number of hours, you know. That could be exempt from Civil Service, exempt from these rules, you know, but we still can use the same job description. That person need not be a Civil Service employee.

RAY: Right.

HIGASHI: Mr. Chairman?

YOSHIYAMA: So -.

HIGASHI: I guess we’re getting away from the job description, however, so the choice is a contract person or someone government person, is that the choice we got here?

YOSHIYAMA: Yeah, that’s your wide range.

??? That’s the whole range.

HIGASHI: So we choose one, one or the other. We go contract, we advertise, we hire somebody, whether it’s from a temporary agency or whatever, and we set up an office and we go from there. So just need to find out what kind of person we feel comfortable with.

HERKES: Well, I can write you the -.

HIGASHI: I like your idea of somebody who is -.

HERKES: Job description that I wrote. Gary, you said you don’t think 19½ hours is enough time, and I guess I need to hear what you would have this secretary doing that would take more than 80 hours a month or -.

YOSHIYAMA: Okay.

HERKES: Seventy-five hours a month.

YOSHIYAMA: As I would look at this job or, you know, I guess our job comes in phases. Right now, we’re in the organizational phase, okay, and soon we’ll be over that phase and we’ll go into something else, whatever that may be, okay. Whoever works for us, be the attorney or a clerical support position, will also be in those phases, so the first job of the person that we hire, if it be a secretary, is organizational in nature, you know, learning about us, us learning about that person, that person maybe brushing up on public information kind of stuff, organizing our office, etcetera, okay. And then along with doing the, you know, recording of the minutes, etcetera, you know. You know, I can only speak maybe to the first phase, you know. I don’t know -, I would agree with what Roland said, okay, that, maybe as time goes on, as we go out in the public, you know, more work will be generated, okay, certainly, a different kind of work. So, you know, I can only go, you know, that’s it, yeah.

HERKES: Yeah.

HIGASHI: Yeah.

YOSHIYAMA: Public contact will increase, I think, as time goes on. Public contact, I think, will be minimal at this point.

HIGASHI: Okay.

YOSHIYAMA: But I don’t want to bring somebody in at, you know, the pay is okay but no benefits and we just start them off, because we don’t know who we’re going to get, and later on says okay, we’re going to give this person benefits. What, could we have gotten somebody better, you know?

??? Just point of clarification, I see some faces over there. What you’re talking about is if the person goes over 20 hours, by law we have to offer some benefit package, is that my understanding?

RAY: No.

HIGASHI: Not -.

SANTANGELO: If we contract -.

BALOG: Not necessarily.

HIGASHI: If you go over 20 hours after three consecutive, four consecutive weeks.

??? There’s some criteria, right?

HIGASHI: And if it’s a consistent thing, yeah, you can -.

RAY: Well -.

HIGASHI: You can go over 20 and then you go back down.

RAY: Yeah, but if they really operate as an independent contractor, more under the description -.

HERKES: They’d do the work.

HIGASHI: Yeah.

RAY: That Marni had -.

HERKES: Yeah.

RAY: You know, I mean if they’re operating with their own laptop and their own, you know, whatever, right, you know, that’s an independent contractor.

YOSHIYAMA: Yeah. I checked with Civil Service Department, who would, you know, be like a regulator for the County on independent contractors, and based upon, you know, what -, in the past, okay, what past commissions have used their secretaries for, they said out-and-out, that’s not an independent contractor. That would be an employee because -.

HERKES: I talked to Michael Ben, and he said that’s perfectly allowable. Is that your understanding, Mr. Wurdeman?

WURDEMAN: Right, but -.

HERKES: If you stay under $45,000?

WURDEMAN: Most of the commissions, the permanent year-round -.

HERKES: Yeah.

WURDEMAN: Commissions do have an employee.

HERKES: But they’re permanent.

WURDEMAN: They’re permanent.

HERKES: We’re a year, one year from start to finish.

RAY: Yeah, so -.

HERKES: We got to leave a trail.

IRVINE: Most boards and commissions are under, administratively, some department at the County, and I’m hearing that there is a position in the Mayor’s Office that was for the previous Charter Commission. That was like not a contract position then, that was a County employee.

WURDEMAN: It’s an employee position.

YOSHIYAMA: Yeah.

WURDEMAN: It exists, but it’s not funded.

IRVINE: Could we -?

YOSHIYAMA: Yeah, it’s not funded.

HERKES: Good luck.

IRVINE: Well -.

ALONZO: We can fund it.

??? Yeah.

IRVINE: So but -

YOSHIYAMA: Yeah.

IRVINE: Is it possible for us to fund that and have somebody at the Mayor’s Office, I mean and use their equipment?

HERKES: Part-time.

RAY: Sure.

??? Yeah.

IRVINE: Part-time. I mean can we get -, can we contract?

YOSHIYAMA: Sue, I think you can do that, but I don’t know why you would want to do that, because, you know, the paperwork might not be worth it to redescribe the position, lower it to what you want or whatever. You know, might as well, you just start with -, start afresh than work with something old.

WURDEMAN: Yeah, they have -.

YOSHIYAMA: Because that position is not this.

WURDEMAN: I think they have -?

