Sloppy Minutes
[NOTE] The chart has been updated to reflect the additional minutes that Sauceda lost track of more than seven months ago. One wonders why he did not notice that he was never signing the minutes that go into the book. That red band of missing minutes says more about his administrative competence than I can say in 10,000 words. [29APR07]
Marfa city government can be divided into two parts, creation of policy and implementation of policy. The governing body creates policy; the city administrator implements these policies with city employees. The record of minutes is the official documentation of city council policy decisions. It is the minutes that tie policy creation to policy implementation and provide the documentation of the votes of council on action items, resolutions, ordinances, agreements, contracts and budgets.
Every functional organization operates by meetings and minutes: cities, counties, states, nations, businesses, churches, and non-profits. Minutes are an integral part of organized cooperation of people. Every official action of the council is documented in the minutes. Robert's Rules of Order (newly revised) says that minutes are to be kept in a "substantial book or binder." In theory, that is Marfa's system of storing minutes.
The minutes for Marfa's city council meetings have been poorly managed since Florencio Sauceda took office. The process is fairly simple: the city clerk records the meeting and makes notes about attendance, motions, votes and reports from mayor, administrator and council. The clerk types up the minutes for the administrator who forwards the minutes to council and places the minutes on the agenda for approval. Council reviews the minutes and can delay action or approve the minutes with or without corrections. After the minutes are approved and required corrections are made, the minutes are prepared for filing. The minutes are filed by printing them on special legal-sized, pre-numbered ledger paper, and getting the signatures of the mayor and administrator. These pre-numbered pages are then returned to the substantial binder that contains the official record of minutes for the city.
Organizations strive to have the minutes available for approval at the following meeting. In this way, the participants have a fresh memory to confirm that the minutes accurately reflect the events. If the minutes are not approved, the record is not official. Approval consists of the vote of council and attesting signatures from the mayor and administrator.
Sloppy minutes leads to an interesting Catch-22. If the minutes for a meeting are not approved, then action on the agenda item that approves the previous meeting minutes are not properly recorded. For example, if the minutes for early May are approved in late May, but the minutes for late May are not properly recorded, then the minutes for both meetings are in a questionable state.
I have reviewed Marfa's meeting minutes since May 2004. This review started with an attempt to look up minutes from the last year that relate to grants. The information presented here is based on a variety of sources of minutes including approved minutes and minutes presented to council before approval. Unfortunately, the city's official records are not in the best shape. An overall picture emerges that suggests poor management of the minutes.
During the nine or ten months before Sauceda arrived, the minutes were handled in a timely way even as the city went through a period of change after Curtis Schrader departed and Henry Moon served as interim administrator. It appears that all minutes during that time were approved and were approved in timely manner. On average, minutes were approved 26 days (~4 weeks) after the meeting and never more than six weeks after the meeting.
In the two years since Sauceda took over, the minutes were approved 41 days (~6 weeks) after the meeting on average. On eight occasions, minutes for three or more meetings were presented to council at one time. On June 30, 2005, Sauceda presented council with minutes for seven meetings at one time. Minutes for at least one meeting were presented to council for approval twice. Minutes for at least five meetings were never approved by council. In one case, minutes were not presented to council until five months after the meeting. Minutes for a meeting seven months ago still have not been presented to council. During 42 regular meetings, no minutes were presented to council in 14 meetings, one-third of the time.
The bigger picture emerges when the data is looked at in a chart. Click on the chart below to see a full-size PDF of the chart. Each bar indicates the number of days after the meeting until the minutes were approved by council. Yellow bars indicate minutes that took 61 days or more for approval. Red bars indicate minutes that it appears council never approved.
Disclaimer: This chart is based on approved and unapproved copies of the minutes and is believed to be accurate. While minor discrepancies might exist, the overall picture is clear. Here are some other observations about this situation:
Proper and timely approval of the minutes are the responsibility of the city administrator. Sauceda might try to blame the current bookkeeper. However, this situation existed long before the current city staff. He might try to blame it on previous employees. However, the situation clearly was handled well by this same staff under the direction of two other administrators. The only source of this inattention to detail is the current administrator. Problems start in March 2005 and continue today.
Some minutes were approved twice and some minutes were never shared with council. No minutes were presented at one-third of the regular meetings. On average, minutes were presented six weeks after the meeting, often in batches. It's possible that some minutes were signed off without council approval.
This deserves more research. Examination of official minutes may clear up or correct some of the statements made here. The poor state of the official minutes makes this difficult. The overall picture presented here is accurate. The minutes were managed well in the ten months before Sauceda arrived and have been poorly managed for the last two years under Sauceda's administration. Without accurate records, it is difficult to understand the decisions made by council. There is no excuse for this lack of attention in an administration.
