CC Board Restricts Sources of Pets Sold at Pet Stores
Note: As mentioned by other League Observers, there
continue to be issues regarding
transparency of Board actions. At
this meeting, there was no WiFi available in the Board room for accessing the
Board and Commission agendas, and no paper copies were available until finally,
after the Committee meetings and an hour and a half into the Board meeting,
citizen George Blakemore came in and started passing copies of the Board agenda
to audience members. However, at that
point, a second amended proposed ordinance to amend the Animal and Consumer
Protection Ordinance was being discussed.
Board members had received this second amended version earlier that
morning, but it was not available to audience members at the meeting, nor was
it available online on either the Secretary to the Board’s or the Clerk of the
Board’s web sites during or after the meeting.
Commissioner Fritchey, who was the chief sponsor of the second amended
and original proposed amendment to the Ordinance did identify the changes from
what appeared in the agenda, but this observer has not been able to verify that
all the changes were identified since this second amended version is still not
posted as of the end of April 9. The 3
New Agenda items were also not available online or at the meeting. Reports of
Board Committee meetings from April 8 were approved by the Board during the
Board Meeting on April 9, but since these Reports are not available, this
Observer does not know what items or how those items that were on the Committee
agendas were dealt with at the Committee meetings and consequently what the
Board votes accepting the Reports actually mean. However, all items dealt with
on the agenda, other than the Committee Reports, were briefly summarized for
those watching the meeting, which is appreciated.
After about an hour of public comment from supporters of and
those expressing concern over the proposed restrictions to the sources of pets
for pet stores, the Board voted unanimously to approve the second amended
version of an Amendment to the Cook
County Companion Animal and Consumer Protection Ordinance. Under the version that appeared in the
agenda, retailers may only offer for sale cats, dogs, and rabbits that are
obtained from a government-operated facility or from a humane society or rescue
organization. However, Commissioner
Fritchey stated that under the second amended version that was passed,
retailers may also obtain these animals from someone that has 5 or fewer
breeding animals. Further, any
municipality that has Home Rule powers may opt out from this ordinance. Finally, this second amended version provides
for an effective date of October 1, 2014, rather than the originally proposed
July 1. Commissioner Fritchey said that
he would be happy to talk with those who expressed concern over the amendment
to see whether any further changes should be proposed to the Board.
Prior to the vote, Commissioner Goslin questioned why the
Board was considering this proposed amendment at all, as opposed to referring
it to a Board Committee, as is the usual practice. Commissioner Gorman then moved to refer it to
the Legislative Committee so that there would be time for all the written testimony
and other information presented to the Board during the public comment period
to be reviewed and considered. That
motion was voted down, with only Commissioners Gorman, Goslin, Murphy,
Schneider, and Suffredin supporting it.
Commissioner Goslin did say that he would look at all the testimony
presented and would consider whether he would offer amendments at future Board
meetings.
The Board received for filing the Human Resources Biweekly Activity Reports for January 12 through
February 8. Commissioner Gainer
questioned the large raises/promotions ($35,000 to $50,000) given to several
employees at the Juvenile Temporary
Detention Center (JTDC) within just a few weeks of the budget being passed. Transitional Administrator of the JTDC
sent an employee with a letter to the Board which stated that the Administrator
would respond in writing to any written questions the Board had and the
employee said that he had been instructed not to respond to any Commissioner
questions during the meeting. Several
Commissioners expressed their dissatisfaction with what they perceived to be a
lack of respect for the Board.
Commissioner Suffredin said that Chief Judge Evans had expressed the
belief that the hand-off from the Transitional Administrator (appointed by the
Federal Court) to the Chief Judge (and therefore from Federal Court to County
control) would take place by June or July.
New Agenda item 14-2448 was passed which apparently (the
text of this item was not available to the public) amends the Board’s appointment
process to cover the appointment of members of a Juvenile Temporary Detention Center Advisory Council once the
JTDC is under the Chief Judge’s
supervision.
The 1st
Quarter Report of the Veterans Assistance Commission was received and
filed. The budget for this Commission
had been a hot topic during last fall’s budget hearings, and the Board at that
time ended up increasing the budget by $100,000 even though the Commission
spent far less than had been budgeted in the past. Per this Report, the Commission has spent
$37,000 vs. the $78,000 the Budget Department would have expected, but what was
spent is slightly over what had been spent at this time the prior year.
Finance Committee
Meeting (prior to the Board Meeting):
Commissioner Suffredin moved to defer the proposed Ordinance to Create a Municipal or Special District Inspector
General to the next Board meeting in order to give the Cook County Sheriff
and State Comptroller time to work out an acceptable deal with Harvey regarding
turning over records. The Committee
received the Revenue Report through
February for filing. Revenues from the
Clerk of the Court and the Recorder of Deeds were down from what had been
projected, but the revenues from the Health & Hospitals System (HHS) for
the Health Fund are well above projections.
Upon questioning from Commissioner Gainer and others, the Chief
Financial Officer for HHS said that most of the excess revenues are coming from
the Medicaid Expansion: the budget
anticipated that there would be 56,000 under County Care throughout the year
under the expansion, while currently 86,000 have been approved, though
some of these may opt for other providers later in 2014; further, some of the
revenues received in 2014 are for services provided in 2013. Commissioner Gainer asked that HHS provide
the Board with an estimate of sustainable increase in income.
--reported by Priscilla Mims
