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Regular City Council Meeting Monday, April 7, 2014 Page 8 Councilmembers Willmus and McGehee agreed with Councilmember Laliberte, that roles should be discussed among commissioners. Member Bachhuber sought guidance from the City Council on the role of the Chair and how that person would work with the City Council. Councilmember Etten responded, based on his personal experience chairing the Parks & Recreation Commission, noted that the Chair worked more directly with the staff liaison to direct the agenda and run meetings, and should be somewhat familiar with running a public meeting and directing those activities. Coun- cilmember Etten noted that, while some Chairpersons were more formal than oth- ers, the point person needed to be able to run the meeting, and be able to work with staff on agendas and directing questions from the body to staff. While creat- ing more work for that volunteer commissioner, Councilmember Etten opined that it was an exciting opportunity and could prove to be a great experience for people. When the City Council drafted and revised the ordinance creating the Finance Commission, Councilmember Laliberte noted the considerable thought put into it; and reiterated some of her preferences, as well as other random thoughts for the Commission to consider as they begin their work. 1) While interesting to discuss having a set calendar for the budgeting process; Councilmember Laliberte opined that since it changes from year to year, it was hard for residents to know that schedule, and suggested that a first step would be to set some of those things in regular practice; and sought the Com- mission's perception of that. 2) Councilmember Laliberte sought input from the Commission on how to look at the budget once it's passed, noting that the Council was currently alerted when things are done at the fund level, but typically things within those funds did not come before the City Council, unless a specific recommendation was needed for a line item within the fund, or for various budget amendments throughout the year. 3) Councilmember Laliberte expressed her initial frustrations when coming onto the City Council and expectations of program prioritization and ranking by importance and maintenance of those programs based on that ranking. Coun- cilmember Laliberte noted that numbers were included in the annual budget to be spent on those programs or services to maintain them; however, never did she find any of them dialed back to question current costs of a program or its specific budget. Councilmember Laliberte suggested taking a look at each program to determine if there was a fresh way to deliver that service or pro- gram in a more cost-effective way versus simply continuing to fund it and rank it based on that new number. 4) As she requested in the previous year's budget process, Councilmember Laliberte expressed her interest in the feasibility of having two budgets pre- sented: one with no increase in property taxes versus the City Manager-