YOSHIYAMA: It’s not what I -.

WURDEMAN: A list, right, Gary?

YOSHIYAMA: Yeah.

IRVINE: Oh, it’s not this? Oh.

WURDEMAN: They got the list, right?

HERKES: No.

IRVINE: Oh.

RAY: Okay. Roland.

WURDEMAN: Does Civil Service have a list on that?

YOSHIYAMA: I don’t know, I didn’t check. I didn’t check if there’s -.

WURDEMAN: So they’d have to create a list and, you know.

HERKES: Yeah. So that’s a Civil Service position.

WURDEMAN: They would have to somehow rate everybody and -.

HERKES: And if we do a contract, we can advertise and hire somebody, right?

WURDEMAN: That’s right.

HERKES: If we do a contract. And we don’t need to do Civil Service and we don’t -. We don’t leave behind an employee that we have to pay for for the rest of their lives.

WURDEMAN: That’s right.

HERKES: I mean, that, to me, is a benefit, because I have to pay these employees that we leave behind.

RAY: Roland.

HIGASHI: I have a question for Gary. If we have somebody who is from the Civil Service, what are the rules about meeting at night, meeting weekends? Do we have -, are we going to have a problem with that?

YOSHIYAMA: Not necessarily. You can make an agreement as to, you know, what’s the person’s hours of work, etcetera, you know -.

HIGASHI: Kind of flex hours? I mean, you know -.

YOSHIYAMA: Yeah, you can make flexible hours, you know, flexible schedule and stuff like that, you know.

HIGASHI: So on the secretary’s position, I think a list is almost readily available, I mean, that’s one job that has a long list all the time.

YOSHIYAMA: I would -.

WURDEMAN: This is a special kind of secretary.

HERKES: Yeah.

YOSHIYAMA: Yeah. This is a little bit higher because it’s to a board and commission.

HIGASHI: Okay.

YOSHIYAMA: You know, I -, Marni -. When I had talked to Marni the last time, she had brought up a suggestion that we may want to try, and I don’t know if that person is still available, Marni, you know.

HERKES: Which person?

YOSHIYAMA: You mentioned somebody working maybe for the Planning Department.

HERKES: Well -.

YOSHIYAMA: At this point that -.

HERKES: Yeah.

YOSHIYAMA: May be interested, you know, in working with us, so if there’s somebody already on board, kind of kick start us and then, you know, we can -, okay, we can, you know, grapple with this but, you know, if there’s an employee already on board willing to take on more work because I think you told me she was part-time, hey, why don’t we just give her some more work?

HERKES: I just needed more information from the Commission on how they felt this person -, what they wanted out of a secretary.

RAY: John.

SANTANGELO: Okay. That’s kind of exciting, what you guys just brought up. Take me, for instance.

HERKES: Except Kevin is maybe the one that isn’t -.

SANTANGELO: One of the reasons you look at a charter is because we’re growing and we’ve changed in these 10 years. So, you know, where’s the other County charters, you know? So this -, is that what our secretary does? And if we look at the other charters, where are some of the things we should look at? Is that the lawyer’s job, or can the secretary bring that out? So I see a lot of work that can go on that helps -, because I need to be educated, and I need to find a focus where we’re going, you know. Are we going to be process-oriented? And if we’re going to be process, in terms of how different departments work and how it relates to the charter, this land use thing, I don’t see how that relates to the charter; that’s a whole other, you know -, anyway. So having a secretary that comes from a board, that understands, I don’t know if the Planning’s a good example, maybe it is, that’s -.

HERKES: This particular person isn’t a good example but -, so we’re going to -.

RAY: Well, anyway -.

HERKES: Scratch that one right now.

RAY: Let John finish.

SANTANGELO: So that was the whole thing about, you know, in terms of who we get. I mean, I’d like to see this person a bit independent. I don’t know that I want to go right into Civil Service. And we do have specific needs, and it is kind of a research kind of thing, and so it isn’t just minutes and stuff, you know. I see some -.

HERKES: Oh, yeah, some thinking.

SANTANGELO: Some other information, yeah, gathering, and I like some of the things in here about helping us get resource or setting up a seminar. You know, you sure as heck aren’t going to want a lawyer to do that. There’s -.

RAY: Kevin.

BALOG: I think that we had somebody apply from the Planning Department who has experience working with us, and my suggestion would be is since it’s -, we had a rough month and Marni, myself, and Gary kind of had a hard time communicating, we should at least set a meeting date for ourself to get together and, at least for the next meeting, have this person who is already a County employee just take minutes and help us out, do the recording, show up to the next meeting, and do it for us, and just pay them. We just decide tonight, are we going to pay them 20 bucks an hour or 14 or 15 bucks an hour, and say it’s a two-meeting interim, if we’re going to meet for the next two months. And within that two months, the same way Mr. Bess’ committee has given themself a timetable, give ourself a timetable, and this person may be the person who qualifies to be our secretary and may not, but we would be better qualified than taking another half an hour tonight to go further with this position. Right now, what we need is someone to show up, instead of Marni, to take the minutes, transcribe them, and get them out to the people, because that’s what we need right now. And since we have someone who does it already for the government, pay them a little extra money and do it, and let the committee evolve into doing a search to getting somebody, like John has suggested, Gary has suggested, Roland, Sue, all of us have suggested, yourself, Mr. Chairman, and find a person who qualifies. And the one thing I say is you get what you pay for, which is what Gary alluded to, too. Don’t make it where you -, we cut ourself short. So when we get these applicants in, then we’ll know what kind of scale we’re looking at and what kind of offer can be made. And that you can do through a private contract instead.

