Public Safety Committee Meeting Transcript – 12/11/2015 Title: ATXN 24/7 Recording Channel: 6 - ATXN Recorded On: 12/11/2015 6:00:00 AM Original Air Date: 12/11/2015 Transcript Generated by SnapStream ================================== [9:03:53 AM] >> Zimmerman: Good morning. My name is don Zimmerman, chair of the public safety committee. We have a quorum and I want to announce the committee, public safety committee will now go into closed session to take up one item pursuant to section 551.074 of the government code. The committee will discuss the following item, discuss personnel matters related to the appointment of municipal court substitute judges and associate judges. Is there any objection to going into executive session on the item? >> [Inaudible] >> Zimmerman: Sorry? Oh, councilmember pool has joined us here. Hearing none, the committee will now go into executive session. [Executive session] [11:53:21 AM] >> Zimmerman: Okay, I'm going to go ahead and we'll start some conversation. I believe councilmember Houston is going to join us. There she is. We're out of closed session. In closed session we took up and discussed the personnel matters related to item 1 regarding the municipal court associate judges and substitute judges. And so we're back in open session and we could have some discussion and some motions, whatever the committee wants to do. >> Casar: Chair, I think we have some really exceptional candidates for these positions. After some deliberation, I think I would like to move for us to recommend to the full council the appointment of George Thomas for the position of the full-time associate judge, to recommend appointment of Belinda Herrera for a position as full-time judge handling juvenile cases and paid for out of our juvenile fund which was recommended to us by several folks including the presiding judge, and also recommend the appointment of Ryan turner, John Yeager and Patrick Mcnellis at substitute judges. >> Zimmerman: All right, is there a second? >> Pool: I'll second. >> Zimmerman: So we have a motion here. Is there any discussion on this? Councilmember Houston. >> Houston: Do you want me to discuss something? >> Zimmerman: Well, if you would like. We have a motion on the table here. >> Houston: No, I'd like to call the question. >> Zimmerman: Okay. So the motion here -- let me repeat it and make sure we understand, is for George Thomas for the position of the full-time associate judge, Belinda Herrera for judge for the juvenile cases. For the part-time substitute judges, Ryan turner, Patrick Mcnellis and John Yeager. So that would fill the [11:55:22 AM] positions we have in front of us. Any other discussion? >> Pool: What I think some of the other things we talked about what we might want to do is post this to the message board and have it available for our -- the rest of the council and the mayor to review, discuss it in work session on Tuesday. And then if there are any questions where there's additional information and any of our colleagues which to have, maybe we would not take it up on the 17th and wait for January, but if not we would go ahead and move forward on the 17th with a vote. >> Zimmerman: So that's another point to make. All this committee does is make a recommendation to the full city council. So the earliest that would come up would be this coming Tuesday for further discussion and deliberation. >> Casar: And my last comment on this, chair, is I think having at least some substitute judges for municipal court as soon as possible is important and so if there's questions on Tuesday about the full-time positions, then I think that considering how full our agenda is on the 17th, it might make sense to put some of those conversations off. But I feel confident about all of these choices, but I think that the substitutes, if we could get those done on the 17th, that would be -- I think that would be a minimum that we should try to achieve. >> Houston: I would like to thank the staff for the guidance they have given to us through this process, that they've done a great job on both of these, both the municipal court and this process so I want to thank them. And I would like to call the question. >> Zimmerman: I concur with those remarks and all in favor of the motion for the judges raise your hand. So it is 4-0 in favor of the motion. The motion carries and will be passed to council. Thank you. That will conclude our meeting. We are adjourned at 11:57.