Monday, 18 May 2009 16:43

Board Members in Attendance:  Brad Zanin, Bob Throm, John Clark, Michael Kinsley, Tim McFlynn
Patsy Bacheldor, Kathy DeWolfe, Jan Martin, Frieda Wallison, James Brundige,  Rick Heede.
(On phone: Steve Child, Emily Smith attempted to call in—had phone problems).
Guest: Kelly Fravel                                    

I.    Approval of Past Meeting Minutes.
    Motion: John Clark moved to approve the March minutes.  Bob seconded. All approved.

II.    Budget
Kathy handed out the Profit and Loss and Balance Sheets prepared by Amy through May 15.
   
III.    Road Clean Up.
The annual road clean up event May 16 was a huge success. Great participation. Bob felt the luncheon was an integral part of the event….as it brought people together to visit and get to know each other.

IV.    Dottie Fox Memorial Park
On Wed., May 13, the BOCC approved the open space subdivision exemption to create the overlook park at the switchback on Watson Divide. Tim has talked to Dottie’s children, Randy, Mark and CiCi. They hope it will be passive, road free and maybe have a bench. They want it natural, not improved. Pitkin County Open Space will work with the family and the Caucus to develop the design.

V.    Caucus Website
Jan had sent the Caucus Board a link to view the website prior to the meeting. She received applause for her efforts…. everyone thought the design was wonderful. She said it will go live next week. She hopes it will be “the tool we expected it to be.” She will have the announcement of the site blasted to residents’
e-mails…she believes we have 75% to 80% of the e-mail addresses for Caucus residents. She still needs
help for the e-newsletter. Jan is also still looking for the complete history of Snowmass, the Valley. James said he had a copy….John McBride was the source. James will get this to Kathy who will type it up so it can be edited. Dwight Maurin might have some historical information as well, according to Bob Throm. Tim commented the site has so much beyond our original website. It should unite people in the Valley.   
Jan said the top is community building info, the sidebar is mostly Caucus business. The cost came in at $2,750. (low end of the budget). The designer also set up the election procedure – ready to go for the fall. Joseph Grange will maintain it. He met with Danny Tamez, the creator/designer. It’s a very easy system to maintain. Jan suggested we get our meeting agenda items to Tim, more than a week out, so the agenda can be posted and residents can attend meetings if they want. Tim offered that Board members can submit agenda items at any time….it’s not necessary to wait till he asks for them. Jan needs more “meet your neighbor” ideas. Marilyn Osier has submitted an article on the Monastery.  Jan offered to go to the various subdivision meetings. Tim mentioned thanks to Holly too for her help on the site with photos, etc.

VI.    Caucus Board Elections.
    Tim suggested we hold these in Sept. On the June agenda, we will review and approve the timeline and deadlines under the Bylaws for a September election so that all interested members may apply.

VII.    Staggered Board Terms.
Jan had originally suggested this as a system so the Board would not loose the institutional memory from long-time Board members, but could also get fresh ideas from new Board members.  James felt it’s more manageable having 6 seats open at a time in order to avoid any mass turnover.  Jan is thinking that we could get more community involvement with the new website and have more people potentially interested. Frieda had no objection either way, and suggested we have 18 seats, so 6 at a time could be rotated. However, it is not necessary to rotate people off the Board, unless they don’t want to continue to serve.
John Clark and Frieda will summarize the pros and cons of such a system. …. and it will be on the June agenda for discussion.

VIII.    By-Laws Changes.
    Moved to the June agenda, due to time considerations. 
 
IX.    County Regulations - Review
Jan explained the notion here was to be pro-active on review of County rules, such as fencing and tree planting. Jan formed a committee; they met and came up with guidelines on how to approach the issue. She said they wanted to look at rules on a macro level….rather than dealing with individual situations.  The analysis would consider whether the County guidelines were outdated, or are we missing something in our interpretation of them. The committee will identify ordinances that seem to be impractical; present the identified ordinances to the Caucus Board for approval; meet with county staff to understand the rationale for the ordinances and open dialogue regarding the actual consequences of implementation; give their recommendation to the Caucus Board as to whether the ordinance should stand as is or be modified; and if modification is recommended, prepare a written request for review of the regulation to be submitted to George Newman for presentation to the BOCC.
Tim offered that we’re no worse off than we are today by exploring these issues….and this might give us a better understanding of County rules. He also casually ran the idea by Cindy Houben, the Community Development Director, who was open to it and thought it worth pursuing. As time passes and conditions change, perhaps a periodic review of regulations is warranted, and the County staff is often too busy to address the efficacy of various regulations, that they are obligated to enforce.
Jan presented the four items the committee will study, research and report back to the Board. They are:
1) coupling permit issuance with surrender of agriculture exemption right; 2) fencing guidelines; 3) removing horse shelters from square footage of the barn calculation and 4) height restriction on barns.

