I led the Charge on Moving Meetings to the Night

When I was first elected to the County Board, I thought it was odd that the full meetings of the County Board were at 9 a.m.  Nearly every city council, village board, town board, and school board in Washington County meets during the evening hours, to increase public accessibility.  Why is the County Board meeting during the daytime.  It almost seemed like the goal was to keep the public away from the meetings.

When an ordinance change was brought forward in July of 2016, I had only been on the board for 3 months.  The proposed ordinance change would move our meeting times from 9:00 a.m. to 7:30 a.m.  I saw an opportunity to try for night meetings, and I took it.  I let Chairman Gundrum know ahead of time that I would be raising this issue, and found an ally in Supervisor Kelling who would stand with me on this issue. 

When the ordinance was brought forward for discussion, I quickly made a motion to amend the meeting time to 7:00 p.m., and Supervisor Kelling quickly offered a second, so that the motion would be considered.  Concerns were expressed, many of which revolved around the concept that we all ran for office knowing that the meetings would be during the day.  When the dust cleared, the motion fell 2 votes short, and I had to settle for 7:30 a.m. meetings, at least temporarily.  Se my comments from after that meeting here: http://district3bossert.blogspot.com/2016/07/night-meetings-2-votes-short.html.

A contentious highway project heightened the attention on night meetings.  Several angry e-mails from residents from the Town of Hartford accused us of conspiring in secret, at daytime meetings that were difficult to attend.  In one instance, I was communicating with a resident from the Town of Hartford, who indicated that her boss would not let her off from work to attend a County Board meeting about this highway project, and interestingly enough, her boss was a fellow supervisor.

Dennis and I worked together, to continue to push this issue.  Chairman Gundrum formed a committee to develop a proposal for night meetings that allayed the concerns many other had.  Both Supervisor Kelling and myself were put on the committee.

In our work, we developed a proposal to move meetings to the 2nd Wednesday night of the month, the same night my kids have 4H meetings.  The cause is bigger than my commitment, and I can work to find ways to make it work, so I supported the effort.  We also realized that it might not pass if we implemented it immediately, so we delayed the effective date until after the 2018 elections.  Our proposal went in front of the County Board, and this time it passed.  Starting in May, just 2 months from now, we will be meeting on Wednesday evenings.  http://district3bossert.blogspot.com/2017/12/night-meetings-start-in-may.html.

We already have the 1st signs that it is working.  In 2016 there were 4 contested races for County Board Supervisor, and 22 races where someone ran unopposed.  With night meetings, we now have 9 contested races.  I look at some of the incoming Supervisors I've seen, and I see a lot of talent.