February 26, 2002

West Earl Township Supervisors & Manager
157 Metzler Rd.
Brownstown PA 17508

Dear Supervisors and Manager,

Thank-you for your time and consideration of my web-site proposal and also regarding the release of draft minutes. As I stated after Pat and Kelly provided details regarding the county’s web-site platform, I think the county’s platform would be a better approach versus the site I proposed. Assuming the township decides to proceed with the county’s proposal, I would appreciate it if the board could determine a general timetable for the implementation of the new site relatively quickly so that I could promote the new site on the current site as a way to provide transition.

I would also like to take this opportunity to stress a final important point regarding my request for draft minutes. The most important reason to release draft minutes is to provide a public record of board decisions and motions that are approved effective immediately. As I mentioned in the meeting, it’s a month from the time that a decision in a supervisors’ meeting is made until a person who is informed by reading the approved minutes can address the board. I also should have mentioned that the time lag is 2 months for all of the other boards since they only meet once a month. These time lags are so long that I speculate that they could provide a basis for someone to legally challenge a decision which was implemented immediately.

I request that the township discuss this concern with the solicitor to determine if it would be best to delay implementation of all board decisions until after the minutes which record the subject decisions are released to the public. Even if the solicitor believes there are no legal problems, I would still urge the board to release the draft minutes due to the questionable nature of implementing decisions before the record of the decisions is public knowledge.

Thank-you for your attention to these items and for your service to the township.

Sincerely,

Dave Noyes

CC: Josele