Meeting Records of Central Coast Council advisory committees will no longer be included as attachments to Council Reports unless specifically required.
Links to the Meeting Records on Council’s website will instead be included in Council reports.
The new plan overturns an April 27, 2020, direction that saw councillors re-affirm that Minutes from Advisory Committees should continue to come to the Council meetings.
At that April meeting, staff had suggested that the Minutes need not be presented to the meetings if there were no recommendations that needed action, but Cr Jane Smith wanted them tabled so the Minutes were in the public domain and easily accessed.
Her Motion was adopted unanimously.
Now, a Council report to the first meeting of 2021, to be held on January 27, says the process has been “further refined” to ensure “suitable use” of Council’s resources.
Staff will prepare a Council report every second month to note meeting records from Advisory Group and Committee meetings held in the preceding two months.
“This timing allows for the Meeting Records to be approved and circulated, and the associated one Council Report to be drafted, which will reduce the number of Council Reports overall while not impacting content,” the Council report said.
“If a Meeting Record includes a recommendation to Council and requires further commentary from the Convenor as the subject matter expert, a separate Council report will be submitted from the relevant Directorate.”
The new system is in operation already for this first meeting, with links to a number of Committee Minutes and with a recommendation to the Administrator that he receive the report on some of the meetings held in November and December 2020.
They included the: Audit, Risk and Improvement Committee; Town Centre Advisory Committee; Water Management Advisory Committee; Status of Women Advisory Group; Terrigal Water Quality Sub-Committee; and, the Employment and Economic Development Committee.
However, Catchments and Coast Committee meetings held for Brisbane Water and Gosford Lagoons on November 24, 2020, and for Tuggerah Lakes on December 9, 2020, as well as a Tourism Advisory Committee meeting in December, include recommendations to Council and will be reported separately to provide further commentary, the Council report said.
No time frame was given.
Merilyn Vale