On the beaten path

The real news about how the county runs comes out of the many committee meetings — Public Safety, Human Services, Economic Development, Finance and so on — that the Board of Supervisors hold.

If you go to the main meeting, the once-a-month regular session of the Board of Supervisors, you’ll see a list of resolutions and spending requests approved by all the committees and presented for final OK. The discussion has already been held, so the regular meeting goes by pretty fast most of the time.

That’s why committee coverage is important, but talking with everyone before and after meetings is just as important. I don’t go to a meeting to write a story that says “the Board of Supervisors voted to buy a dump truck” or some such minutia. I try to find issues. Then I write about them.

So stories about Essex County government are usually compilations of meeting coverage and interviews. The idea is that our readers are concerned about the issues that affect their lives and that’s what we should write about.

That’s doesn’t mean that sometimes the meeting itself isn’t the story, as we’ve all seen with coverage of Peru Town Council slugfests. But supervisors in Essex County are usually pretty cordial with each other, and they try to be professional.

I try to get to the Old County Courthouse about 15 minutes early for meetings, so I can talk with people as they arrive. That’s usually how I find out what the major topics will be at a meeting. Agendas are provided on the podium at the back of the supervisors’ chambers, and I take one and look it over.

When the meeting starts, I take notes on my laptop computer. It’s faster and easier than trying to keep up by writing on a pad. The various items of discussion are later evaluated for use as individual news stories.

I try to sit in the front, because you can hear best there. Clerk of the Board Deborah Palmer got them to install a folding table for me at the end of the right front row, so I set up there and have a flat surface to type on and take written notes.

Sometimes people come in to address the board, and if it’s on an important issue I try to take a photo.

That’s harder than it seems because the podium naturally faces the supervisors, and I have to vault over the front-row railing to get a good angle for a photo. More than once I’ve caught my foot and stumbled, although I haven’t fallen down yet.

Sometimes the supervisors refer to me, as Newcomb Supervisor George Canon did the day County Social Services wanted a bill paid for $248 worth of pizza pies from Bub’s Pizza and Deli in Elizabethtown.

“I am willing to bet you that the Press-Republican’s headline tomorrow is ‘County buys $248 worth of pizza,’” said Mr. Canon.

Guess I’ll have to write a brief on that.