Marfa city government can be divided into two parts, creation of policy and implementation of policy. The governing body creates policy; the city administrator implements these policies with city employees. The record of minutes is the official documentation of city council policy decisions. It is the minutes that tie policy creation to policy implementation and provide the documentation of the votes of council on action items, resolutions, ordinances, agreements, contracts and budgets.
Every functional organization operates by meetings and minutes: cities, counties, states, nations, businesses, churches, and non-profits. Minutes are an integral part of organized cooperation of people. Every official action of the council is documented in the minutes. Robert's Rules of Order (newly revised) says that minutes are to be kept in a "substantial book or binder." In theory, that is Marfa's system of storing minutes.
The minutes for Marfa's city council meetings have been poorly managed since Florencio Sauceda took office. The process is fairly simple: the city clerk records the meeting and makes notes about attendance, motions, votes and reports from mayor, administrator and council. The clerk types up the minutes for the administrator who forwards the minutes to council and places the minutes on the agenda for approval. Council reviews the minutes and can delay action or approve the minutes with or without corrections. After the minutes are approved and required corrections are made, the minutes are prepared for filing. The minutes are filed by printing them on special legal-sized, pre-numbered ledger paper, and getting the signatures of the mayor and administrator. These pre-numbered pages are then returned to the substantial binder that contains the official record of minutes for the city.
Organizations strive to have the minutes available for approval at the following meeting. In this way, the participants have a fresh memory to confirm that the minutes accurately reflect the events. If the minutes are not approved, the record is not official. Approval consists of the vote of council and attesting signatures from the mayor and administrator.
Sloppy minutes leads to an interesting Catch-22. If the minutes for a meeting are not approved, then action on the agenda item that approves the previous meeting minutes are not properly recorded. For example, if the minutes for early May are approved in late May, but the minutes for late May are not properly recorded, then the minutes for both meetings are in a questionable state.
I have reviewed Marfa's meeting minutes since May 2004. This review started with an attempt to look up minutes from the last year that relate to grants. The information presented here is based on a variety of sources of minutes including approved minutes and minutes presented to council before approval. Unfortunately, the city's official records are not in the best shape. An overall picture emerges that suggests poor management of the minutes.
During the nine or ten months before Sauceda arrived, the minutes were handled in a timely way even as the city went through a period of change after Curtis Schrader departed and Henry Moon served as interim administrator. It appears that all minutes during that time were approved and were approved in timely manner. On average, minutes were approved 26 days (~4 weeks) after the meeting and never more than six weeks after the meeting.
In the two years since Sauceda took over, the minutes were approved 41 days (~6 weeks) after the meeting on average. On eight occasions, minutes for three or more meetings were presented to council at one time. On June 30, 2005, Sauceda presented council with minutes for seven meetings at one time. Minutes for at least one meeting were presented to council for approval twice. Minutes for at least five meetings were never approved by council. In one case, minutes were not presented to council until five months after the meeting. Minutes for a meeting seven months ago still have not been presented to council. During 42 regular meetings, no minutes were presented to council in 14 meetings, one-third of the time.
The bigger picture emerges when the data is looked at in a chart. Click on the chart below to see a full-size PDF of the chart. Each bar indicates the number of days after the meeting until the minutes were approved by council. Yellow bars indicate minutes that took 61 days or more for approval. Red bars indicate minutes that it appears council never approved.
