In its regular meeting on Tuesday, the Goleta City Council unanimously voted to allow each council member to weigh in on the selection of one planning commissioner.
The proposed ordinance codifies the interim process for mayoral appointments of members of the public to city and regional boards, commissions and committees established shortly after the 2018 municipal election, but not the mayor’s appointment of council members to regional boards, commissions and committees.
This process, which remains consistent with the vision of the council and the mayor, will have the city clerk advertise for and accept applications. Then, the council will conduct interviews and each council member will announce their preferred candidate for the vacant position.
Finally, the mayor will make appointments from the list of candidates and bring the final decisions back to the council for approval.
“This is a result of us moving to a directive elected mayoral system, so this is one of the things that was talked about early on, was that the mayor was going to be in a position of having some authority and having some power that the mayor didn’t used to have when we were in a position where the council selected the mayor from among the council,” said Mayor Pro Tempore Kyle Richards. “I think this is a good proposal.”
Mayor Paula Perotte said she likes the idea of keeping the process inclusive.
“I felt like, except for the planning commission, we’ve always decided as a whole, and I really felt like I wanted to continue that,” she said. “I feel like it’s worked pretty successfully. We do a good job of interviewing and deliberating on our selection.”
In other business, the council received a report on the city’s fiscal year 2020/21 first quarter financial review and approved the recommended general fund budget adjustments, which will result in a net increase of $119,300 to the overall fund balance of the general fund.
The recommended expenditure budget adjustment of $161,600 is reprogramming the current budget available in general government/support services to other departments because of COVID-19.
Finally, the council received a presentation on the status of the Regional Housing Needs Allocation.
Santa Barbara County Association of Governments is currently developing the methodology for the sixth cycle RHNA for the Santa Barbara County region, and will be significantly higher because of new state requirements.
The new state requirements hold higher vacancy assumptions and address existing housing problems related to overcrowding and overpayment.
SBCAG staff is seeking a draft RHNA methodology recommendation from the SBCAG Technical Planning Advisory Committee, which the city’s Planning and Environmental Review staff will vote on in its meeting today.
After the recommendation today, SBCAG staff will present the draft to the SBCAG board for approval on Dec. 17, and following that approval, it will be presented to the State Department of Housing and Community Development.
email: gmccormick@newspress.com
