HomeMy WebLinkAboutSpecial Council November 30 20041
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DISCLAIMER: This document contains the Whatcom County Council or Committee
minutes, as approved. However, unless an attested signature page is attached, they
are not the final approved minutes.
WHATCOM COUNTY COUNCIL
Special County Council
November 30, 2004
Council Chair Dan McShane called the meeting to order at 10:30 a.m. in the
Council Chambers, 311 Grand Avenue, Bellingham, Washington.
Present:
Barbara Brenner
Laurie Caskey- Schreiber
Sam Crawford
Seth Fleetwood
Sharon Roy
Absent:
L. Ward Nelson
1. NOMINATION AND APPOINTMENT OF INTERIM DISTRICT COURT
JUDGE (AB2004 -359)
Crawford nominated Lee Grochmal.
Brenner nominated David Rhea.
Fleetwood nominated Warren Page.
Caskey- Schreiber nominated David Grant.
Crawford voted for Grochmal.
Fleetwood voted for Page.
McShane voted for Grant.
Brenner voted for Rhea.
Caskey- Schreiber voted for Grant.
Roy voted for Grant.
Roy stated there are four outstanding candidates. She would be happy with
any of them. The references for Mr. Page were outstanding. There is amazing
support across the board. He has a very judge -like demeanor. David Rhea has the
experience and is willing to hold the spot for them. Lee Grochmal had an
outstanding interview, and was very succinct and on- target. Mr. Grant's interview
was very strong. In his packet and interview, he articulated the issues with District
Court in a clearly analytical way. Mr. Grant has a breadth of experience with both
Whatcom County Council Special Meeting, 11/30/2004, Page 1
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DISCLAIMER: This document contains the Whatcom County Council or Committee
minutes, as approved. However, unless an attested signature page is attached, they
are not the final approved minutes.
criminal and civil issues. He has experience as a police officer. She is impressed
that Mr. Grant has two advanced degrees, including a Master's Degree and a
Doctorate. Mr. Grant did the best job in the interview talking about issues related
to the court and possible solutions. He displayed thinking outside of the box and
did an excellent job.
Brenner stated she agreed that all candidates are incredibly outstanding.
She feels strongly about her support for David Rhea. The Council is thrown into a
public process. She respects the public process. She doesn't want to substitute
herself for the public process. Mr. Rhea would be an excellent place- keeper. She
received many phone calls from people who say what a fair guy Mr. Rhea has been.
That is very important to her. She's comfortable with whomever becomes judge.
She's not comfortable giving anyone a leg up on the next election when they're all
of the same exact stature. Mr. Rhea is the best person to continue until they have
the next public election.
Caskey- Schreiber stated she agreed that the candidate pool is excellent.
They would all make excellent judges. She appreciates Mr. Rhea giving the Council
an option that is palatable. However, Mr. Grant would make a fantastic judge. To
avoid the perception that the Council is making a biased decision, she put Mr. Grant
under more scrutiny. She was very impressed during the interview that he
communicated innovative ideas and marketed himself as a fair person who will
always fall back on the law and not his personal opinions of something. That's the
best thing they can do for Whatcom County. Deliver a competent judge who can
continue the track of service for the County. David Grant is that person. She has
grown to know him over the years. She could have lost respect for his abilities, but
her respect has grown and grown. His future is unlimited. He's very competent.
Anyone who has an opportunity to work with him will recognize that. Don't punish
him because he has worked with the Council.
Crawford stated the Council had a productive conversation after the
interviews. It is appropriate at this time to acknowledge that the majority is in
favor of David Grant. He will make an excellent judge, as will the others. However,
they need to move on. The courts deserve an appointment. He will change his
vote to David Grant. He encouraged the other councilmembers to do so, so there is
a unanimous vote. That doesn't change the way he feels about the other
candidates, one of whom was his first choice. It's time to move on. Mr. Grant will
do an excellent job.
Fleetwood stated he had hoped there would be a process in place to deal
with this situation. He strongly supports Warren Page. All applicants passed the
test of fairness and impartiality. Each councilmember had to come up with how
much weight to give each criteria, in their own minds. The interview itself shouldn't
be given extraordinary weight. Consider the information in the packets. Mr. Page
has a breadth of diversity of references. When he weighed that with his
experience, he choose Mr. Page as his favorite. All the applicants have great
capacity and will do a great job.