Disclaimer: This chart is based on approved and unapproved copies of the minutes and is believed to be accurate. While minor discrepancies might exist, the overall picture is clear. Here are some other observations about this situation:
- March 8, 2005 and March 24, 2005:
It appears that the minutes from March 8, 2005 were approved twice, once on March 24th and again on April 28th. Furthermore, the same records suggest that the minutes for March 24, 2005 were never approved. One likely explanation (this assumption is illustrated in the chart) is that council actually approved the March 24th minutes on April 28th, and the minutes from April 28th have an error indicating March 8th instead of the 24th. - April 14, 2005:
This was a regular meeting on a Thursday. There was no quorum. Mayor Martinez opened the meeting at 6:00 and adjourned at 6:10. Minutes were typed up. I find no record that these minutes were ever approved. The minutes for April 28th were approved on June 30th, 2005. It should be noted that the minutes for council meetings of April 28, May 10, May 17, May 26, May 31, June 9, and June 14, 2005 were all approved on June 30th. This is seven meetings. Sloppy attention to minutes could easily lead to this oversight. - July 14, 2005:
The minutes for this regular meeting were approved five months later on December 13, 2005. For that reason, they are filed out of order in the official book, right before or after the November 2005 minutes. This was a regular meeting. Subsequent minutes were approved in the typical time frame. - July 28, 2005:
I can find no record that these minutes for a regular meeting were ever approved by council. - November 8, 2005:
It appears that these minutes were approved twice, first on December 13, 2005 and then again on March 14, 2006. The minutes were approved with corrections on December 13th, but that never means that the minutes come back for approval again. - January 10, 2006:
Minutes for this meeting were delayed by three consecutive cancelled city council meetings. The previous meeting could have been approved in 28 days if it had been presented at the January 10 meeting, instead it was approved 91 days after the meeting. - May 16, 2006:
This was a special meeting to canvas the election. Minutes are in the book on page 191, but there is no record that the minutes were ever approved. - September 5, 2006:
This was the public hearing to close out the ORCA pool grant. The minutes were typed. I can find no record that the minutes were ever approved. It is possible that the minutes were approved on September 12th, but... - September 12, 2006:
The minutes for this meeting have never been presented to council.
Proper and timely approval of the minutes are the responsibility of the city administrator. Sauceda might try to blame the current bookkeeper. However, this situation existed long before the current city staff. He might try to blame it on previous employees. However, the situation clearly was handled well by this same staff under the direction of two other administrators. The only source of this inattention to detail is the current administrator. Problems start in March 2005 and continue today.
Some minutes were approved twice and some minutes were never shared with council. No minutes were presented at one-third of the regular meetings. On average, minutes were presented six weeks after the meeting, often in batches. It's possible that some minutes were signed off without council approval.
This deserves more research. Examination of official minutes may clear up or correct some of the statements made here. The poor state of the official minutes makes this difficult. The overall picture presented here is accurate. The minutes were managed well in the ten months before Sauceda arrived and have been poorly managed for the last two years under Sauceda's administration. Without accurate records, it is difficult to understand the decisions made by council. There is no excuse for this lack of attention in an administration.
posted by RobC at 10:34 AM
14 Comments:
That must have taken ALOT of time.
Gathering minutes took a long time. Fortunately, current and past council members were able to supply most minutes. Sorting the information took a while. Spreadsheets make the analysis and charting a snap. Who knew that when you subtract one date from another you get the number of days between them!
Like many problems with this administration, I tripped over this trouble while trying to look up a past council action. Once I started looking, I couldn't stop until I understood the whole picture. And it was quite an eye-opening picture. I'm confident that I know the minutes better than the city does.
Rob, being the modest person you are, I know you don't like thank yous but thank you anyway. You managed to untangle the budget,decipher the pool grant, and now you have wrestled the wild minutes to the ground!
And all of this goes to prove that the two years of Lanman and Sauceda have completely wrecked city government (with some help from council from time to time).
In retrospect, it has been a long wild ride, beginning with the Gracie Parras wars. I understand now that Flo is wanting to set up the permit process. After two years of sandbagging the effort, he wants to make nice. Oh, and I understand that the Mayor has prevailed upon Vilis Inde to come back to BoA. Out of a two-year do-nothing-but-damage tenure, what do we have to show? No permit process, no P&Z committee, no BoA, no signed zoning map, a lot of illegal permits signed by the Mayor(the second lawsuit beside the Rembers has been filed in District Court), a hullaballoo over an unneeded landfill, two loans of about 5+ million, a budget and tax rate derailment, okay, okay. I'll stop now.
I have finally hit upon the answer. Flo has Attention Deficit Disorder! He does no follow-up, no follow-through, total disregard for calendars and guidelines, pontificates mindlessly with officious doublespeak. Got fired for insubordination (misbehaving in class), not following established policy and procedures (running with scissors), not providing requested reports (where is the homework???) excessive absence
The DSM-IV-TR gives these signs of inattention:
Often becoming easily distracted by irrelevant sights and sounds
Often failing to pay attention to details and making careless mistakes
Rarely following instructions carefully and completely losing or forgetting things like toys, or pencils, books, and tools needed for a task
Often skipping from one uncompleted activity to another.
Alert! Flo has been seen with somebody from the engineering firm of Parkhill Smith from Midland. They have not been hired for the Library...couldn't happen unless they were hired by Tom Greenwood under his architect contract. No requests for proposals have been published. We theorize they may be here looking at sites for the recycling. Watch for the agenda!
Don't let him off that easy! I thought he came with experience? This is simple. He gets money. Marfa gets competent work. It looks like we have been shortchanged.
He DOES have experience, experience in hornswoggling cities.
