THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1997, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Tuesday, January 7, 1997 TAG: 9701070226
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: NORTH CAROLINA
SOURCE: BY CATHERINE KOZAK, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: MANTEO LENGTH: 92 lines
The Dare County Board of Commissioners did lots of housekeeping Monday, paid some bills and ironed out some operational wrinkles, but saved most action for another day.
With a new year and two new board members, much of the business during the first meeting of 1997 was making appointments to commissions and committees.
Appointment of an acting chairman and vice-chairman for the Control Group, the panel that takes the emergency response wheel during hurricanes and near-misses, was left open for an indefinite period while Commission Chairman Robert V. ``Bobby'' Owens Jr. searches for a replacement. In the meantime, the law requires Owens to head the panel. Owens said he is not up to the task permanently because of the demands of his job as the governor's eastern representative.
``Whoever serves as chairman of the control group must be committed to spend (up to) 36 hours at the center,'' Owens said. ``It is an awesome, awesome, task and it is not a popular job.''
Among other duties, the Control Group decides whether to evacuate the county when hurricanes approach. Clarence Skinner previously headed the panel, but he was not re-elected to the Board of commissioners.
The board agreed to appoint Commissioner Richard Johnson to the Oregon Inlet and Waterways Commission slot vacated by the death of Robert Williams, who headed the panel. Commissioners also promoted acting waterways chairman Moon Tillett to chairman.
After considerable discussion about the merits of two books on government meeting rules of procedure, the board decided to have Commissioners Geneva Perry, Cheryl Byrd and Douglas Langford study how to combine information from the books into a coherent manual.
County Attorney Al Cole told the board that several of the rules of order in both books are ``diametrically opposed'' to one another.
The board adopted the widely used Roberts Rules of Order in 1977, but at Commissioner Shirley Hassell's prompting, recently read the slimmer and simpler Rules of Procedure published by the Institute of Government.
``It was a lot easier for me to understand the smaller book because it's in everyday language,'' said Commissioner Richard Johnson.
But Owens said no matter what book the commission uses, decorum at public meetings is controlled by the chairman. Perry warned that too much adherence to rules can hinder more than help, saying that she was advised at county commissioner school to be flexible.
``They pointed out over and over again that the Board of Commission does not need to tie itself so tight to rules and procedures that it can't get anything done,'' she said. ``They were very emphatic that the smaller the board, the more you need to aware of the need for flexibility.''
In other business, the board again expressed frustration about the School Board's desire to place a referendum on funding a new high school on the ballot by May 6.
The county board recently met for the first time with the School Board on the issue and told educators they were being rushed. Since then, Owens said, the commissioners' board has been sharply criticized by some county residents.
``The Board of Education right now is being very unfair to us,'' he said. ``And some members of the public are being unfair to us. We're taking very unjust and undue heat that we don't need to take.''
Also Monday, commissioners unanimously approved spending $350,000 for a dirt pit in East Lake that is used for landfill cover and road repair. The county had leased the land over the last four years at a cost of $210,000, County Manager Terry Wheeler said. But he said now that the lease is up, it would be cheaper to buy the 76-acre tract from Basnight Construction, which is headed by the president pro tem of the State Senate, Marc Basnight of Manteo.
``Three hundred and fifty thousand dollars is a tremendously good buy,'' said Bernie Austin, county public works director. ``It would be a big savings to the county.''
Austin suggested that the county could offset the cost by raising the C&D disposal costs from $10 a ton to $20 a ton.
The board agreed to award a $97,731 bid for purchase of improved surveillance equipment at the Dare County Detention Center. County Finance Director David Clawson said a contract for the equipment will end six years of hold-ups to the project stemming from contractor bankruptcy and subsequent lawsuits.
A request to transfer control of the county communications system from the Dare County Criminal Justice Board to the sheriff was tabled until the next meeting, which will be Tuesday, Jan. 21, because of the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday on Monday. ILLUSTRATION: AMONG THE ISSUES
The board again expressed frustration about the School Board's
desire to place a referendum on funding a new high school on the
ballot by May 6.
The county board recently met for the first time with the School
Board on the issue and told educators they were being rushed.
Also Monday, commissioners unanimously approved spending $350,000
for a dirt pit in East Lake that is used for landfill cover and road
repair.
KEYWORDS: DARE COUNTY BOARD OF COMMISSIONERS