Whatcom County Council Special Meeting, 11/30/2004, Page 2
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DISCLAIMER: This document contains the Whatcom County Council or Committee
minutes, as approved. However, unless an attested signature page is attached, they
are not the final approved minutes.
McShane stated that David Grant is the new interim District Court Judge
because Councilmember Crawford changed his vote to David Grant.
2. WORK SESSION ON THE COMPREHENSIVE PARKS AND RECREATION
OPEN SPACE PLAN (AB2004 -363)
Mike McFarlane, Parks and Recreation Department Director, stated they are
in the beginning stages of working on the Comprehensive Parks and Open Space
plan. The plan was last updated in 1989. The plan is required for funding. Not
having a valid plan has been a hindrance in terms of acquiring matching grant
funds for acquisition and development of parks. The original intent was to include
the plan in the County's master facilities plan, but it was pulled. He is asking for a
plan to address parks and recreation development in the county for 20 to 50 years.
Out of the plan will come policy changes. Having dealt with the Comprehensive
Plan and levels of service, the plan will address those issues and bring forward
changes to the Comprehensive Plan. A steering committee will meet weekly and
there will also be a public process. First, he wants to address the Council and
Planning Commission to discuss concerns and issues.
Tom Beckwith, Beckwith Consulting Group, et al, submitted information (on
file). He discussed his background and team members. There are 18 tasks
grouped based on their emphases. The first task is a retreat with the Council and
Planning Commission, which is what they are doing now.
The second task is an inventory of sites and facilities. They do a lot of
outreach in task four. During that task, they want to find out the agendas of
interested parties, what is working, and what is not working, and what they foresee
for the future.
Tasks five and six have to do with the dynamics of population changes,
future demand, and future financial information. They will have to anticipate those
conclusions over the next five to 20 years. The question is how to respond to
changes.
They will lay out some alternatives that are possible, then create draft plan
elements. They will bring user group representatives in to look at different
elements of the plan.
Tasks 14 through 16 will create an implementation strategy. The most
important task is task 15, which is a mail out and phone back survey. The survey
will include choices on the proposals and the financial implications. The summary
asks what the priorities are, the financial strategy they should use, and how much
people are willing to pay for. From that, they will develop a priority list and
financial plan with voter support. Through task 15, they have been able to get very
specific with those questions.
Whatcom County Council Special Meeting, 11/30/2004, Page 3
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DISCLAIMER: This document contains the Whatcom County Council or Committee
minutes, as approved. However, unless an attested signature page is attached, they
are not the final approved minutes.
Crawford asked if they would have a hard time getting people to respond.
Beckwith stated they will survey people who are interested in doing the survey.
They've found in the past that many people want to participate. It's a popular
subject. The survey is extremely useful. Without the survey, the plan could be
based on advocacy or would not be too conservative. That won't work.
Roy asked if the survey is done by people who know how to develop
representative samples of the county residents. There is a very diverse
community. Beckwith stated the opinion sampling group has worked with him for
the last 26 years to do 35 surveys. It is the largest group in the State of
Washington. They've done such surveys for cities in Whatcom County.
Roy stated she is concerned about amalgamating all the data in the county.
They might get a different picture if they looked at what people from different areas
of the county want. Attend to those different regional responses. Beckwith stated
they would look at each of the subgroups.
The survey can provide some big surprises. For instance, the highest thing
on the survey may be wildlife conservation and trails development. However, it's
been different in different counties. Open space and wildlife have been the things
what most people are interested in.
People are willing to pay for those attributes if they can measure how they
are paid for and exactly where the money is going to go. They've been able to test
a variety of different ways to pay for parks.
Roy stated this sounds wonderful. It looks like they've done a lot of work
before they get to that point, including creating an implementation plan. That
seems backwards. It seems the survey ought to come before the planning.
Beckwith stated task five also involves survey. They like to do the scientific,
registered voter survey last. They've done other plans where they do the survey
first. They found that issues come up later. It's more effective to use the hard
survey approach at the end, and the soft survey at the beginning. Public
involvement will occur throughout the process.
