HANSVILLE — Before getting down to the hard stuff, like organizing community improvement projects, the newly formed Greater Hansville Area Advisory Committee got to work deciding what involvement Kitsap County would have with the group’s efforts to make Hansville a better place.

The members were looking for a less formal relationship with the county, hoping for guidance but not wanting to have their members picked for them, like the Kingston Citizens Advisory Council and the Suquamish Citizens Advisory Committee.

“The county sees real value in a relationship with a group like this one, even though we’re not going to be as formal as Kingston,” said Hansville Futures steering committee member Steve Bauer at a Jan. 23 meeting. “We’d like to have a less formal relationship, and (Kitsap County Commissioner Chris Endresen) was quite open to that.”

The GHAAC formed after the final report of the Hansville Futures Project was released at the end of 2006. Included in the report were a number of changes residents would like to see happen in the North End communities. The committee, made up of 30 representatives from each neighborhood and organization in the Hansville area, is taking the next step to carry out the plan.

“Obviously the county will benefit as well,” said GHAAC interim chairwoman Judy Foritano. “They get a single, smaller group to contact on all the issues going on around here. That’s easier than each of us going to them separately.”

There will have to be a few policy changes on behalf of the county, Bauer said, but they are easily accomplished so the GHAAC can maintain some of its independence as well as having county support.

“The only thing I could could see about the staffing is the county’s timing on getting back to us,” said GHAAC member Judy Roupe. The county is notorious for taking its time in returning e-mails and calls, she added. “I’m not sure if it would be good to have an overworked staff worker who wouldn’t get back to us in a timely manner.”

Bauer assured everyone present the group would have its own county employee who would attend meetings and be able to investigate queries for the GHAAC.

“Hansville has a stick-to-it-ness, and if the county started to come up short, people in this group would continue to work on it,” said GHAAC member Becky Ellison. “I think it would work.”

The committee decided to work with the county, to a certain degree. The rest of the evening consisted of the members writing by-laws and electing an interim council to get the GHAAC moving forward. In the coming meetings, members will begin forming plans and projects to carry out the Hansville Futures Project action items.