2025-10-22 Pre-Council Meeting: Council Practices and Procedures Review
Pre-Council Meeting: Council Practices and Procedures Review
The October 20, 2025, pre-council meeting focused on reviewing and updating the City's communication and meeting practices, including public comment protocols, virtual participation guidelines, and board recruitment. Council members engaged in a comprehensive discussion to modernize existing ordinances, address technological advancements, and ensure equitable public access while maintaining efficient meeting management. The dialogue centered on clarifying rules for public comment, exploring the legality and logistics of remote council participation, and determining the best methods for disseminating board and commission vacancies.
Consent Calendar
- No routine approvals were discussed; the meeting focused on deliberative items and housekeeping updates.
Public Comments & Testimony
- No public testimony was recorded during this pre-council meeting; all comments were made by Council members and staff.
Discussion Items
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Public Comment Protocols (Resolution 1881):
- Council members discussed amending the 1981 resolution to clarify public comment time limits (currently 3 minutes, with a request for up to 5 minutes for organization representatives).
- Position on Additional Time: Council members expressed support for removing the provision allowing a single council member to grant additional time. Instead, they reached a general consensus to require council consensus (rather than individual discretion) to grant additional time to a speaker.
- Position on Name/Address: Members discussed removing the requirement for speakers to state their residence address due to privacy concerns and the availability of online minutes. Staff noted the original intent was to gauge proximity to the issue, but Council members agreed to remove the address requirement while retaining the name requirement.
- Position on Decorum: Council members debated updating rules regarding "out of order" behavior, specifically proposing the inclusion of inappropriate language (repeated cursing) and nonverbal disruption (booing, snapping, hissing, yelling). Members expressed caution regarding potential First Amendment free speech pushback, agreeing to refine the language to focus on reasonable decorum and interruptions before codifying.
- Position on Total Time Limits: While one member suggested limiting total speaking time per meeting (e.g., 6 minutes), another expressed strong opposition to limiting the number of times a public member can speak, noting that expertise often spans multiple agenda items.
- Position on Adjournment Time: Council members discussed the proposal to set a hard stop time (e.g., 11:00 PM) to ensure efficiency, with the caveat that this must not compromise public engagement. Data presented showed the majority of recent meetings concluded before 10:30 PM, though budget and capital improvement items sometimes pushed meetings later.
- Position on First Read Comment: Council members considered the practice of other cities (specifically Springfield, MO) where public comment occurs at the first reading of an ordinance to allow time for questions before the final vote, suggesting a need for further research.
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Board and Commission Appointments:
- Staff presented data indicating that board appointments are currently advertised in the Tribune and Missouri newspapers at a cost of $7,000–$8,000 annually.
- Position on Newspaper Ads: Council members expressed hesitation to immediately discontinue newspaper advertising. Several members stated they wanted to first determine where applicants are finding information (e.g., press releases, social media, utility bills) before deciding whether to consolidate efforts to one paper or remove print advertising entirely.
- Position on Digital Outreach: Council members agreed to emphasize digital channels (website, press releases, social media, utility newsletters) and neighborhood association contacts as primary notification methods moving forward.
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Virtual Participation:
- Council members expressed interest in adopting virtual participation capabilities, particularly for work sessions and as a contingency for illness or travel.
- Position on Technology: Members noted that current technology had improved since the pandemic but requested a specific assessment of audio/video capabilities.
- Position on Best Practices: Staff presented Springfield, MO's model (Zoom-based, council-only participation with minor exceptions for attorneys). Council members agreed to investigate these best practices and the specific notification timeline required (staff suggested a no-later-than-noon deadline for 7:00 PM meetings).
- Position on Quorum/Membership: Members discussed the need for guidelines ensuring in-person quorum requirements are met if virtual members are present.
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Broadcasting Pre-Councils and Work Sessions:
- Council members expressed strong support for broadcasting work sessions and pre-councils to improve accessibility, citing the needs of those with child care conflicts, lack of transportation, or work schedule issues.
- Position on Cost: Council members expressed concern regarding the cost of closed captioning ($98/hour) and the potential for staffing gaps. One member stated a willingness to temporarily absorb costs for a few meetings to start, while another stated they wanted a full budget impact analysis before approving the move to the main chamber.
- Position on Technology: Members discussed the potential for AI live captioning to reduce costs and the timeline for the ongoing chamber RFP (no timeline available yet).