RAY: Okay. I think that addresses, you know, one set of needs, and that’s the bare necessity. But we did talk about, you know, the needs to have somebody, you know, more as a researcher, you know, gathering information, you know, right away, and it doesn’t necessarily address that. I mean, do we -, that, like I say, that covers our meetings and whatever, but do we want, you know, somebody, you know, looking into the files and doing some background information and researching other, you know, other county charters and -?

BALOG: Maybe she could do that. It doesn’t hurt just to ask. We have some applicants.

RAY: Wait, Roland. Steve.

BESS: Yeah, I was just going to say that it seems to me that coming back to the definition of the job, okay, the only thing that seems to be fuzzy is the extent of the research and what we want her to do, okay.

HERKES: Or him.

BESS: And, you know, I’d be happy, you know, the committee could decide that, or we could do it here as a committee of the whole, I mean, you know, to hey, let’s just get our hands around that, try to define it as best as possible. Okay, that’s the kind of person that we want. And in terms of, you know, long run, I think, one, we ought to go on a contractual basis and we ought to try to go to the widest pool possible to get the most qualified person. And I think by going on a contractual basis, you avail yourself. Now, on the short run, there may be a need for a secretary for a couple of times, but why not come to grips with the job description now and charge.

RAY: Okay. Roland.

HIGASHI: I think we’re being old-fashioned by calling a secretary. I think we’re really looking for an administrative assistant.

HERKES: Yeah, I think so, too.

RAY: Yeah.

BESS: Or maybe somebody to run this whole thing.

HERKES: But , yeah. Yes.

HIGASHI: I mean, pretty much, what you’re going to have somebody kind of take charge for us the paperwork -.

RAY: Right.

HIGASHI: Promulgates after a meeting, call this guy, do that.

HERKES: Yeah.

HIGASHI: I think it’s an administrative assistant.

RAY: Okay.

HERKES: Can I read what I put together for the secretary position? She will be an independent contractor. The secretary shall have dependable transportation and be able to travel to various parts of the Big Island for Commission meetings and document investigation, be computer literate and conversant with the latest in communication technology. The Commission will rely a great deal on the talents of the secretary to bring the group together in an efficient and timely manner, therefore, good work habits are essential. He or she must be able to work productively and possess, as well as apply, effective work habits and attitudes within an organizational setting.

Thinking critically and creatively in applying the principles and strategies of purposeful, active, organized thinking is most important. We will rely upon the secretary to research documents, which means he or she must learn effectively and possess the necessary basic skills in reading, writing, computering, and possess and apply skills in acquiring information and use learning tools and strategies effectively. The secretary must be able to apply appropriate, speaking, and listening skills in order to precisely convey information, ideas, and opinions. The Commission will rely upon the documents created by the secretary to develop the public program of the Commission. The secretary must work cooperatively and be able of working with others to complete tasks, solve problems, resolve conflicts, provide information, and offer support. And, personally, the secretary must act responsibly and recognize an obligation to self and others for their decisions and actions.

So it’s a fairly comprehensive, and just for your information, it comes out of the core abilities that the high school kids are being taught, but it’s a fairly comprehensive administrative assistant, you’re right, Roland. That’s not -, we’re not looking for a secretary, because we’re looking for somebody that’ll deal with all 11 of us in an organized way.

IRVINE: I think we are, though. I mean, that description pretty much follows this Department of Civil Service Secretary to Boards and Commissions that Gary gave us.

HERKES: They’re using core abilities, too.

IRVINE: Yeah. Yeah. I mean, they call it a secretary, even though -.

HIGASHI: Offices hardly have secretaries anymore.

HERKES: Now, Bill Gray said we can hire a contract person if not over $25,000, and then we don’t have to do procurement. Temporary service is okay, and we need a written proposal from the applicant. That’s kind of a sketch.

HIGASHI: Twenty-five thousand per year or per contract?

HERKES: Well, per year if it isn’t over -, per contract, actually, but a year was kind of what we’re looking at.

HIGASHI: So you can go on a yearly basis and renew the contract?

HERKES: Huh?

HIGASHI: You could then take the contract for a year and review it and renew the contract?

HERKES: Uh huh.

RAY: Okay. So how do we -?

IRVINE: Last thing, can this contracted person, in any way, get access to the County Building for this research and what not or have a spot there, like in the legislative -?

HERKES: Rudy said yes.

IRVINE: Oh, okay, Rudy said yes.

RAY: Let’s double-check that.

IRVINE: Pardon?

RAY: I say let’s double-check that. I mean, Rudy’s just trying to get rid of us, too.

HERKES: Yeah.

RAY: He’s saying anything at this point.

