By LESTER CHANG
The city of Sunnyvale admitted to making a mistake when it reported that a majority of Private Industry Council members failed to attend enough meetings last year to retain their positions.
The city was initially concerned that the PIC, a six-city committee charged with creating jobs in northern Santa Clara County, could not operate effectively with 12 of 20 members missing meetings from Oct. 1 to Dec. 31.
While the Sunnyvale City Council does make appointments to the PIC board, the group is not a Sunnyvale commission and is not subject to the same rules, said Mike Curran, PIC's director of employment development.
The city's Volunteer Services Division inaccurately applied attendance rules--those established by the council--to the PIC members, Sophie Horiuchi, a manager with the division, said last week.
Those rules apply only to the 11 city commissions and boards.
The findings on the attendance of the PIC members came out in a report to the council in January.
The PIC, whose status equals the council's in developing policy for the NOVA projects, uses its own attendance rules for meetings, Curran said.
He said the information in the report was "inaccurate" and was "inappropriately presented."
"Absolutely none of these folks has attendance problems," he said. Some missed meetings because their jobs called for them to be out of town for a period that was acceptable to the PIC, he said.
Others were absent from meetings because they were ill, Curran said.
The PIC meets once a month in Mountain View. Some members might not make it to those meetings, but they do attend subcommittee meetings and other gatherings, Curran said.
The report shows that Margaret Calderon, Cindy Campbell, Priscilla Camperud, Joan Deaton, John Love, Connie Martinez, Stan McDonald, Clare Phillips, Gary Pruitt, Denice S. Ray, Clysta Seney and Ronald Willsey had "substandard attendance."
The city initially said these PIC members attended less than 75 percent of scheduled meetings and/or had two consecutive unexcused absences during 12 months.
If a Sunnyvale board or commission member has three consecutive unexcused absences from regularly scheduled meetings, the council will declare that person's seat vacant. The person can then be replaced, according to city officials.
But the council has no authority to determine whether a PIC member should be removed for missing meetings, Curran said.
A PIC executive committee will decide what action, if any, to take in cases where a member has missed more than two consecutive meetings, Curran said.
The PIC consists of business people, educators and government employees who provide direction for the NOVA Consortium.
Sunnyvale, Cupertino, Palo Alto, Mountain View, Los Altos and Santa Clara implement the job programs with funding from federal, state and private sources.
This article appeared in the Sunnyvale Sun, February 26, 1997.
©1997 Metro Publishing, Inc. All rights reserved.