Recreation Advisory Board approves minutes, discusses outreach, chair selection and open-meetings limits

At the Sept. 9 meeting, members of the Buncombe County Recreation Advisory Board moved and seconded to approve the July meeting minutes; a vocal second was recorded and no roll-call tally was taken.

The board discussed outreach and education strategies to raise public awareness of county parks and programs as a precursor to any funding proposals. Members suggested using participation data and comparisons to peer counties when communicating with the Board of Commissioners.

Allison Daines, director of Buncombe County Parks and Recreation, said the department will add advisory board members to its newsletter distribution and suggested a retreat to focus on priorities and funding options. Board members discussed possible funding mechanisms (property tax allocations, sales taxes, bonds) but made no formal recommendation.

Board members also discussed governance items: they plan to nominate a chair and vice chair at the November meeting and to adjust the meeting schedule (staff to confirm whether Nov. 11 conflicts with Veterans Day and propose an alternate date). Members raised open-meeting law concerns about collaborative online documents; staff advised that using a single point of contact for emailed questions is safer than real-time shared documents to avoid constituting a meeting under the public-records/open-meeting rules.

Daines and other board members named Commissioner Gary Wells and Commissioner Amanda Edwards as county commissioners known to be engaged on parks issues; staff noted advocacy to commissioners should be informed by data and the department's business plan.

Ending: The board asked staff to circulate meeting materials prior to meetings, to collect member questions in advance, and to return to the advisory board with a plan for a winter retreat that could include long-range funding discussions and a possible chair election.