The Kenai Peninsula Borough Assembly refined amendments to Borough code regarding committees and procedures for excused absences and teleconferencing.
Assembly Members Tyson Cox, Brent Hibbert and Cindy Ecklund, in a memo to the Assembly, stated that after more than two years of using this hybrid format, it is appropriate to update code provisions regarding assembly committees, excused absences and participation via teleconferencing, also known as remote participation, that account for this hybrid meeting format.
Assemblyman Cox, speaking in favor of the ordinance, commented on the effects of the pandemic and use of teleconferencing for meetings.
“With the pandemic, we started doing video conferencing and those kinds of things and we really did loosen up on some of our teleconferencing rules for assembly members not only did we loosen up on them, they weren’t actually in the code because having teleconferencing and that was not part of our code.”
Assemblyman Cox addressed changes to KPB 22.30 and KPB 22.40.
“Number one is to identify the standing committees of the assembly. That is a change we are looking to do and what that will do is these committees that we have regularly, those will be members of everyone on this assembly; also within that allow the assembly president to have additional committees if necessary the president would have the leeway to make those committees of the members that they would like.
The next one would be to establish an expectation for members to notify the Bureau Clerk prior to meetings if they expect to be absent. That was not clearly written into code and there has been issues in the past of not knowing until right before the meeting whether somebody may or may not be there. To have people tell the clerk that would be for both committees and for our regular meetings the only difference being is for regular meetings that should be in writing.
The next one is set parameters on excused absences; prior to this pretty much up to the assembly and or the president to decide if it was an excused absence. This new code will spell out some of those items.
The last one is to combine three sections of code regarding teleconferencing. This adds in the video conferencing section and our legal department noticed that when we were going through it there were three sections of code that repeated a lot of items and we were able to get that down to one section of code that says what we were wanting to say and it says it very clearly.”
In opposition to Ordinance 2023-03, Assembly Member Richard Derkevorkian spoke against the “babysitting’ of the ordinance.
“While I appreciate portions of this code; I won’t be supporting this ordinance. There’s a lot of word vomit in here that essentially amounts to you babysitting us with code. We’re all responsible adults that are here to represent the people that elected us. Codifying a lot of stuff that doesn’t need to be said we’re just adding pages to the borough codebook.
If I’m going to miss a committee meeting, I contact President Johnson. I’ve done that for a year if I’m going to be late you contact President Johnson. A lot of this stuff doesn’t need to be said in borough code and for that reason I won’t be supporting this ordinance.”
The Ordinance 2023-03 passed by a vote of 6-3.
