City Council - Rules & Government Relations Committee

CITY OF EASTHAMPTON OFFICE OF THE CITY COUNCIL Easthampton Municipal Building 50 Payson Ave., Ste. 100 Easthampton, Massachusetts 01027-2260 Telephone #: (413) 529-1460 MINUTES RULES and GOVERNMENT RELATIONS Meeting 08/27/2020 Attendees: R&GR Committee Members: Councilor Thomas Peake, Chair Councilor Peg Conniff, Clerk Other Attendees: Owen Zaret, City Councilor Bill Lynch, City Councilor Homar Gomez, City Councilor Absent: Councilor Dan Rist Meeting called to order at 5:30 pm. The meeting was videotaped. Approval for past minutes. Minutes from 8/13/2020 were approved. MOTION by Councilor Conniff: SECOND Councilor Peake. Passed 2-0. 1. Request to establish easthamptonma.gov emails for committee chairs 1.1.Councilor Zaret presented his rationale for putting this request forward. Today we do not have a standard process for the public to access our multi-member bodies. Some committees provide personal emails, some do not. Having an easy way to access boards and committees would create greater transparency and accessibility. 1.2.Question around potential costs to the city from additional emails is open and Coun- cilor Zaret will reach out to Ashley Barstow, IT Director for that response. 1.3.Councilor Conniff expressed a need to be clear to the Committee chairs on the use of the email and the open meeting law adherence as well as an understanding of FOIA re- quests that come with a .gov email address. Is there a difference in FOIA requests from personal email v. .GOV emails  1.4.Should this rule be put in place, there was a discussion on whether it should be part of an amendment to the City Charter. 1.5.It was agreed that more discussion would be had on this topic at further Rules and Government Relations meetings. 2. Resolution re: Payment in Lieu of Taxes (PILOT) 2.1.Councilor Peake read into the record an email from Councilor Rist (attached) 2.2. Discussion on centered on how to present recommendation to Mayor. There was discussion around a) selecting the top 3-4 organizations to focus the PILOT on; b) whether to only make the recommendation to the mayor to create a PILOT request of whatever organizations in the city she chooses; c)does our recommendation provider leverage to the Mayor or is it a request only from City Council? No decision made 2.3.Further discussion on doing a public hearing within committee to allow public input as well as any comment by the potentially impacted organizations. The date was not set but it will likely be in October 6:45 pm - Motion to adjourn by Councilor Conniff, seconded by Councilor Peake. Motion passed 2-0 Next Meeting: TBD at 5:30 pm