01/03/2008: "Part Time Council? Some More Than Others"

Out of the approximate 200 work days in 2007, the County Council formally met 76 times. Less than half of those meetings lasted 2 hours or less, and the remaining lasted about 5 hours each. Of those 76 meetings, Councilman Bob Myhr set the record for the year, missing over 20% of the meetings (we count 23.68%), with Ranker coming in second, having missed 17% of the meetings.

Councilman Rich Peterson missed 6% of the meetings, Alan Lichter missed 2%, and only Gene Knapp and Rosenfeld had 100% attendance.

Of the 18 meetings Myhr missed, 11 were (by our count) unexcused, and only 3 of Ranker’s 13 absents were unexcused. Myhr stated off his record pace by missing 6 meetings in a row. The Charter states that “An elective office shall become vacant when…a legislative body member [is] absent from three (3) consecutive regular meetings without reasonable cause”, or “..absence from the County for thirty (30) days without being excused…”

It was not until April that the question of excused absences was raised by Councilmen Gene Knapp and Alan Lichter. Lichter said be believed it would be helpful when excusing an absence to know what the standards are for an excuse. Ranker suggested the Council could create a procedure; but that was the end of the discussion.

From that point on there was an increased attention by the Council to formally state an absence was excused, but never that an absence was unexcused; although there were times when an absence was simply ignored without any statement made by the Council. There were two times that a motion was made to excuse Ranker that were approved, but Myhr abstained from voting for the motions.

What was absent from many of the formal granting of an excused absence was a reason or justification. On more than one occasion the Council was asked the reason for granting an excuse, and the response from the Chair to one such request for an explanation was “I have no idea.”

The meetings missed were the formal meetings, and of course do not reflect time members spent preparing for the meetings, and the informal meetings with groups and individuals that can occur thoughout a work week, or meetings that may include additional members, but are not formal meetings.

While the hours spent outside of formal meetings has been factored in by the Salary Commission when it sets the commission salary (Related Story) -and is a hotly contested debate between those who are on the old pay scale, and those who are on the current salary- but it is a separate question from how many meetings can be missed without having an impact on County government.

On those occasions when both Myhr and Ranker were absent, Councilman Rich Peterson said the absences of more than one council member at a time was slowing down the work of the Council, and suggested upcoming absences should be know in advance to insure the Council would have a quorum.

That was the last discussion of the topic in 2007.