Last Monday's council meeting was quite interesting with one of the major topics being an attempt to reduce the minutes of council proceedings from verbatim to summary.
The meeting was covered by the Shawnee Dispatch
http://www.shawneedispatch.com/news/2010/nov/10/council-delays-vote-cutting-minutes/
and the KC Star
http://www.kansascity.com/2010/11/12/2423133/shawnee-looks-at-audio-minutes.html
Basically those who wanted to change the minutes to summary form kept using the ridiculous reason of cutting costs. This is ridiculous, because, as pointed out the costs are negligible and there are transcription services (including local) that can provide full minutes at lower costs.
Then why do some want the minutes format changed from verbatim to summary? Could it be as Councilmember Mickey Sandifer once said because "they use them against us"? Could it be because Councilmember Dawn Kuhn does not want the public to see how she attempts to monopolize meetings? (Former Councilmember Kevin Straub stated his research showed that overall she was responsible for 38% of the dialog).
Full meeting minutes provide the public with complete info and transparency as to what the council does. They also provide info as to what members of the public might say at these meetings. Reducing the minutes to summary format takes all of that away. Thoughts regarding this had previously been strongly mentioned by Council Members Distler and Pflumm and alluded to by others (Sawyer, and Morris) and finally echoed by Vaught.
Additionally, it took yours truly to show that other cities are also making the results of the meetings available on the web in both audio and video format for extremely low costs, to include virtually free.
Ironically, after it was obvious that seven of the eight wanted to postpone any action (even Sandifer saw the handwriting on the wall), Dawn "Motormouth" Kuhn still tried to get the item pushed through. Methinks that maybe she not only does not want folks to see how much she rattles on, but also how she does not chair committee meetings in a fair manner. That's right.....go to a meeting that she chairs. Watch, and listen. If you agree with her you can speak all you want. Be in disagreement with her, and she'll cut you off. Her facial expressions are a dead giveaway. Also, in keeping with her motormouth know it all attitudes, she has to, most of the time, add her two cents in to everybody else’s comments.
Detailed minutes are very important and need to be maintained. The argument of cost is not valid. More info on this can be provided, but one out of town trip by the council members (like the upcoming one to Denver) would cover a year’s worth of minutes.
