Next Meeting

[Brent]

Next meeting is this Thursday 05/06, 6:30 p.m. We don't have a location yet; we are trying to get a "Town" facility.

Homework is to review operating and capital budgets and come up with your high and low spending priorities, similar to what we did at the last meeting for parks, recreation & cultural resources.

[Brent]

The next meeting on Thursday 05/06, 6:30 p.m., will be held in Room B of the Herb Young Community Center (downtown Cary, next to Town Hall).

[kellyc]

cool. I have an ISAB meeting at 5:30...also in the Herb C YOung Center. Will attend afterwards.

Kelly

[Brent]

I know that several members of Town Council are interested in the work we're doing, and a couple have indicated that they may try to drop by for a few minutes this evening to "listen in".

[kellyc]

I felt as though we made a little headway tonight...OI almost wish the council would take sections of the 2005 budget before small diverse groups of people and say what do you think.

Kelly

[Cathy]

On May12th the council will be holding their Work Session on the 2005 Budget at 4:00 in Bldg A. I plan to be there to observe. Perhaps others in the budget Review group could put this on their calender, too.

Cathy

[Brent]

Cathy and others,

The upciming May 12 meeting is one of the reasons I continue to act like a jerk during our committee meetings -- we had set a goal to have some preliminary input to Council for their consideration during this work session (if I'm not mistaken, this first one is for the capital budget and there is one later in the month for the operating budget).

This is why I continue to try to get us focused, focused, focused on trying to establish PRIORITIES for budget line items. I think Don and Jennifer helped do that somewhat at last night's meeting, but I think we need to do even more.

"Roundtable disucsion" is very valuable -- I just don't think this forum (the committee) is the best time/place to have it. Cool ideas about HOW we might accomplish things should be put in e-mails or phone calls to council or staff, in my opinion. I really think that this committee needs to FOCUS on telling council and staff what we think is important to spend money on and what's not.

For example, I think it is great to talk about a dozen different ideas about what we might do with the old Cary Elementary building. But that discussion has to be secondary to the discussion of the budget priority of preserving/renovating Cary Elementary in the first place.

I don't think we ever got around to the line items that Mike & Karen spent a lot of time putting together (at least we didn't address them specifically). That's a shame, because those are concrete items we can set priorities for. And we need such concrete input for council and staff, I think.

I am not saying we shouldn't have such discussions. I am saying we need to separate such discussions from the discussions that are needed to achieve our main goal. Hows, whys, wherefores and brainstorming good ideas should be discussed indeed...but perhaps later, when we have the luxury of a little more time.

As it is right now, we've met 4 times and I am dissatisfied with the amount of concrete input we have for Council at this point, especially in the area of the capital budget, which they take up in a work session very soon.

Just wanted to note why I keep being so anal at the meetings.

Done venting (for now).

[Wuptdo]

Brent,

Ditto.

The effectiveness of any group is in direct proporation to its size; i.e., the larger the group, the less that gets done. This is especially true when you get a group of people who really don't know one another. (Going back to skool and getting my degree in "interpersonnel Communications" - lots of group interactive stuff.)

How about this. We break into two small groups, split the CIP in half, each group come up with a set of priorities for their portion of the CIP. At the next formal meeting, each group present its priorities and as a whole group we redefine and reprioritize both groups findings. Hopefully we leave with a top 10 list for the CIP to give to council before their first work session.

Since time is of the essence, I also recommend small group meetings as soon as possible. I will gladly host one of the small groups (dining room with large table). Thoughts, comments, or suggestions?


Mike B-)

[Karen]

Agree with Brent and Mike. Mike and I did get a lot done with our little group. (He does have a lovely dinning room table to work at.) :wink:
As Mike and I were breaking down the CIP there were several items we wondered what their status was, and felt maybe that was a place to "put it on hold" and look at the real feasiblity of it, thus "getting some money back" for another higher priority concern. I think we did get a lot accomplished on a smaller group level. So I'm for breaking into focus groups so to speak.

I'm sorry I had to leave early. Had a quick errand to run then had to get back to my children. (My night to put the kids down). :D I was wondering if we ever got to the "homework" part???

