And no one can say with precision just how many there really are.

City Hall is infested with fast-breeding nests of committees, commissions, task forces, review boards and advisory groups trained on everything from road ends to hotel taxes.

Not even city officials are sure of their numbers, but a recent study suggests there may be too many.

Some groups are very active – such as the citizen-based Planning Commission or the City Council’s Public Works Committee – but others rarely meet. Some largely-dormant committees occasionally scurry out of the woodwork to the shock of busy city staff.

All told, there may be 30 groups, or maybe just 27 – depending on who you ask at City Hall and how many were last spotted.

Consultants who drafted the city’s recent “benchmarking” study on government efficiency put the number at 24, which is more than double the average of comparable cities.

“Bainbridge is by far much higher than its peers in the number of committees,” said Dan Speicher, a consultant with the Colorado-based firm CH2M Hill.

Speicher recommended the city take a hard look at what the groups are doing, how much they cost and the possibility of reducing the number of active committees.

“They key is really staff time and how much that costs,” added CH2M Hill consultant Jennifer Barnes.

But some councilors were uncomfortable with notion that committees may be gnawing at the wires of city government, impeding work rather than improving it.

“You struck a nerve,” Councilman Bill Knobloch told the consultants.

Councilwoman Debbie Vancil defended citizen-based committees as a vital part of Bainbridge government.

“Citizens are our strength,” she said. “Citizen committees are not the problem – it’s how the city functions with them that needs addressing.”

Vancil listed the many accomplishments of city committees, including developing the goals of the Winslow Tomorrow project, the open space bond levy and the non-motorized transportation plan.

“If there’s a breakdown, it’s at the doors of City Hall,” she said. “When the good work of the citizen committees moves to the city for implementation we frizzle out.”

Vancil said the city should try harder to implement the committees’ work and recommendations.

“(City) staff need tools and support from the administration,” she said. “(Staff) needs leadership.”

But some city staff say they already have the tools. They just need a break.

“Oh boy, I can’t tell you how many hours a month my staff put into committees,” said interim planning director Jim Harris, who’s staff assist numerous committees targeting development, environmental issues and urban design. “It’s unbelievable. I’ve never worked for a city with so many committees.”

The City of Renton, when Harris worked there, had under a dozen committees. In Kent, where he recently oversaw the planning department, there were just eight committees.

The low numbers were partly due to paltry citizen involvement, Harris said. People in Kent and Renton just weren’t particularly enticed by volunteer service on municipal committees. But on Bainbridge Island, he added, citizens are a bit more engaged.

“I bet if you had a hundred committees here you’d have citizens for every one of them,” Harris said. “You just have citizens who are more involved here.”

That can be good and bad.

“It’s good to have a very aware community but the drawback is endless process and citizens involved endlessly in city affairs,” he said.

Staff assigned to committees provide a range of services, from attending meetings to research.

Some of the work is mundane, but time-consuming.

“Time-keeping and keeping notes is a bear in its own right,” Harris said.

Public Works Director Randy Witt said citizen committees churn out many good ideas – almost too many.

“My staff can’t keep up with all the good ideas,” he said.

The department provides staff support or oversight for a half dozen committees, Witt said, including the Community Forestry Commission, the Planning Commission and the Open Space Advisory Commission. Other groups advise public works on projects, such as bike lanes, street design and other capital improvements.

“I could spend all my time serving the committees and not do the routine, expected work,” Witt said. “There’s a lot of experts in the citizen committees with a lot of ideas. It’s just implementation. I get lost in that.”

Many ideas don’t come with money, or the staff or the required resources to develop them. Some proposals are flat-out against the law, Witt said.

But Don Willott, a member of the non-motorized transportation committee, said citizen groups could save the city time and money if staff worked more as collaborators and less as managers.

“The committees really save work,” he said. “If (staff) feel like they have to control…they wind up thwarting volunteers (by) managing volunteers rather than acting as collaborators.”

Willott said he believes work between staff and citizen committee members is running smoother than ever.

But the collaborative gears rolling between City Council committees and staff could use some grease, Witt said.

He offers Bremerton, where he worked as city engineer, as a city with a positive and productive relationship between council committees and staff.

“In Bremerton, the council worked much quicker and were more interested in what staff had to say and in the direction we thought we should go,” Witt said. “It was fairly well accepted that (staff) would handle the routine (projects), and we handled it quickly.”

Often the Bainbridge council committees intervene on projects, burden staff with requests for information or sideline them mid-way through, city staff say.

“One thing (Bremerton) did better was that when (a decision was made), the council would close out, accept the work and thank the staff,” Witt said. “Here, we’re hugely involved (and) sometimes we can’t keep up with all the process. It’s our biggest asset and it can be our biggest detriment.”