The following is from Border Hotline. When last we saw this loan, Flo and David told us they were going to Austin on February 28 to the TWDBoard meeting to hear if the loan was approved. Never another word from them, as I recall. And further, the council voted to hire a bond attorney firm, a financial advisor, an engineering firm, and the city attorney to put this application together. As the Mayor and Flo said then, just because we apply for it does not mean we have to accept it. This loan requires proof of a public commitment from the citizens. PROOF that the citizens agree to be saddled with repaying this loan.
The following article looks like this loan is pretty much etched in stone.
Marfa gets $1.2 million from state
AUSTIN – Rep. Pete P. Gallego (D- Alpine) announced that the Texas Water Development Board (TWDB) has committed to purchasing $1,265,000 in bonds for waterworks and wastewater improvements for Marfa.
For the first time in Texas history, Texas is using more water than the state is producing. Financial assistants from the Texas Water Development Board allows the local communities to plan for their long-term needs while developing necessary infrastructure with no cost to the taxpayer.
“The TWDB loan from the Clean Water State Revolving Fund- Disadvantaged Community Program are critical in helping Marfa replace deteriorating sewer lines, construct a pond system and improve necessary infrastructure without putting additional strains on the community. This loan will help Marfa lead the way in the construction of water supply, wastewater treatments, flood control, and agricultural water conservation projects,” said Rep. Gallego. “These projects will ensure Marfa will have the water it needs, for years to come.”
Rep. Gallego serves in the House Natural Resources Committee and the Agriculture Committee. He has worked to protect our rivers and parks and has pledged to continue the fight for ranchers and our environment.
What does the article mean when it says "no cost to the taxpayer?" According to Flo and our financial advisor, Larry Skiles, every water user will have to pay an extra $5 per month for the next 20 years to repay this.
When this loan first came up, the question was asked, "How do we pay for all those advisors" if we don't accept the loan? And if we do accept the loan, can we use that money to pay for all those advisors?
My sense is that Marfa needs the $1.2mil water loan at 0%. Even with the inequitable $5/month per account payback. However the larger loan with interest is another animal.
Just to clarify, that "article" was a press release generated by Pete Gallego's office. It was not an original piece of reporting by the Border Hotline.
Revisiting the wastewater loan per Rob's Nov. 2006 blog.
Thursday, November 30, 2006
Wastewater Poll
The latest MarfaGov poll has closed and the results are in! A while ago I created an unscientific poll about options for the wastewater debt to allow people to express their opinion. Forty-two responses came in with about half wanting the city to do both the loan and more grant work. The other half of respondents was split with about one-quarter wanting the city to look for grants first and one-quarter wanting the city to do nothing for now.
Looking at it another way, three-fourths of the respondents wanted the city to pursue grants either first or in combination with a loan. This is perhaps the clearest message for the council to consider. City hall is proceeding along the easy path of loans because that was the option placed in their laps thanks to the hard work of previous administrations.
Marfa's wastewater citations have been mentioned by many. We have not seen all these citations yet, but what we did find indicates that this administration has ignored the situation for a year and a half and are now choosing the most expensive solution. When we received our latest permit in June 2005, the state told us to build an effluent storage pond. This is considerably less work than an entire new treatment plant. The state outlined a twelve-month deadline that expired this past summer to design and build the storage pond. This warning was completely ignored by Mayor Lanman and Administrator Sauceda. A year and a half has passed and nothing was done, and council was not informed.
This simple storage pond is the one thing that the state has required us to do as part of our permit and we are not in compliance. The million-dollar wastewater plant includes a new storage pond and will meet the demands of our most recent permit and then much more. There is no question that this plant is a good thing and part of a long-term solution. The question is if the new plant and the million dollar debt is the right thing right now.
The reasons to move forward with this debt are:
The wastewater plant is 80 years old.
The interest rate is zero percent.
The reasons to not move forward with this debt are:
We do not own and do not have a long lease on the land we will be improving.
The revenue bond is a regressive tax meaning that the poor will pay a larger percentage of their income. In other words, grandma pays the same amount for her one toilet as a hotel pays for all their toilets.
We have not done enough research into grants. Once this administration has a loan, they will not do the extra work to look for grants.
This plant far exceeds the improvements demanded by the state.
We need a new sewer plant. The question is this the best option today? One option is to build a storage pond for now at a much lower cost. Then we can put together an integrated solution that includes a long-term lease, more grants, and a more equitable way to repay the debt. When we have taken the time to structure this deal properly, we can apply for the loan.
posted by RobC at 10:23 AM 5 comments
Post a Comment
<< Home