Just my 2 cents,
Karen

[Cathy]

Brent,

You are absolutely correct in everything that you have said here.
The submission to the forum by Mike & Karen was a very good distillation of the CIP down to key questionable items.
I went to last night's meeting thinking that we should, and that we would, take the line items that Mike & Karen submitted and go from there. Those items were pretty much the items that jumped out of the CIP Budget for me also. Unfortunately the discussion went elsewhere and then everywhere. I don't think that you were "acting like a jerk".
If people come unprepared to the meeting by not reviewing & highlighting the actual budget line items, or if they are there with only the intent of advocating for a single issue, we get very little done.
We should be beyond re-hashing the basics by now, and we should be able to do this analysis of the budget without being parochial about any one particular issue.
Individual issues,_ if valid_, will end up being addressed in the final outcome as part of a honest analysis of spending priorities. Those issues will speak for themselves with very little additional prompting.

[Karen]

I'd like to make another comment. I am not belittling Lynne's sewer issue at all. It is a very emotional issue for her. Several folks have independently looked into this very thing by contacting Tim Bailey with the town. I am one of those. The information I have received points to the lines in question being the responsibility of the PUD/HOA. And I listened with great interest Mike's indepth comments on PUDs. Lynne stated that it was not a PUD issue. Obviously there was some heated discussion about this.

Personally, I don't feel the town should take over maintainence of private sewer lines. However, if there are those on the committee that feel the town should, I propose they meet in a subgroup and present the fiscal ramifications of the town providing service to those sewer lines in question. That way we can see from a budget standpoint how this issue ties in with what we are trying to accomplish with this committee.

Feedback???

Karen

[Brent]

I believe that everyone is entitled to have their say, and all issues brought to the table by anyone deserve a full and fair hearing.

I'll just use the "focus" word again...we should strive for focused discussion that leads toward concrete recommendations.

Mike, I agree with your observations, although I will assert that a group of a dozen or so people can make significant forward progress if we (1) have an orderly process; and (2) focus (there's the 'f' word again :) ).

I think the idea of splitting into groups has merit (although one fear is that most people would want to be in both groups). We have never been able to conclude on this, I think, because of lack of you-know-what (that would be "focus" :lol: ). I recall when you brought it up at the meeting at Cathy's house...we never got around to "voting" on it because of other meandering discussion. I would like to see if people want to proceed this way.

In any case, I will try (perhaps this weekend) to start pulling together a consolidate report of what we have addressed so far and what results we think we have achieved. Having this "big picture" may also be helpful in moving forward. One other thing that might be helpful, and I don't think I've mentioned it yet, would be focus. :lol:

Done venting for the second time. :-D

[Karen]

I apologize if my last post seemed harsh. I think we do need to stay focused, and I wasn't implying that folks shouldn't have their say. I was just thinking that this issue would be better addressed if it were more "focused". And thought that a subcommittee might be helpful.

Again, my apologies if it came across as not wanting folks to their say...

Karen

[Brent]

Karen,

No apologies necessary as far as I'm concerned. Your points are valid. I *THINK* that everyone who has brought something up has had a full and fair hearing...sometimes more than full and fair, which has the danger of having us lose focus... :)

[Wuptdo]

A few thoughts as I read the other posts......

1) Where are the rest of the members?

2) Lynn's sewer issues: I am distrubed that the homeowners in several of these neighborhoods where not aware that they owned their sewer lines. Stuff like that is either in the PUD documentation or attached as a ryder on their deeds (not a lawyer). Except for a few LTE's, why hasn't this been a bigger issue (at least in Cary) with more media coverage? If this is such a big issue, why aren't the homeowners more organized (like the STOPCARY folks)? However, I believe this committee is not set up to handle an issue such as this; i.e., we barely have time to deal with all the other budget issues. My recommendation is that Council ask for volunteers to form a ad hoc committee to look over and review this issue. If 20% of homeowners in Cary are affected by this, it shouldn't not be a problem finding volunteers.

have to go, more to follow.....(I get good ideas while fishing :D )

Mike B-)

[Brent]

Mike, agreed on all counts.

[MattD]

I've been reading the postings, but not posting myself. I agree with most everything said, so I didn't think I should repeat just to repeat.

Staying focused... and fair/balanced

Matthew