SANTANGELO: But she works for the board, I mean for the Commission; the Commission’s part, you know -.

HERKES: Yeah, part of the County, so he said she would have all the rights and privileges. Of course, we don’t have any rights and privileges, so why would we think our administrative assistant would -?

SANTANGELO: Well, we’ll take his job -.

HERKES: Have rights and privileges?

SANTANGELO: Out of the charter.

HIGASHI: Mr. Chair, are we faced with a question of being a contract worker or not at this point in time?

RAY: That’s one choice, yeah.

HIGASHI: What’s the recommendation of the Chair, Marni?

HERKES: What?

HIGASHI: Do you have a recommendation to bring before us so we can move along this issue?

HERKES: Well, see, we have a committee that’s kind of split. My recommendation would be 19½ hours. Gary doesn’t think that’s enough.

HIGASHI: No, I guess I’m -.

HERKES: So we don’t -.

HIGASHI: Trying to get -, do we do a contract here?

SANTANGELO: No, contract or -.

YOSHIYAMA: Contract doesn’t matter.

HIGASHI: Or get somebody from the Civil Service list?

RAY: Put a motion on the floor.

HERKES: What?

RAY: Give me a motion.

HERKES: Give you a motion?

RAY: Yeah, in regard to the contract.

HERKES: So we can discuss it?

RAY: Yeah.

HERKES: I move we hire an administrative assistant, part-time, 19½ hours.

SANTANGELO: A week, contractually.

HERKES: Contract, under contract to the Charter Commission.

RAY: Is there a second?

SANTANGELO: Second.

RAY: Any discussion?

IRVINE: Do you think we should leave the number of hours out?

BALOG: Yeah.

??? Yeah, I think as a contract hire, the hours may not matter because you’re going to pay her a salary.

IRVINE: Right.

??? And she can work five hours or 50, so we may not have to have her stuck to 19 hours.

RAY: So we’ll regard that as a friendly amendment?

SANTANGELO: And it might be a he.

YOSHIYAMA: So what is the amendment?

HIGASHI: Delete the hours.

IRVINE: I mean, knock the number -.

HERKES: Contract.

IRVINE: Delete the number of hours.

YOSHIYAMA: Oh, delete the hours, okay. Can I speak to the motion?

RAY: Sure.

YOSHIYAMA: A little bit on the technical side. When I objected to, or I made a statement about independent contractor, you know, I meant under, you know, like the Fair Labor Standards Act, okay. I didn’t mean I objecting to the Commission hiring somebody on contract, okay. I just do not believe that we can go out and hire somebody who is, under the federal law, Wage and Hour Law, a independent contractor and, you know, order this person around, because then, you know -.

HIGASHI: She’ll become an employee.

YOSHIYAMA: We will just be in violation of the law. Okay, that’s -, I just wanted to clarify that, okay.

The other clarification is, you know, within the Civil Service system, we have contract hires, you know, so you can, you know, hire somebody under contract, you know, like the public, somebody like a public employee, or you can hire a private, you know, somebody in private sector under contract, so that’s another clarification. So when we say that we’re going to hire somebody on contract, it’s wide open, that’s all I’m saying.

HIGASHI: So your interpretation of independent contractor is they do their own work, whatever they work.

YOSHIYAMA: Yeah, they do their own thing. You just tell them, hey, you know, get from Point A to Point B, and then they’ll get there, whatever way, but you cannot order, you know, you don’t give orders, but we will be giving that person specific orders.

HIGASHI: So, technically, we’re independent contractor as an employee to this -, I mean that’s what it boils down to, you know, independent contracting that -. What he’s talking about is you cannot really tell them how to do their job, they’re just going to do their job.

YOSHIYAMA: Right. Right. And that’s what I’m just clarifying.

WURDEMAN: There’s like 14 criteria the IRS use.

HIGASHI: Yeah.

WURDEMAN: I don’t remember what they all are offhand. But your attorney would be an independent contractor, right? So your admin. assistant, you would have to treat that person pretty much in the same kind of relationship. You’re hiring a professional to do a particular job.

??? Yeah, and you know, other than the set meetings, you know, I think the nature of the job’s going to be pretty independent.

WURDEMAN: I know using the employer’s facilities is one of the criteria, so if you -.

IRVINE: Oh.

WURDEMAN: If you give the person an office in -.

HERKES: County Building.

IRVINE: That’s what I -.

WURDEMAN: In the County Building, that’s one down, 13 to go.

HIGASHI: And you can have only four demerits or something like that.

RAY: Well, you know, having -, well, wait a minute. Having access to an office in a building -, I mean, I’m an independent contractor for Hawaii Leeward Planning, and, you know, they have an office and a secretary in Kona but, you know, I don’t have to work there. I come and go, you know, work out of my home, you know, I don’t have any set obligation. They don’t care whether I go there one day, two days, or ever, you know. I mean, it is an office there.

HERKES: And that’s what -.

RAY: So -.

HERKES: I’m looking at. I mean, that’s what I think this person does.

RAY: So I mean I think they still could if that’s, you know, we wanted that, have access to -. Okay, we got a motion on the floor we’ll discuss -. Go ahead, John.

