Procedural notebook: Consent agenda to be used by Monroe County council in effort to boost efficiency
At its Tuesday meeting, the Monroe County council voted to adopt a procedure to start using a consent agenda in the course of its regular business.
A consent agenda is a subset of actions that could be voted on separately, but that are collected as a single item on the agenda for one vote. The items making up a consent agenda are supposed to be perfunctory and uncontroversial.
The idea is that a consent agenda will help the county council “efficiently accomplish statutory responsibilities:”
Area residents who attend meetings of the Bloomington board of public works or the Bloomington board of park commissioners will be familiar with the idea of a consent agenda. Those two boards make routine use of consent agendas.
But the county council’s resolution to start using consent agendas did not pass on a unanimous vote. The sole dissenting vote on the seven-member council was from Kate Wiltz, who had a couple of concerns.
One of Wiltz’s concerns was about transparency. How would attendees of a meeting even know which items are included in the consent agenda? Councilor Geoff McKim proposed an amendment to the resolution that requires the reading aloud of each item that’s included in the consent agenda. The amendment on reading aloud was unanimously approved by the council.
Another concern that Wiltz expressed was related to the way that the consent agenda is built. In the wording of the resolution, the council’s administrator is supposed to put on the consent agenda any of the following types of items: category transfers; creation of new account lines; job description changes with no classification change; and approval of meeting minutes.
Wiltz was concerned that a department head might not want their item included in the consent agenda—because they could have some reason to want to talk to the county council about it.
One way of trying to address that concern came as an amendment to the resolution, before any of the council’s discussion started. McKim asked that the resolution be amended so that no motion by a councilor or a vote is needed to remove an item from the consent agenda for separate consideration.
The wording of the unanimously adopted amendment was: “If any councilmember wishes to have an item contained within the Consent Agenda addressed independently, the councilmember need only request that it be removed from the consent agenda to be considered separately.”
But having an easy way for a councilmember to remove an item for separate consideration did not address how to prevent the inclusion of the item in the first place. Councilmembers batted around the idea that a department head could make a request, as a part of the ordinary agenda request form, that their item not be included in the consent agenda.
After the vote, when it was clear that Wiltz was still not in support of using a consent agenda, council president Trent Deckard indicated that revisions to the procedure might be needed in the future. Deckard put it like this: “And we’ll keep working, if we need to on that, to do whatever we need to do.”
The next item on the council’s agenda was the consent agenda for that night. It was read aloud item by item by council president pro tem Jennifer Crossley:
8. CONSENT AGENDA ITEMS
A. Approval of Summary Minutes as Presented
‐February 13, 2024, Council Meeting
‐February 27, 2024, Council Meeting
<><><><><><><><><><><><>B. PROSECUTOR’S OFFICE
Request the Creation of a New Account Line
Arnold Ventures Grant, 4936‐000030028 Training and Travel New Account Line
The Department has requested a new account line as the department has received permission from Arnold Ventures and Indiana University to use part of the Arnold Ventures subgrant award for the purpose of attending the Association of Prosecuting Attorneys 2024 Prosecutorial Data Summit in Mountain View, CA. No appropriation is necessary, for unspent funds will be transferred into the line.
<><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>C. HEALTH DEPARTMENT
Request Approval of a Category Transfer Crisis CoAg Supp. Workforce, 8111‐9623FROM:
10124 Covid‐19 School Liaison $23,359.94
17601 Longevity $200.00
18001 FT Self Insurance $6,000.00
18101 FICA $1,961.87
18201 PERF $ 3,346.36
TOTAL $34,868.17TO:
20011 Other Supplies $34,868.17The Department has requested to move funds from the Personnel Category to the Supplies Category as the School Liaison is currently being funded through a service contract. The transfer of funds will allow the Department to have funds available for supplies when there are needs within Monroe County schools.
