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County staff are recruiting residents for a committee related to Measure R, the voter-approved sales tax increase passed in November.

But before supervisors approved the resolution establishing the oversight committee, Del Norte County District 2 representative Valerie Starkey asked about the committee’s application process.

“In the resolution it doesn’t have what the criteria is for the candidates that are going to apply,” Starkey told County Counsel Joel Campbell-Blair.

The five-member committee will consist of residents from outside Crescent City limits, according to Campbell-Blair. County Administrative Officer Jay Sarina and Auditor-Controller Clint Schaad or their designees will be non-voting members on the committee.

The committee will review budget information and input from department heads responsible for spending the revenue generated by Measure R. It will also report to the Board of Supervisors whether the money spent was consistent with the tax measure’s purpose.

County Clerk-Recorder Alissia Northrup will verify candidates’ residences and create a panel of other officials to review the applicants and select the best five to put forward to the Board of Supervisors for approval, according to Campbell-Blair’s staff report.

“Rather than require one member from each supervisorial district, the resolution calls for a reasonable attempt at regional balance,” Campbell-Blair wrote in his report. “Thi sis because not every district has an equal amount of residents in the unincorporated area and it might prove difficult to find a person from each district.”

Though the application asks basic questions such as why a candidate would be interested in serving on the committee and what their qualifications may be, the county counsel said he didn’t want to bring it to the Board of Supervisors to have it “set in stone.”

“I don’t know what qualifies somebody for this. I think it’s a little bit open-ended,” he said. “If the Board wants to create something more specific, we certainly can. I’m not sure what the qualifications would be.”

Starkey, noting that Crescent City’s application process for its Measure S Oversight Committee had more concrete questions, said Campbell-Blair didn’t include any real guidance on how to go about choosing the most qualified candidates for the county’s oversight committee.

“Should they have a financial background? Do they have conflicts of interests and would we weed them out based on that?” Starkey asked, listing questions a potential application could ask. “There are a variety of things I think we should clarify before we put that out.”

Starkey said she didn’t feel it would be fair to Northrup to make the determination on who the best five candidates would be, especially if 50 applicants vie for oversight committee seats.

Northrup pointed to the provision in the resolution stating that she could form a panel of officials to help her make that decision. If there is a large response, she said she intends to take advantage of that resolution.

“My initial job would be to go through the applications, make sure they are qualified as far as (whether) they live in Del Norte County and are a registered voter,” Northrup said. “If we’ve got a really large response, I feel we should bring in some other department heads who would have something to add. My job is to make sure the whole county would be represented as far as each district.”

Starkey said if there was a large enough response that Northrup appointed a panel of other officials to help screen applicants, doing so would allow the process to be transparent to the public.

Del Norte County voters approved Measure R, a 1 percent sales tax increase, in November 2020 with 5,018 yes votes to 4,971 no votes. The measure needed a 50-percent plus-one majority to pass and is expected to generate roughly $1.2 million in revenue.

Those dollars are earmarked for a variety of services including repairing potholes and streets, maintaining emergency dispatch services and mitigating blight and public nuisances, according to the county’s FAQ sheet.

Documents:

• Oversight Committee Staff Report

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