SANTANGELO: Yeah. Well, in the context that, you know, one of the things that we’re describing here is more like the legislative auditor, the legislative assistant we had as Council. Here’s a person, when which as a Council Member we had a problem, we bring the person over and almost as an independent contractor, they’d say, okay, I’m here to help you solve that problem. They’d help us get the research, help us write up the stuff. If, you know, get the input from other people, and eventually have it result in a piece of legislation or be trashed. And I don’t see how being an independent contractor is contrary to what we need. They write a proposal. That proposal has to fit what we want. So I need to hear more to say that we’re in conflict. I understand that though; I understand exactly what you’re saying here, and I don’t pretend to know the difference, you know, legally.

IRVINE: Maybe we better get those 13 -.

HERKES: Criteria.

IRVINE: Points, criteria or something.

YOSHIYAMA: I don’t think Marni’s motion included the term independent contractor. The reason I brought it up was just for a point of clarification.

SANTANGELO: It just said contract.

IRVINE: Unfortunately, I got muddier after you talked rather than clearer, I think. Can you go through that again, independent contractor -?

HERKES: Contract.

IRVINE: Versus -.

HERKES: Well, no, I said, the motion says contract, part-time administrative assistant for the Commission.

YOSHIYAMA: Yeah, okay.

HERKES: So it doesn’t say independent contractor.

YOSHIYAMA: Right. It doesn’t say -.

HERKES: We’re not into that yet.

YOSHIYAMA: Yeah. But -, yeah.

IRVINE: Oh. Oh.

YOSHIYAMA: But the previous -.

SANTANGELO: But if that’s our intent -.

YOSHIYAMA: Thing that Marni was reading was her job description.

HERKES: Yeah.

YOSHIYAMA: It started out with independent contractor.

HERKES: Right.

IRVINE: And there’s a difference.

YOSHIYAMA: And so I wanted to just, you know -.

HERKES: Right.

YOSHIYAMA: For clarification purposes, bring up the distinction. That was it.

RAY: Kevin.

BALOG: Just another point. If you’re taking out 19½ hours, you should take out part-time because it’s just going to be an independent contractor to do "X" duties. If we say we want -.

HERKES: Getting shorter and shorter here.

BALOG: These duties.

YOSHIYAMA: Contractor.

BALOG: Whatever it is. Forget that word. If it’s these duties here that Gary passed out, that’s what we want you to do; it’s your problem to do it. Get to here to there. Answer the phone.

HERKES: That’s all right with me.

BALOG: Return calls, whatever. If that’s -.

HERKES: Contract administrative assistant -.

BALOG: Where we’re going, we should get there.

HERKES: For the Commission.

BALOG: It’s twenty to seven, and I have two kids I need to go see.

SANTANGELO: But we met late because of you.

HERKES: Yeah, really.

HIGASHI: Mr. Chairman?

HERKES: Good one, John.

BALOG: I was told we were only going to have half hour meetings.

IRVINE: What?

RAY: So what’s the need to start this person off?

IRVINE: Henry Ross took 20 minutes.

HERKES: Have we passed the motion?

HIGASHI: No, not yet.

SANTANGELO: No, we’re still -.

BALOG: I think the other part -.

YOSHIYAMA: But there’s amendments being made, I think, to the motion.

BALOG: Of the motion though -. The other part of this needs to be is what Gary addressed is to put this out to get a list of applicants and get the best qualified person. And if we’re going to say $25,000, and that’s what’s been tossed out for "a year," divide that up by 12 months and is two grand a month of whatever it is, put it out to notice, and whatever they work, that’s what they get paid. They get paid "X" thousand per month for five hours to 50 hours, it doesn’t matter what it takes to get the job done.

SANTANGELO: So is -, for clarification then, if we did that, then a person would submit a proposal and that with it would be the price tag.

BALOG: Yes.

SANTANGELO: And they’d be -.

HERKES: Actually, we would submit a proposal.

SANTANGELO: They would -.

HERKES: And they could come with the price tag.

SANTANGELO: But no, don’t they have to -? Oh.

HERKES: We would tell them what we wanted done.

SANTANGELO: So are we doing an RFP? So we’re setting the pay and everything?

ALONZO: No. Are we?

SANTANGELO: Or are we asking for bids?

ALONZO: We would have the amendment to the motion or right now it’s just a motion?

HERKES: This is discussion. If we’re going to contract an administrative assistant, we’re going to have to define what we want that administrative assistant to do.

SANTANGELO: And then that -, and then the applicant would submit what I’m calling a proposal. What’s the word for it, a resume?

HERKES: A description of how they’re going to -.

SANTANGELO: Okay.

HERKES: Fulfill our needs.

SANTANGELO: And a price tag to go with it.

HERKES: Well, they could.

BALOG: They could, but I would have a not-to-exceed figure because -.

HERKES: Yeah.

BALOG: I would feel -.

HERKES: Right.

BALOG: Awfully guilty if you let people apply thinking -.

SANTANGELO: Okay.

BALOG: They’re going to make five grand a month.

SANTANGELO: Okay. And then would they be responsible, him or her, mind you, we’ve got some good -.

