Board Of Aldermen - Minutes - 7/6/2021 - P5
Special Board of Aldermen 07-06-2021 Page 5
What became apparent in my opinion over the last year was with a Board of three, they’re very vulnerable
to their own needs professional speaking. They have an obligation to treat their patients, to have to
maintain the appointments that they schedule and sometimes meetings where they’re exploring public
policy can become longer than anticipated or issues can come up that need to be addressed faster. When
you only have three people on the Board if you have one person who is not able to make it because of work
obligations or has to leave because of work obligations, you’re basically left with a one versus one
committee. So discussion becomes difficult because if there’s any disagreement, they can’t reach a
resolution.
So what the referendum does is it introduces the opportunity for the voters to adopt an ordinance that
would upgrade the Board of Health to five members instead of three. Because it was originally conceived
of before psychiatry was particularly recognized, one of the positions could be a medical doctor but could
also include someone with doctorate level experience in psychiatry. That’s | think more relevant today than
ever it has been because we’re facing public health issues like suicide outbreaks and substance misuse
outbreaks where the opioid crisis is more specifically a substance use disorder and that discipline has more
input on it.
Then additionally one of the spaces could be used for somebody who has advance public health
knowledge or experience because as it is right now, we don’t have any public health practitioners who
aren't employed by the City. That’s what the ordinance does is it allows for a more flexible quorum to be
reached and if there’s an incident where there’s a health crisis facing the city, we’re not going to put the
Board of Health members into a situation where they’d have to decide between treating a patient and
advising policy for the City.
Chairman Caron
Thank you. Director Bagley are you on Zoom?
Director Bobbie Bagley
Yes good evening | am here. | am at home.
Chairman Caron
Would you be willing to speak on this on behalf of the Board of Health Commissioners?
Director Bobbie Bagley
We have the Chair of the Board of Health who’s also on.
Chairman Caron
Oh okay. Yes | see him now. Okay would you like him to speak?
Director Bobbie Bagley
Yes please. Thank you.