"Touchy feely" aint for Commissioner Yow
Thursday night, after arguing for hours about several other things, the Guilford County Commissioners argued about where their next opportunity to argue would be held.
As we wrote (here and here and here), Commissioner Bruce Davis wants to have the commissioners' annual retreat outside of the county.
But a memo by County Attorney Jonathan Maxwell quotes state law that say the board "shall not vote upon or otherwise transact public business while in attendance at such a gathering," outside the county limits.
At the commissioners' regular meeting Thursday, Republican Billy Yow said he would not go because without the ability to take votes, the retreat is "going to be a touchy feely thing."
Chairman Bruce Davis responded, "at least you won't be there for us to touch and feel on you."
Other Republicans chimed in, saying they don't know how the commissioners can get anything useful done if they aren't allowed to "transact public business."
Commissioner Trudy Wade said she'd "never been to a retreat with this board where we didn't take any votes."
Democratic Vice-Chairman Paul Gibson voiced support for the out-of-county trip saying there's plenty of consensus building that can happen without taking votes.
In the end, the five Republicans on the board voted against setting the meeting but were overruled by the six Democrats. At least there was consensus within each of the two parties.
On the up side, the School of Government, will not charge the county to rent space for the retreat Rental costs had previously been estimated to be about $500.