HERKES: Yes.

SANTANGELO: Men, too, you know, would they be responsible then for their own payroll and their reporting?

BALOG: That’s right.

SANTANGELO: And their -, you know, the benefits and stuff?

HERKES: Everything.

SANTANGELO: So that should be -. So if you say -, I’m wondering if $25,000 covers it because the benefit package -.

HERKES: Well, hopefully, they’d have two or three other jobs.

SANTANGELO: Okay.

HERKES: Or it would be somebody that -, what I’m looking for is a retired administrative assistant.

HIGASHI: With the pay package for government employees, is vacation and sick leave a big deal?

(Indiscernible discussion)

BALOG: You know, in all honesty -.

RAY: Can we -, let’s -. Order. Kevin.

BALOG: We need to get it out there and get a response back to see what this type of people are. You might have zero responses because of what you’re saying, you know, what -, the cost of the benefit package, let’s just use that as an example. Or you might get a hundred responses. We don’t know because we haven’t put at least a minimum description for an RFP to come back.

SANTANGELO: But the problem I have is we’ve set a salary limit based on almost arbitrary, and the arbitrary is we cannot go out and just hire unless it’s 25 and under without an RFP. That’s what we’re saying. If you go over 25, then there’s a whole new set of rules. We’ve set a $25,000 limit to avoid a certain set of rules. Does that -? And I don’t have a problem with that if this Commission feels we are going to fill that properly. But I just wanted to point out that we’ve set this threshold for that reason.

HERKES: We didn’t really set the threshold.

SANTANGELO: Oh, yes, we did. We can’t go above it.

HERKES: We can go above it. We can do the procurement law if you want to.

SANTANGELO: Then we go through procurement, okay.

HERKES: I mean, we didn’t set the threshold.

BALOG: I got a question for Corp. Counsel.

WURDEMAN: Yeah.

BALOG: Could you do more than one $25,000 contract in a calendar year or fiscal year?

WURDEMAN: You could, but it would be frowned upon.

HERKES: That’s a no.

WURDEMAN: That’s why we have a Procurement Code because -.

BALOG: Okay.

WURDEMAN: People were -.

BALOG: I think the other thing, too -.

HERKES: Splitting them up.

BALOG: I know quite a few people who have, like Roland said, there’s not too many offices that have secretaries. Roland is his secretary part-time, and he has people help him. I’m my secretary part-time, and I have people who help me. But there is a lot of people who do this type of work as a business that are out there. I think you might get qualified people, but not too much less than $25,000. I wouldn’t say for $20,000 a year, no way. But I just don’t feel comfortable not putting a tag on it not to exceed.

RAY: Okay, discussion. Are we -? Gary.

YOSHIYAMA: I guess that I would -, I speak against the motion because I guess I disagree with where the conversation is heading and, you know, what I think would be an independent contract. When we’re going out for requests for bids, I would rather us hire an employee, we’re the ones that go out there and say, look, we want to hire somebody for $2,300 a month or whatever, plus benefits of whatever it is, or comparable to, you know, what the Civil Service salary structure is. That’s where I’m coming from so -.

RAY: Okay. Other comments?

HIGASHI: So technically, you’re saying you don’t -, what the word? Where you come from, you want a government worker or -?

YOSHIYAMA: Or our own employee of the Commission versus an independent contractor -.

HIGASHI: Okay.

YOSHIYAMA: Of the Commission.

HIGASHI: Oh, okay.

YOSHIYAMA: You know, for the Commission. But that’s what -, because that’s what I’m hearing.

HIGASHI: So we take care of payroll -.

YOSHIYAMA: You know, once you go out for a request for bid.

HIGASHI: Taxes and stuff like that. We’ll take care of the payroll taxes, medical, vacation -.

YOSHIYAMA: Yeah.

HIGASHI: And stuff like that. Or we can contract it with what’s her name?

BALOG: Mayor’s Office.

HIGASHI: No, no, Altres.

IRVINE: Yeah.

HIGASHI: Right? Or Cheseco Employment.

HERKES: You have a different Altres or Pro Staffing or something, yeah.

BALOG: In other words, you want a full-time -, or not full-time.

YOSHIYAMA: No, not full-time.

BALOG: But someone who is an employee of this Commission.

SANTANGELO: I see this as an employee of the Commission. We are stating we want to contract an employee, not independent contract.

YOSHIYAMA: Well, you know, that’s where I’m coming from.

RAY: You know, not that I’ve, you know, particularly adhere to the letter of the law always in business, but I really see this as an independent contractor, you know, type position. I mean, I’ve operated in that capacity a lot and, you know, gosh, other than the, you know, coming to a monthly scheduled meeting or whatever, I just think this person falls under that, you know, easily would, you know, qualify under scrutiny for that type of position.

BALOG: Question for Corp. Counsel. If you hired an independent contractor versus an employee, you would have to give them a pretty good information, or I don’t know what the right word to say, what is exactly expected out of this -.

SANTANGELO: Job description.

BALOG: Independent contractor. Job descrip -, well, it can’t be a job description because they’re a contractor. You can’t give a job description to a contractor, so you have to give a contract description, whatever it’s called, so -.

