During the last Lompoc City Council meeting of 2019, council members reviewed the need for the commissions/committees that have been established for many decades. The question should have been “Are they effective?” But the real questions are “Does anyone care what they are doing?” and “Are they helpful to the council or constituents?”
The stated purpose of this discussion was: “Give direction to staff on whether to modify or eliminate the Economic Development Committee and … whether to modify or eliminate any other current commission or committee.” Councilman Victor Vega had previously advocated for the elimination of the Economic Development Committee, but he met with stiff headwinds.
The stated purpose of commissions and committees is to provide input to the City Council on matters within the departments they are advisory for. It is rare that any of them provide any advice to the council and those that have, such as the public safety committee, are usually “thanked for their input” and then ignored.
I served on two commissions and one committee as an appointee for more than 23 years. While on the Water Commission, now merged with the Electric Commission to form the Utility Commission, it was rare that the public ever attended any of our meetings. The agendas were repetitive and, except for one item, construction of a new water treatment plant laboratory and administrative office building, we never provided any other recommendations to the council.
I also served on the Committee to Oversee Park and Pool Maintenance tax bond. Again, not one member of the public ever showed up at any of the meetings and eventually the committee was disbanded, and the council took over the task. Of course, this is contrary to the purpose of a citizen oversight committee, but if no one wants to serve and no one attends the meetings, why waste time on it?
The last commission I was privileged to serve on was the Planning Commission. In 16 years of service, some meetings filled council chambers with members of the public, many of whom offered public comment, but many other meetings had no public attendance.
When the public did provide input, it was very helpful in crafting recommendations on public policy for the council to consider. In many cases, the council agreed with the recommendations and in some cases, they changed it, but the input was never ignored.
The average commissions/committee meeting lasts a little more than an hour and the cost to support all of these meetings is about $116,000 per year. Planning Commission meetings are usually funded by developers’ fees.
During the Dec. 17 commissions/committee discussion, no members of the general public spoke, but a few commissioners from various commissions made some very good points. For example, they pointed out that while the city fulfills its basic responsibility by posting the agendas on the City Hall bulletin board, very few people know when meetings will occur or what will be discussed.
So, it’s clear that either the public doesn’t care about these issues or that they just don’t know when the commissions/committees meet or what they are going to talk about.
Others pointed out that instead of the council directing change from the top down, that they should engage the various commissions to find out how to improve the product. As far as I can tell, this has never been done.
There was something of a change in the council dynamic during this discussion. The usual “coordinated agreement” of the three amigos was missing. In fact, they each disagreed with statements the other two were making concerning this issue.
When Councilmember Vega suggested the elimination of the Economic Development Committee, neither of the other two would agree with him, and, when Councilmember Jim Mosby said that the problem of public access had been solved by moving all the meetings to City Hall, Councilmemeber Dirk Starbuck had to correct him, saying that a couple of commissions still meet at other locations.
The value of these commission/committees is that they can answer questions concerning specific issues in a less formal setting. Many times, only a few people want to know about specific issues, so this saves council meeting time.
So, what needs to be done? First, there needs to be a clearly defined role and expectations for each group. Second, the city should require an annual report of commission activities, including public participation, issues discussed, problems that were resolved at the commission level, and recommendations made to the council when issues cannot be resolved by the commissions.
The City Council ultimately decided to eliminate the Senior Commission, which hadn’t met in more than two years, and create an ad hoc committee of two council members to study the issue with each commission before proposing any changes.
Overhauling the Handbook for Commission, Committees, and Board Members and the purpose and authority of each is long overdue. We’ll have to wait and see what they do.
Ron Fink writes to the Sun from Lompoc. Send your thoughts, comments, and opinionated letters to letters@santamariasun.com.
This article appears in Jan 2-9, 2020.