Frieda said these four areas are extremely important. Kathy felt that it might help our cause if we suggested changes that could be pertinent to our own area, and not necessarily applied to the entire County. Jan said we are just “tapping on the door” here….just to create a dialogue.  Tim said it’s great to involve George Newman who is looking for issues to work on for his district. James commended the group for following in the steps of the Master Plan Committee to put this work together. Tim suggested they start out with one or two issues to get some trust going.  He also suggested this group should think of a name for their committee.
Motion: Frieda moved to authorize the committee to pursue the 4 areas described above. Kathy seconded the motion. It passed unanimously. (the understanding is the Committee will pick one or two to begin).

X.    Moon Run Fundraiser.
    After discussion, the date preferred was Sunday, June 28.

XI.    County Road Maintenance.
Tim said we seem to have 3 issues: 1) use of Mag Chloride; 2) Fence Damage by County vehicles; and
3) Increasing widening of roads by maintenance vehicles, particularly East Sopris Creek Rd. A mention was also made re: the necessity for bicycle safety improvements between the Conoco and the T intersection. Some residents commute via bikes to catch the RFTA buses, including children. Should there be speed bumps like in Woody Creek? Steve said there was a meeting he attended a couple of weeks ago regarding the Elk Creek and Upper Capitol Creek roads. He will attend the June meeting to discuss this further.
Bob sent a memo to the BOCC and Road and Bridge Dept. April 16 re: the conditions of his section of Snowmass Creek Road and gave Kathy the memo to include in the minutes. He represents 10 of the 11 property owners on this road. Bob said the County feels they need to use Mag. Chloride to properly make the road safe and that it is not harmful, but rather beneficial, to wildlife. 
Tim will invite the County Road people to the June meeting (Brian Pettet and Temple Glassier) as well as George Newman, so the Board can learn more about the issues from the County’s point of view.  Rick was asked to independently research the Mag. Chloride issue and perhaps see if there are other alternatives. Michael mentioned that he was on the group that approved the use of Mag. Chloride for County roads 25 years ago and it was determined to be benign at that time. Tim suggested we might have evidence to the contrary now that we’ve used it a while. We can listen to the County’s presentation, and discuss this among ourselves….don’t need to come up with any decisions in June.

XII.    Snowmass Creek update.
Ziegler reservoir – everything is proceeding in Water Court. Nothing new to report.
Hydrosphere’s principal had a family emergency and did not deliver the draft proposal by the end of March. When they get it, and review it, the Water Committee will report back to the Board. John Clark and Emily Smith are new members on the Water Committee.

XIII.    Snowmass vs. Snowmass Village.
Sue Helm wished to inform us that the marketing arm of Base Village developer, Related WestPac, is marketing the new base village as Snowmass…not Snowmass Village. This also happened years ago with other marketing groups. Sue thought we should discuss this and urge the TOSV and Related WestPac to rethink this plan. It causes confusion with the identity of Old Snowmass vs. the Village. There were mixed feelings in the group on whether to pursue this. Tim suggested he start by sending a simple e-mail to lawyer friends of his who are experts in trademark law to see if we have any legal leverage. The question would be what are our rights to protect the name Snowmass, given our use of the name for over 100 years. Rick suggested we start calling ourselves Old Snowmass….to differentiate us from the Village.

IX.    Board Member Attendance.
Kathy reported that John McBride has missed four consecutive Caucus meetings, and per the By-laws, was notified that he needed to attend this meeting or would be deemed to have resigned. He was not present. Several Board members felt he has contributed so much in the past that perhaps in his case, an exception be made. There were also opinions that we have had to make this decision recently before, and we should treat everyone the same. The By-Laws do not allow for exceptions on this point. Michael suggested giving John a Board Member Emeritus designation. The sense of the Board was that there was no discretion under current Bylaws and that John, in fact, has resigned and can reapply for a vacancy or run again in September.  Tim will put further discussion of this Bylaw on the agenda for the June meeting.

X.    Holy Cross Election
Michael passed out a flyer endorsing Adam Palmer and Marshall Foote for election to the Holy Cross Board of Directors, due to their pro-active stance on pursuing clean power energy alternatives. All Caucus members are encouraged to vote for these candidates.

The meeting was adjourned by Tim. Next meeting June 15th.