WURDEMAN: Well -.

BALOG: How would you go about that, legally?

WURDEMAN: Put an ad in the paper similar to the one that was put in for an attorney. And I would -, you don’t put down necessarily the compensation. Then you meet and you evaluate the responses. You pick the one you think is the best, and then you negotiate with that person, and if that’s not satisfactory, you go to the second best.

RAY: Roland.

HIGASHI: So under that scenario, is he an employee or a contractor?

WURDEMAN: It would be a contractor.

RAY: Okay.

YOSHIYAMA: You know your last comment, you know, as far as my comments, I’m not speaking about legality of independent contractor, I’m stating my preference.

WURDEMAN: That would be a request for -, under the Procurement Code, for professional services.

HIGASHI: So, Mr. Chair, just to simplify this thing, we’re going to vote on the question. Could we have a straw vote, independent contractor versus employee, and then move on with the regular vote?

RAY: Okay.

HIGASHI: I mean, that’s what we’re boiling down to, right? Get an employee of the Board or some kind of contractual agreement.

RAY: Okay. All in favor of the independent contractor relationship, raise your right hand. Okay. All in favor what do we call the other?

HIGASHI: Employee.

RAY: Employee. Raise your right hand.

??? I guess the Chair breaks the tie.

RAY: Somebody didn’t raise their hand.

HERKES: How about -?

??? It’s six and five.

SANTANGELO: It was six and five.

ALONZO: Five-five, Chairman.

??? Chair, break the tie.

ALONZO: Break the tie.

RAY: Well, I voted for the independent contractor.

(Indiscernible discussion)

RAY: Okay, six-five.

HERKES: So it’s real close.

BALOG: Well, majority rules, you took -. There was a motion on the floor -.

SANTANGELO: Well, not necessarily.

HIGASHI: So you can move who you vote.

SANTANGELO: It’s a straw vote.

HERKES: Yeah.

RAY: Okay.

BESS: I’d like to hear, I mean, are there any arguments I’m missing here about an employee? I’d like to know why you -?

HIGASHI: I’m just -, my reservation is that there may be some technical ends and an independent contractor, somebody could be hired and say I’m an independent contractor and I’m going to do it this way.

HERKES: And what?

HIGASHI: I mean, I’m going to do it this certain way about how we’re going to achieve the goal. It’s a matter of personality. An employee, they don’t cut, you can let them go.

IRVINE: Just fire them.

HIGASHI: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

BALOG: Well, the only reason -, not to raise your eyebrows, Mr. Bess, but after hearing what Mr. Wurdeman said, we, as our business, have a couple times, skirted real -, on a fine line between independent contractor or contractor and employee. The difference is once you start directing that person more than what you should be, you have them report to an office, they do their -, more of their general amount of workload for us rather than their other accounts, you’re really on the fine line, in my opinion, of the labor law. And I’m not somebody like Gary or even like yourself who has legal background. If we want to tell them, you know what, call them up, go call these people, fax this to here, answer a phone, return a call, do -, once we start giving them specific direction as to job duties and what to do, I think it’s a fine line already. That’s why I asked the question. And in my mind, I think it’s more of an employee.

Now even if you hired them as an employee, once I had to make that decision, we can’t hire a -, quote, I think we could even hire an emergency hire or -, I don’t know. I don’t know the State system that well; my wife works in the State, I don’t. But somebody that you could go flexible from maybe ten hours, five hours, 18 hours, and as the job progresses further. But I don’t see -, I can’t see us giving -, we can’t give too much direction to a contractor. We have to tell them here is what we expect of you and do it, and if they don’t meet this, we can’t tell them, hey, bruddah, you late -, you didn’t -, you forgot to put out the notice to the paper. Hey, it’s expected to do it, they’re a contractor, so what’s our option?

BESS: Fire them.

BALOG: Terminate them, then go back out.

SANTANGELO: Violation of contract.

BESS: If one is considered to be an employee and works more than 20 hours, what’s the situation as far as Civil Service or -, you know, an employee of the County in being entitled to all benefits of the County?

YOSHIYAMA: I got to make an assumption, Steve, okay. My assumption is that the person we hire will not be a Civil Service employee, so the Civil Service laws do not apply to this person, okay.

BESS: All right.

YOSHIYAMA: Maybe a union -.

SANTANGELO: So just the State law.

YOSHIYAMA: Contract would and, you know, other type of wage and hour type laws, Federal and State.

BESS: That’s my question, not under the Civil Service but with regard to labor.

RAY: Kevin.

BESS: Contract.

BALOG: I don’t know the name, but I know that it’s done, Jimmy Arakaki’s done it, it was in the news. He hires somebody like Taka Domingo, they work "X" amount of time. They can work "X" amount of time. They have to stay home or whatever, and there’s no benefits or what, I don’t know, that’s what I read in the paper, but I know it’s done in a lot of government facilities. It may not -.

??? That’s the fancy dance that they have.

RAY: That’s the temporary hire. I don’t think we want to -.

