Attendees:

Call to Order: President John Fox called the meeting to order at 7:10 p.m. The attendees were introduced.

Approval of Minutes: Motion, second, to approve the Minutes of the April 22, 2002 meeting. Unanimous.

Treasurer’s Report: Chuck Arnold reported the checking account has $3,258.10 and savings account has $8,651.36.

Location of Next Chapter Meeting: It was noted that the June monthly chapter meeting will be held at this same Solvang location.

Committee Reports:

Program Committee: David Schwartz said he is contacting a member of the Coastal Commission to be a future speaker.

Legislative Committee: George Emerson reported that the State budget is the major topic in Sacramento. There will be more forthcoming because of the State budget’s impacts on local governments.

Web Site Committee: Larry Meyer cautioned everyone to perform a current update on their virus protection.

CSDA Report: John Fox reported he and Larry Meyer attended some recent meetings in Sacramento. There were over 600 local government representatives in Sacramento to lobby for Sacramento to leave local funds local. This was a concerted lobbying effort by CSDA, ACWA, CASA, and other local government associations. It was noted that because of the State’s deficit that Sacramento would not be reimbursing counties for some social programs.

The annual CSDA conference will be held September 24-26^th in San Diego.

LAFCO Report: John Fox reported the last LAFCO meeting was routine with a few annexations. There was discussion about our special district representative to LAFCO’s Technical Advisory Committee to study municipal service reviews.

MOTION by Carey Rogers, second by David Schwartz, to ask the following people in this order to consider being our representative to LAFCO’s Technical Advisory Committee: Chuck Hamilton, Jerry Smith, Kamil Azoury, Jim Raggio, and Mitch Bernstein. The motion carried unanimously. It was noted that our representative(s) to the Technical Advisory Committee should be determined by the end of May so the Committee’s work can proceed.

MOTION by Mitch Bernstein, second by David Schwartz, that we request LAFCO to consider having a representative from both an enterprise and a non-enterprise district, and thus have 2 special district representatives. Unanimous. It was noted that if LAFCO agrees to this request, that Mitch Bernstein will be our non-enterprise district representative.

Ad hoc LAFCO Budget Committee: Jim Raggio reported on the committee’s work on the LAFCO budget. LAFCO will adopt the budget at their June meeting. There was discussion, Jim Raggio said it is expected LAFCO’s current budget surplus will be $167,000. The committee recommends we urge LAFCO to adopt a budget of $269,550, which has $50,000 removed from the category for municipal service reviews, which would be done in-house.

MOTION, second, to accept the Committee recommendation to urge LAFCO to adopt a budget of $269,550 with the current year surplus of $167,200 being applied to offset the proposed budget. Unanimous.

John Fox noted that according to AB2838, there is a 24-day window from June 4 (when LAFCO adopts their budget), to June 30^th if we want to change the formula for allocating the special district share of the LAFCO budget.

Old Business: None.

New Business: None.

Guest Speaker: Jim Diani, Chairman of Citizens for County Organization, Inc: John Fox introduced Jim Diani and Sharon Steele, proponents to split Santa Barbara County. The new county would be Mission County. Mr. Diani said the current effort started in 1999. The reason for the split is because the north and south portions are different from each other and each should be allowed to govern themselves. Currently there is a petition drive that would allow the process to proceed. If 23,000 signatures are gathered, the Governor would appoint a Commission to review the proposal. The end of the Commission’s work would be a voter decision on the split. It was noted the County and LAFCO are not involved in this process. The Commission would include 2 representatives from the new area, 2 from the old area, and 1 member at large. No California County has split since 1907. We all as taxpayers will pay the costs for the process. There was discussion of the proposed boundaries and ramifications of the County splitting. If this effort proceeds to a vote, it would need 50%+1 in the new county and 50%+1 in the old county to be successful.

Adjournment: John Fox adjourned the meeting at 9:08 p.m. The next chapter meeting will be held on Monday, June 24, 2002 at the Royal Scandinavian Inn in Solvang.