Planning Commission Interviews PLUS The Selections
I hope y'all had a great weekend - what a glorious place we live in, right? OK, back to business.
Tuesday evening, January 31, 2017, the Costa Mesa City Council will continue with the process of interviewing candidates for the three commissions that are presently completely vacant. This time it is the Planning Commission candidates that get the attention. More on that in a minute.
Prior to the interviews the City Council will hold a closed session beginning at 4:00 p.m. in City Council Chambers for Public Comments on these items, then moving to Conference Room 5A to discuss labor negotiations with City Manager Tom Hatch. There are four items on the agenda, HERE, that involve the Costa Mesa City Employee Association (CMDEA); the Costa Mesa Firefighters Association (CMFA); the Costa Mesa Division Managers Association (CMDMA) and the Unrepresented Executive employees.
Following that Closed Session the City Council will move to Conference Room 1A, on the First Floor, to begin the Planning Commission candidates interviews. This is scheduled to begin at 5:30 p.m., and Public Comments are permitted in this meeting ONLY on the issue at hand - the interview/process of selecting commissioners. The agenda for that segment of the meeting may be found HERE, including the schedule of interviews.
Each candidate will be interviewed for eleven (11) minutes, just as the candidates for the Senior and Parks and Recreation Commissions were last Tuesday. If they follow the same format as last week, Mayor Katrina Foley will greet each candidate - all the others will be asked to remain out of the room for fairness - then will ask a couple of pre-determined questions. Following those questions the interrogation will rotate among the council members, one question at a time. This takes a great deal of time discipline on the part of the council members. The only exception to time provided that has been made in the past is that candidates being interviewed for two commissions is provided a couple more minutes. Jeff Mathews gets 15 minutes. That interview schedule is presently as follows: (I noticed an aberration on the schedule - Susan Gonzales is provided with 15 minutes - so this schedule may be adjusted.
5:40 p.m. Stephan H. Andranian
5:51 p.m. Byron de Arakal
6:02 p.m. Sarah Bortz
6:13 p.m. Robert L. Dickson, Jr.
6:24 p.m. Teresa Callo Drain
6:35 p.m. Susan Gonzales
6:50 p.m. Jeffrey Harlan
7:01 p.m. Danial Hoffmann
7:12 p.m. Jay Humphrey
7:23 p.m. Isabell Mayer Kerins
7:34 p.m. Jeff R. Mathews (interviewing for Parks and Recreation also)
7:49 p.m. Jenna Tourje
8:00 p.m. Dan Worthington
8:11 p.m. Jonathan Zich
8:22 p.m. Mark Buchanan (I'm not sure what will happen here, since he was already interviewed.)
Upon completion of the interview process the City Council will reconvene in the City Council Chambers at approximately 8:30 for the Appointment Process. As you can see by the agenda notes, this will include an opportunity for Public Comments, too.
Then the fun begins. I'm not going to attempt to explain the process to you. The agenda item goes on at great length - ten (10) steps for this process - in what certainly appears to be a process that reduces the politics of the appointment process. I guess we'll see. I suggest that you go through the exercise yourselves for each commission - try to guess who will nominate whom and run the tallies. I have... Oh Boy!
It is my understanding that the interview segment, as was the case last Tuesday, will be taped for later viewing - so those of you who did not attend can see how the candidates responded to the interrogations. The Appointment Process is being held in Council Chambers and will be televised and streamed live so those of you only interested in the results can follow the process at home.
I suspect that somewhere around 10:00 p.m. we will have three (3) fully staffed and sworn-in commissions and they will be ready to get down to work. The Planning Commission will likely have a couple meetings in February. The Parks and Recreation Commission should be able to meet in February, too. The Senior Commission only meets every other month and their next scheduled meeting will be in March.
As a side note, I suggested that we don't really need a Senior Commission - the City staff does a great job of running that operation. We certainly don't need seven (7) commissioners. The previous iteration of the commission had seen very significant turnover and only two of them - Gary Parkin and Lee Ramos (both short term commissioners) - applied this time around. If the City Council decides to contemplate disbanding that commission they could delay the appointments for that commission and schedule a discussion at their next meeting in February. If they decide to reduce the number from seven (7) to five (5) they could do the same thing - delay appointments, agendize the issue and still have time to appoint commissioners for their March meeting. There is NO RUSH.
I wonder if Jim Righeimer will boycott this meeting as he did the one last Tuesday? If he does show up, he will certainly test the schedule, since he seems unable to not say every word in his head. I also wonder if Allan Mansoor will bail out early as he did last Tuesday. Both of those situations were very disrespectful to the process, and to those of you who voted for them. They may not like this process, but it's part of the job they were elected to do. If they don't like it they should resign... sounds good to me.
So, join me in the cheap seats in Conference Room 1A for the interrogations of these highly qualified individuals - the Planning Commission applicants are excellent. And/or, watch the results beginning around 8:30 Tuesday night. It should be VERY interesting...
Labels: Commission Candidates, Costa Mesa City Council, Labor Negotiations, Parks and Recreation Commission, Planning Commisison, Senior Commission
posted by The Pot Stirrer at 1/29/2017 05:54:00 PM
5 Comments:
All rigbots should be excluded regardless of experience. They've done enough damage. When will Allan Puppet cut the strings?
Someone needs to install a remote control off switch for Jim's microphone when he starts into one of his tirades - or at least a timer that shuts off the mic.
I'm looking forward to a diverse new PC and P&R, and by diverse I mean some women. All the major commissions have been dominatd by men, which is a slap in the face to 50% of our population. We actually have educated, experienced and capable women, who knew? Yes, right here in Costa Mesa incrediably talented women...the "old" commissioners, who were Rigbots (almost to the one) need to go and let tge new breeze blow through the city. We will see..remember the new majority was voted in by a LARGE percentage, so council najirity, do what you were voted in TO DO...new broom sweeos clean!
Geoff...As I wrote you in an email back a little while...My prediction will stand that Jim Righeimer will resign before his current tour is completed, as being in the minority is simply a waste of his time. Last Tuesday was just the beginning of the end for the minority. I do believe that he will run in the direct mayoral election, regardless of whether he resigns or not...
Actually a woman was appointed to the Parks and Rec commission. Remember Julie Mercurio, part of Jim's fan club, whose wrote (printed, I think) that being a mom made her qualified.
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