BALOG: No, I’m not -, I don’t know -. I’m not saying to follow that, but is there a way -, I’m just trying to find out from Gary because he knows more about government hiring, is there a way you can hire somebody flexibly and not have to worry about what’s on some of the people’s mind, like Mr. Bess, this benefit package. That’s what I’m trying to find out.

HIGASHI: The medical, only you’re losing the medical, I mean, you know.

BALOG: Well, the medical is 200 bucks a month, it’s no big deal.

SANTANGELO: The same, TDI, workmen’s comp.

HIGASHI: I think when we advertise the job, it’s $25,000, the whole shooting match packet. We figure what workmen’s comp is, we figure vacation, they get vacation after one year. We go one day less than one year, you can give them the money, you know, so -. All she’s talking about, that’s all we can expend, right, $25,000?

HERKES: Without doing a procurement, but we can do procurement, if you want.

WURDEMAN: If you hire an employee, you’re in a different -.

HIGASHI: We don’t need the procurement then.

HERKES: You’re in a different -, yeah. So we’re not under that procurement law, it’s an employee of the County.

WURDEMAN: Now you’re under Civil Service law.

HERKES: Yeah. And we’re leaving an employee after a year. You can’t ever fire one, so you leave them here.

BALOG: Well, what happened to the last secretaries from all the last Charter Commissions?

HERKES: They’re probably still -.

BALOG: I don’t see them around.

HERKES: Working for the County.

BALOG: I doubt it. I got my doubts about that.

RAY: Pardon?

??? As I said, if you do it on a temporary basis, you can eliminate the position, right?

??? Yeah, I would suggest -.

??? Without -.

??? Don’t go permanent.

??? Repercussions.

YOSHIYAMA: You know, it’s too much of a problem.

BALOG: That’s what I mean, yeah. Whatever it is, but don’t make it permanent.

??? Temporary six to eight or months or whatever the case may be.

BALOG: Because just a clarification, temporary hires don’t have vacation and sick leave, huh.

YOSHIYAMA: Not necessarily, yeah.

BALOG: Yeah.

YOSHIYAMA: Some do, some don’t.

HIGASHI: Mr. Chair, I think has been discussed.

YOSHIYAMA: I hear the whole ball of wax.

HIGASHI: Sufficiently, so we should vote on the motion and -, the majority takes over and we move in.

RAY: Okay. Will this motion deal with this? What is the -?

YOSHIYAMA: The motion is for the job description, per se. Could we vote for it and then have our committee look into what options we have from hire? Is that reasonable?

BALOG: Well, the motion was to vote for -.

IRVINE: A contract.

BALOG: An independent contractor.

HIGASHI: Contractor.

SANTANGELO: Go for contractor.

HERKES: Actually, the motion says -.

BALOG: Whatever.

HERKES: Contract.

RAY: Contract.

HERKES: An administrative assistant -.

HIGASHI: Right.

HERKES: For the Commission.

HIGASHI: Right.

HERKES: Right?

HIGASHI: Right.

BALOG: Whatever that right word is.

RAY: Okay. Does everybody understand the motion?

SANTANGELO: Mr. Wurdeman has some information?

HIGASHI: Any -?

HERKES: Are you reading to us, Mr. Wurdeman?

SANTANGELO: Are you going to read us a bedtime story, Mr. Wurdeman?

RAY: Okay. All in favor, raise your right hand? Five. The motion doesn’t carry.

BALOG: Well, I’ll make a motion right away because I just want to move on.

RAY: Okay.

BALOG: I want to make a motion that we hire a temporary employee for -, what that word?

WURDEMAN: Ninety days.

IRVINE: Administrative assistant.

BALOG: Administrative assistant. What did you say, Mr. Corp. Counsel?

WURDEMAN: Temporary is limited to 90 days.

IRVINE: Oh.

HERKES: Temporary is 90 days?

BALOG: Well -.

HERKES: We’ll keep hiring them.

BALOG: An employee. Now I’m going to get stuck, Gary.

IRVINE: Yeah. I don’t think we understand what we’re doing. Nobody knows -.

BALOG: Well, you know what, I just -, if that’s the case, forget the word temporary. I’m going to make a motion we hire an employee to be an administrative assistant and have the committee of the administrative assistant/secretary come up with qualifications and advertise it and come back to the Commission, hopefully, within the same reasonable time frame that was done with the attorney.

RAY: Okay. Is there a second?

YOSHIYAMA: Second.

ALONZO: Second, Mr. Chairman.

RAY: Discussion?

HERKES: I need the motion repeated.

BALOG: Oh, my God. That’s why we need an administrative assistant/secretary.

HERKES: No, we need some straight talking. Hire an employee, an administrative assistant.

BALOG: An employee who is an administrative assistant/secretary.

HIGASHI: Just administrative assistant.

BALOG: Or just administrative assistant; forget the word secretary.

HERKES: Okay. And have the secretarial subcommittee draw up a job description and advertise.

BALOG: And advertise.

RAY: How do we -? Any discussion? How do we deal with the permanent or, you know, temporary nature of the thing? I mean, obviously, we don’t want to get into a long-term relationship with somebody. I mean, this is -.

HIGASHI: Obviously, when the Commission goes, there’s no more position.