BMRC Synopsis 3-1-17City of Atlantic Beach
Board Member Review Committee
Synopsis of Suggestions from the meeting of the 1n of March 2017
ATTENDANCE:
Board Member Solomon Brotman - City Clerk Donna Bartle
Board Member Jennifer Lada City Clerk Aide Joame Bowman
Commissioner John Stinson
RESIDENTS IN ATTENDANCE:
Ms. Judy Workman
Mr. Chris Jorgensen
1) Purpose of the Meeting
a) The meeting was called to order at 6:00 pm.
b) Approve the minutes of the Committee meeting of the 17N of November 2016
and of the 19th of January 2017.
c) Discuss the concepts discussed and proposed by the Board chairs and
liaisons to improve recruitment and retention of new Board members.
2) Courtesy of the Floor
a) Mr. Chris Jorgensen expressed concerns about multiple Boards and
Committees meeting on the same date and time, thus preventing citizens
from attending most if not all Board or Committee meetings or other City
gatherings.
b) Ms. Judy Workman asked "what does the BMRC do?' She expressed concern
that not enough oversight was provided to other Boards by the BMRC.
3) Board Discussion
a) Recruitment of members
i) Utilizing prepared "marketing materials", recruit citizens who had prior
leadership experience and by hosting a booth at social events held within
the City, including Art Walk, Farmer's Markets, Cultural Arts & Recreation
Advisory Committee events or other gatherings within the City.
ii) Ensure that upon appointment, new members understand the
expectation they should immediately begin to evaluate and consider
residents to nominate as their replacements at the time of their exit from
service to the BMRC.
iii) Standardization of all Boards and Committees in how they function and
operate would increase the pool of potential applicants for the BMRC.
iv) Encourage BMRC members to attend City Commission meetings and
other Board or Committee meetings, request City Commission members
attend at least one meeting of every Board annually, and share agendas
and minutes of every Board or Committee meeting with the City
Commission.
b) Training
I) Include requirements and expectations for membership to the BMRC
when interviewing prospective candidates.
(1) Requirements and expectations might include;
(a) Sunshine Law training completed within a certain time frame
annually;
(b) Ethics training completed within a certain time frame annually;
(c) Roberts Rules of Order training;
(d) Financial disclosure form submission and explanation;
(e) Mandatory attendance, with limits on the number of meetings
missed annually;
(f) Make required training available to applicants prior to
interviewing the applicant for an open position.
c) Mentoring
i) Ensure prospective candidates understand and accept that they would be
expected to mentor new members for a period of up to one year, as they
are exiting service to the BMRC.
(1) Utilizing BMRC members who have termed out to mentor new
members eliminates any Sunshine Law violation concerns;
(2) And, utilizing these outgoing members takes advantage of their
experience on the BMRC as well as their professional experiences and
education.
ii) Inquire with the City Attorney about City Commission members talking to
other Board and Committee members and how the Sunshine Law views
such interaction.
iii) Inquire with the City Attorney about the CARAC members meeting or
communicating about logistics for Committee approved events.
d) Evaluation
i) Annual or perhaps semi-annual reports made by the BMRC (and other
Boards and Committees) representatives to the City Commission
detailing challenges, successes and other accomplishments.
ii) Contact the Non -Profit Resource Center of NE Florida about assisting with
a 360° performance evaluation using information such as attendance,
training completion, etc. that avoids any personal assessments but
focuses on metrics that are part of the public domain.
iii) City Commission member attendance at least annually to at least one of
each Board or Committee meeting is believed to encourage a higher
standard of performance by Board and Committee members.
e) Retention
I) Use of alternates for the BMRC was discussed.
ii) A recommendation to split the CARAC into an Arts Board and a separate
Recreation Board was discussed.
f) Closing Comments
I) A question regarding the revision of standards creating and governing
City Boards and Committees was raised during the closing comments. The
BMRC members in attendance believe it would be in the best interest of
the City, both financially and in the essence of time, for the BMRC working
closely with the Chairs of each Board and Committee, as well as with the
respective liaisons, to host two to three working sessions to compare,
revise and draft new language that would standardize and normalize
these groups more similarly. After such drafts were complete, these
documents could be submitted to the City Attorney for review and further
revision and then presented to the City Commission for approval and
adoption.
ii) The final request discussed during closing comments was the utilization
of City (COAB.us) email addresses for each Board and Committee
member. Such use would ensure archival of communications and
essentially eliminate the need for FOIA requests to be completed by those
outside the City framework.
4) Adjournment
a) The meeting was adjourned at 7:30 pm after allowing the public to have final
courtesy of the floor.