To: Board of Supervisors
From: Internal Operations Committee
Report Title: Updates to Mental Health Commission Bylaws Pertaining to Attendance
☐Recommendation of the County Administrator ☒ Recommendation of Board Committee
RECOMMENDATIONS:
ADOPT changes to the Mental Health Commission’s bylaws pertaining to attendance.
FISCAL IMPACT:
No fiscal impact.
BACKGROUND:
In July 2021, the IOC decided to recommend changes to the Mental Health Commission bylaws pertaining to recruitment and membership. Those changes were adopted by the Board of Supervisors in September 2021 and the current bylaws are attached hereto for reference. At that time, it was anticipated that additional changes pertaining to attendance would be forthcoming from the Commission and considered at a future IOC meeting. At the end of 2023, there was an incident involving a commissioner concerning differing interpretations of attendance requirements in the current bylaws. Consequently, the Commission determined to revise and clarify its attendance requirements to avoid any future misunderstanding.
At its regular meeting of June 10, 2024, the Internal Operations Committee (IOC) reviewed the Mental Health Commission’s proposed changes to its bylaws pertaining to attendance, both redline and final draft versions, as well as the current version of the bylaws adopted September 2021, which are all attached for reference. The proposed changes were unanimously approved by 11 Commissioners at the Commission’s May 1, 2024 meeting.
The IOC recognized that Proposition 1 will likely necessitate combining the Alcohol and Other Drugs Advisory Board with the Mental Health Commission (MHC) (or decommissioning those bodies and creating a new body) by the end of this year. Still, the IOC agreed that the proposed MHC bylaw amendments could move forward in the interim to define what constitutes an excused absence and provide a procedure to report and recognize excused absences. This is especially important for Commissioners who have professional obligations, particularly involving travel, that prevents attendance at some MHC meetings.
CONSEQUENCE OF NEGATIVE ACTION:
Without the clarifying changes, the Commission may continue to have disputes over interpretation of the bylaws as they pertain to attendance.