Chair, it was my understanding, in correspondence with the clerk and from the text of the motion, that we were supposed to have witnesses in last week, because I think there was a deadline for the briefs. That was the intent of the original motion as we all understood it: It was that the briefs would come in and be distributed by the clerk, and we would read them. We did have correspondence with the clerk, and the clerk had told my staff to have these witnesses in.
Whatever, Chair, I'm frustrated that we don't have a schedule for meetings yet. We've done a lot of work. My team is doing work behind the scenes. What I would suggest....
It's not for me to tell you how to do your job, but we can't keep sitting in these meetings with stakeholders watching us while we don't have a clear path forward. Please don't take no for an answer from the clerk that we can't schedule this meeting. I would suggest that you schedule a subcommittee meeting this week and we hammer all this out, or schedule another meeting with everybody on board so that we have a very clear path forward.
What I don't want to see is a notice of meeting coming out later this week for another meeting to discuss more meetings on Monday. We need to start both of these studies. We have submitted witnesses. We have read the briefs. We have very clear direction from the House. We passed Mr. Davies' motion. Let's get started. On Monday, we have to get going on at least one study.