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Approved 1/4/2017 8 appreciate. I’m still a little bummed about the non-quorum issue but I understand why it’s in place at the quarterly 371 public hearings. But I think it’s good for the public to be able to come and comment more often and I think it’s good 372 for us to hear their comments. 373 374 Lydia Wegman: I would agree with that. 375 376 Kim Piracci: Not very many of us go to the quarterly public hearings, do we? 377 378 Perdita Holtz: Well that was a little bit of the problem with that. Having the quorum as a requirement in order to hold 379 the public hearing and there were a couple of hearings where we were on the phone trying to get Planning Board 380 members to the hearing and the hearing started half an hour late while somebody came. And I do recall one 381 specific hearing where there were like 100 people in the room that had to wait half an hour. That was really when 382 the BOCC said, “We might have to look at how we do these”. But this year now that it’s no longer a quorum 383 requirement it doesn’t seem like there’s a quorum of Planning Board members at public hearings. 384 385 Laura Nicholson: That was the reason I was opposed to it initially because if you don’t require it sometimes people 386 don’t feel the need to come, and second what does that say about us as a Planning Board when we can’t even get 387 a quorum together for a meeting? That says that we’re all disengaged, and that doesn’t really speak volumes. 388 389 Lydia Wegman: I would just speak for myself, I don’t feel disengaged but I do travel a lot which has made it hard for 390 me to go to all of the meetings. And so for me personally I am grateful that things can move forward even if I’m not 391 there. And Tony has been great about being there. Others have as well. And I do feel bad about not being able to 392 be there but I just wouldn’t assume it means disengagement. 393 394 Buddy Hartley: The one that she was talking about, I came back from vacation to get there so they’d have a 395 quorum. So I think that it’s probably a good idea that we are not having to have quorums. 396 397 Kim Piracci: Right. But, ok I still feel so new… We should either be there or we shouldn’t whether we’re required or 398 not? 399 400 Perdita Holtz: You’re supposed to come. It just means that the public hearing is not going to be held up just 401 because there’s not a quorum of Planning Board members. 402 403 Kim Piracci: Ok, and you’re supposed to go because… 404 405 Patricia Roberts: It’s a joint meeting between the BOCC and the Planning Board so the idea is that we would be 406 there. I’m not sure that we’ve done the best job in the on boarding process because it took me a long time as a new 407 member to realize that it wasn’t just the monthly meetings and there’s the quarterly public hearing as well. As so I 408 think that that could be the missing link. Like on the website, when it has the job description it doesn’t really saying, 409 “And attendance of the quarterly public hearing”. 410 411 Perdita Holtz: It does now. Because of what you had said I made sure they changed that. 412 413 Kim Piracci: Ok so when I’m there, it’s usually going over what we go over here and what we approve? 414 415 Perdita Holtz: Right because you’re now making a recommendation earlier in the process than the Planning Board 416 used to. Formally the Planning Board didn’t make a recommendation until after the quarterly public hearing and that 417 made it so that items that were low controversy actually took longer because it had to go back to the Planning 418 Board in order to get a recommendation. And so it is kind of a big deal that those 7 that were adopted the night of 419 the hearing. Formerly that would’ve taken anywhere from 4-8 weeks longer. 420 421 Tony Blake: And the Commissioners do want you there and they will often ask you for comments or ask if there are 422 general Planning Board comments. 423