Selectmen have made it clear that they will meet and not maintain minutes of meetings unless they execute a vote or are in executive session which both require minutes by Maine law. The Selectmen claim for example their Tuesday morning meetings are more informal than the evening meetings and since the public is invited minutes are unnecessary. Technically it may be true, minutes are not “required” but why operate in such a manner?
I believe if Selectmen meet they should record minutes and at a minimum these should include, the topics discussed, matters addressed in reasonable detail and indicate persons in attendance. Having minutes of discussion, action and decision can help protect the town in legal matters and also explain the reasoning for taking a particular course of action now and also to others days, weeks, months and years from now. Minutes are also one of the only tools at the Selectman’s disposal to communicate there work to the residents as well as Selectmen whom may have been absent from a meeting. Detailed minutes also provide the chronology of events so you can demonstrate courses of action and avoid he said, she said, discussion that occurs repeatedly at meetings.
I have sit on many Safety Committees and Project Committees in my life. Minutes were always used as the core tool to manage committee business and action items as well as share the Committees progress on same. It’s my opinion Town business is no different and if anything Town minutes should provide greater disclosure of detail not less. If you compare Lebanon’s minutes to say Wells or Berwick you will see what I mean by the Old / New business philosophy and the detail they include. We compare ourselves to these towns in many other ways why should administrative minutes be any different.
The Selectmen could simply institute policy and start maintaining minutes and improving on them on their own but that would appear unlikely. To require it, a referendum would need to be created and added to the ballot.
What do you think… Am I way off base in my thinking?
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2 responses so far ↓
1 Don Hollenbeck // Mar 21, 2009 at 7:28 am
I agree with Glen on this one!
I am probably with the majority of people when I say this.
This seems like a no brainer, and so much like common sense, I don’t know why it is even a question!
All towns business concerns it’s citizens, and should be documented one way or another so a “He said She said” scenario can’t happen.
I was the only one who was able or willing to attend the March 19th meeting due to my furlough from work, and, I saw what seemed like a typical white collar meeting going on.
There seemed, to me, to be way too much information being passed around to not have minutes of some sort being recorded.
There were people being confronted with information almost every few minutes, it seemed.
Each person being confronted would seem to go right to work making a note of the issue that needed to be addressed, or rushing off out of the meeting to take care of that issue.
This may not seem productive, and it may not be, but I can see why they would work like this.
It seems to be because they all have desks in such near proximity to each other, and the ability to communicate with each other without much wasted time. One person being on the job in the town office behind the counter, at the same time another is behind the desk next to the meeting room, while the others are in the meeting room discussing the towns affairs.
I, personally, think multitasking breaks up focused concentration, but everyone can handle doing things differently.
That’s my opinion, and I’m sticking to it, unless enlightened with a better opinion!
Don
2 Steve Endsley // Mar 25, 2009 at 3:58 pm
I personally think it should go a step further. I think the meeting should have a recorder in it to get everything.
Sometimes things get busy and noisy and some folks do not hear others’ comments. Including the secretary, through no fault of her own. By having the device, the minutes could be accurately produced in its entirety with some one as a convening authority to read along and listen to the tape as validation before posting and killing the tape. Just like in a law office.
Or, the recording could be captured on the computer digitally and burned on a CD for archiving in the event of a rebuttal. Kind of a cover you a$$ tool.
I have tenitis which clouds my hearing when things get real noisy. Then everything becomes one loud din and is hard to discern. If a selectman, would rely on the recording or transcript to make sure I did not miss anything important.
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