Roy stated she would like a list of the steering committee members and who
the members represent. She also would like to know where the meetings will take
place. The underlying issue for her is whether this process will be inclusive of all in
the county. Beckwith stated the steering committee has about 24 members,
including city, county, state, and private representatives. The committee is
designed to be as representative as possible. They haven't yet scheduled meeting
locations.
Quantifying the County's roles and responsibilities is a key component of the
plan. Over the years, the definition of parks and leisure has expanded to almost
everything that isn't work or a job. It's about quality of life. Identify the factors
that determine whether an environment, facility, or program is regional, local, or a
Whatcom County Council Special Meeting, 11/30/2004, Page 4
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DISCLAIMER: This document contains the Whatcom County Council or Committee
minutes, as approved. However, unless an attested signature page is attached, they
are not the final approved minutes.
special service. Once the regional and local services are determined, determine the
level of service (LOS) for each, who their sponsors are, and what their funding
levels will be.
The Growth Management Act (GMA) says they must have a funding strategy
to fit the LOS. He's found that they have to project the consequences out for
twenty years, and then back off to find a financial strategy that is effective for the
six years.
The steering committee members created a list of all the park, recreation,
and open space issues.
(Clerk's Note: End of tape one, side A.)
Beckwith continued to state that some of the major components of the issues
identified by the steering committee include habitat and open space, distribution of
parks between rural and urban areas, revenue and stability of the parks system,
maintenance and funding, and a plan that is opportunistic and flexible.
Fleetwood asked if the issue of preservation of open space habitat includes a
process to identify those places. Beckwith stated it does. The working process
would be to identify those areas.
He asked the Council to add to the list of issues.
Fleetwood asked if long -range implementation could be more difficult
because they have so much open space to begin with, which makes it difficult to
rate highly for grant programs. Beckwith stated grant monies are drying up
drastically for park and recreation uses. At the State level, the grants are based on
the maximum benefit for the maximum number of people or strategic opportunities
for which they can package other grant resources. For example, the Foothills trail
has been funded with several different grant sources, but it has not gotten any
money for traditional parks. That's what they will see locally. Grants will not fund
the facilities, but this plan will make them competitive in selecting areas. Trails and
open space corridors are easier to get money for. If something has wide public
support, don't use general fund money on it. Go out and ask the public for funding
for it.
Lee Springgate, Point Wilson Group, discussed the history of the King County
parks system. He liked that Whatcom County is taking a good, long, hard look at
its role, vision, and financing strategy for parks for the next ten to 20 years.
Whatcom County has a lot to learn from King County.
Roy stated she likes the idea of evaluating and prioritizing the land they
have. It's a weakness locally. She asked who in King County would be responsible
for bringing in commercial sponsors to support parks. She asked who convinces
the commercial businesses to put up a sign in a park. Beckwith stated the Parks
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DISCLAIMER: This document contains the Whatcom County Council or Committee
minutes, as approved. However, unless an attested signature page is attached, they
are not the final approved minutes.
Director and Parks Manager has that responsibility. They are still trying to make
that idea work. Many jurisdictions are deciding where the user has a greater
responsibility to pick up a share of the cost and where it is in the public's interest to
support with taxes. They can identify what is a private good and what is a public
good.
Brenner asked if they are finding that user -ship is going down. Beckwith
stated it is not going down dramatically. That did happen with the State parks.
McShane stated the State's decision of public good versus the private good
seemed to be a blanket policy. Some parks were being used by a select group of
individuals. Beckwith agreed. They shouldn't be so uniform in the application of
that policy.
Brenner asked why King County approved a levy for only four years.
Beckwith stated the reason was because of the almost uniform distress to local
governments. King County felt it should check in with voters after four years. A
time limit was a recommendation of the committee and a result of the survey.
Brenner asked if there is a sunset on the conservations future fund levy.
McShane stated there isn't.
Beckwith asked the councilmembers to submit any issues they want to add
to the list.
Caskey- Schreiber asked for a list of steering committee members and
notification of time and place of the steering committee meetings.
ADJOURN
The meeting adjourned at 11:41 a.m.
Jill Nixon, Minutes Transcription
The Council approved these minutes on January 11 , 2005.
ATTEST:
Dana Brown- Davis, Council Clerk
WHATCOM COUNTY COUNCIL
WHATCOM COUNTY, WASHINGTON
Dan McShane, Council Chair
Whatcom County Council Special Meeting, 11/30/2004, Page 6