Bluff Town Council members spent a work session examining how town departments, boards and committees should report to elected leaders, debating whether routine operations should roll up to an administrative director or remain under closer council oversight.

The discussion centered on who should handle day-to-day administration and where advisory and regulatory bodies — such as planning and zoning and the water board — should sit in a governance chart. “Everything is gonna roll up to here,” one council member said, gesturing to the council, reflecting concern about ultimate authority. Mayor (unnamed) said, “Ultimately, I have responsibility for all of it as the mayor.” Legal counsel warned about hiring limits, saying, “the law makes it a crime to recommend for employment or actually hire a relative for a public position when you are going to be the relative supervisor.”

Why it matters: the council is trying to balance continuity for daily services (water, facilities, building permits) with public accountability, while keeping meeting length and staff workload manageable. Officials also raised grant and funding implications, and community expectations about local control of utilities such as the water system.

Most council members favored a structure that places routine operations with an administrative director (the staff position referenced throughout by name as Malia) who would report to the town manager or mayor and present periodic updates to council. Under one proposal discussed, department heads would provide staggered reports so not every department appears in the same meeting; several speakers suggested either quarterly oral reports or monthly written summaries made available in meeting packets to avoid long meetings and volunteer burnout.

Council members and staff also debated the difference between permanent departments (for utilities and ongoing services) and short-term committees for project work. Several speakers recommended retaining long-term advisory boards — for example, a water board, cemetery board and planning and zoning commission — with those boards continuing to provide policy direction to the council while paid staff manage daily operations.

The council reviewed the water board as an example: participants said the existing water board currently has five members, a manager, a clerk and outsourced accounting. Speakers asked whether the town would control appointments to that board after organizational changes and whether the board would retain authority to recommend hires. Council members noted a history of reluctance from the water board to be absorbed into town administration and warned that some members could resign if changes were forced.

On staffing and pay, the group raised the possibility of paying certain board members for assigned operational tasks, but legal counsel cautioned about conflicts of interest and state rules on supervising relatives. Speakers also discussed creating facility or operations manager roles (a paid, technical employee) to handle daily maintenance across departments rather than relying on volunteers.

No formal motions or votes were recorded during the session. The council directed staff to draft a document that lays out options discussed — including a governance chart showing departments under administration with dotted lines to council, reporting cycles (quarterly oral reports and monthly written updates), and specifics about how boards such as the water board would interact with administration — and to return the plan for a follow-up work session.

The discussion also included operational clarifications: several speakers emphasized that departments doing budgetary work should coordinate with the town manager for payroll and procurement, while advisory boards could continue to advise the council on policy. Participants asked staff to include estimates of how many paid positions would be needed under different models and noted a planning horizon of 10–15 years for how the town might grow and organize itself.

Ending: Council members agreed to continue the conversation at a follow-up working lunch and asked staff to prepare a written proposal that includes recommended reporting lines, a draft reporting schedule, and notes on legal constraints (conflict-of-interest and open-meeting rules) for the next public meeting.