What does a Village Councilperson do?

Did you ever wonder? Did you really care?

Well there is a bit more to it than getting together once a month. Let's start from the beginning.

Once you get elected, or appointed, if you are filling out someone's term, after you get sworn in by the mayor, you get your tools of the trade. Keys to the village hall and a copy of the codified ordinances. It's a gigantic book. I have a copy of the ordinances on my computer, Trish has my hard copy somewhere. I hate paper. You fill out a couple forms for PERS and insurance. Yes I am allowed to drive the village vehicles except the police cars :(

In addition to attending village council meetings there are other responsibilities. The village has 14 standing committees. I serve on eight of them. Some exist only because I think the state mandates we have one. Many of them only meet when required, but some of them have regular meetings. Finance, Street Water and Sewer, and Fire Board meet regularly and are probably the most active committees. I am on the Fire Board, Planning, Zoning, Safety, Special Ordinance, Library, Records, and Parks and Recreation Committees. Fire Board meets every month and requires a separate posting to talk about. The other committees only meet when there is something to talk about. The mayor decides who sits on these committees. I have attended two Park and Rec meetings, one Planning meeting and missed one Planning and two Library meetings because of family commitments. I have not missed a Council or Fire Board meeting.

Then the paperwork starts rolling in. Ordinances, financial reports, resolutions, meeting minutes. I already have a box full. Everything also comes to me by email. This is what I read. I do read them over. All the documents I receive by email I load into a program called Microsoft OneNote. I have a Tablet PC that enables me to write on the screen. I can take notes on the documents I receive. Yes I do run regular backups on my PC.

The council meetings will generally run a minimum of 90 minutes, many times they can run longer. Really much of what we do are things required by the state. Approval of previous minutes, financial reports, vouchers (bills), resolutions for various things. Bills go through a large amount of checks and balances before the council votes to pay them. It was frustrating for me at first because of the fact, if I need something for my business, I just go buy it. It does not work that way in government.

After we have gone through previous minutes, allowed visitors to speak if their subjects do not pertain to scheduled agenda items, and Old and New Business, the mayor, each council member, the Police Chief, the Clerk, the Solicitor (lawyer), the Village Administrator, and the Zoning Inspector has a chance to speak about anything. If a council member is a chair of a committee (I am chairperson of Parks and Rec) that has met since the last meeting, that person gives a report of the meeting. After we have allowed each of those people to speak, visitors again have a chance to speak. Finally if no one has anything else to say the meeting is adjourned.

Sound pretty tedious to you? It can be. At the beginning of this year when Mayor Hipp started, the first few meetings drew a good crowd. The last few months we have barely have two people show up. To me it means we are doing our job, because people usually do not come to a meeting to thank you or compliment you. They come because they are upset, have a problem, or didn't like something you did.

I get paid 600.00 per year for being on council. We get paid once a year in December. After taxes and PERS I received 525 and change this week. I do not get paid extra for serving on committees (except for Fire Board, I will explain that in another post). Everyone has their opinion about pay rates for Council. Some think we should not take any pay, and there are those who think we don't get enough. I think the pay is fair. I don't believe we should work for free. It is worth something for the time we dedicate to it. A few have told me they think its worth the pay just so they don't have to sit through the meetings themselves!

So there you have it. Your Civics lesson for the day.