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Emergency Communications:
- Staff confirmed the current practice of sending text updates to all council members during emergencies.
- Position on Public Notification: Council members requested clarification on the timeline for public notifications. Police and Fire Chiefs explained that public safety departments have strict protocols regarding when to release information (e.g., waiting to notify victims' families first, verifying facts before press conferences) to ensure accuracy and avoid compromising investigations. Council members expressed appreciation for the Chiefs' explanation of the balance between timely information and privacy/accuracy.
Key Outcomes
- Actioned: Council directed staff to prepare a formal report summarizing findings on public comment protocol changes (Resolution 1881), board recruitment advertising strategies, and virtual participation best practices.
- Actioned: Council targeted the December meeting (second meeting) for a decision on finalizing these policy changes, including potential legislation for the ordinance amendments.
- Actioned: Staff agreed to investigate Springfield, MO's specific practices regarding virtual participation and first-read public comment to be included in the December report.
- Actioned: Regarding the broadcasting of work sessions, Council deferred a final decision on moving meetings to the main chamber pending a cost analysis.
- Actioned: Council agreed to review the specific question regarding public comment timing at the first read of ordinances, with staff to research and report back.
- No Vote Taken: No immediate vote was taken to abolish newspaper advertising or implement virtual council meetings; these items remain under review for the December agenda.
Meeting Transcript
We convene now our pre-council meeting or October 20th. The subject of the majority of this meeting is around our council communication and meeting practices. I want to think staff attached a lot to our agenda for this evening. Um and I've just like to ground set part of this is just housekeeping. You'll notice in the attachments and agenda from 2019 with some of the things that the council then uh were talking about wanting to check. Uh some of them have been staff brought up. For instance, Sheila pointing out that there's a thing in the ordinance about not smoking in the council chambers that we could probably just eliminate since we can't smoke indoors. Um as well as other things about um periods of time for we allow for public comment that had never been, or at least we can't find words officially in there. And so just kind of doing some of those housekeeping things. So I'm gonna kick it over to the crying because I do have a few slides, but I I my my guess is that this is really a council conversation, and you're wanting us to kind of lead the discussion and excuse me, potentially any updates, but as well as point out what you guys are aware of that probably need to be updated. Absolutely. Yeah, that's that's exactly the the idea is for us to have a conversation. There's a lot of things that council kind of talks about the questions about where we're at with this, what is this looking? Uh it should be on. Okay. I'll just take it off. Yeah, there it is. So that we can actually talk into it. And so it's just it will give us an opportunity to have that conversation. I know there's so like the first thing if you want to pull up the first slide, it's about public comment, time limits, though stating war versus address, and some of these things we've talked about, but we're never really officially adopted as part of our ordinance. And so I'll open up for conversation. Okay, so the first one I have a note on is in relation to resolution, the resolution from 1981, the R1881. Um this is the the discussion that we need to, we want to probably amend this one to just clarify the three minutes given to um people, and that they can request five minutes of their representing an organization um that is affected by the legislation. Um any concerns or questions that council members have for that. And my assumption is from this one to Carlin is that you all will take like kind of the feedback from here and then craft something to come back to council for either official adoption or as a report and then for official adoption. And that would be the idea. So some of the things are like this will be codified, so we'll bring ordinance back. Some of the other one may just be practices, so we'll say here's our room in our practice. One of the things we've we've been talking about is putting up putting together the council handbook. So this stuff can be included in those council handbooks. So new council members coming on board will have that same information. Okay. Yeah, Virgo, you had your hand up. I noticed in the same one, um, it mentions that any person can be granted an additional five minutes on top of the three to five minutes uh by any council member. We're talking about number four, right? Um, I see that, yeah. Is that something that we are is that something we are also cleaning up and cleaning out of the ordinance? I think because how long have we been doing the current practice? Are we aware of since the four or nine o'clock? That's before there's 81. I think that's a good one to clean up as well. So you want to remove that? I would say, yeah, because we I don't it hasn't been a practice at least filling. Well and remove a comment. Well, I just bring it to us. Yeah. We I haven't seen it, but I don't know that there might not be an occasion where we would want to hear more from someone, but I don't know that I would want to leave that up to one council member uh to do. I think though if there could provision that would allow us to extend someone's time if the council approves it together. General consensus for the idea, yeah, general consensus of council. For instance, if it's like an applicant or in one of the things that we want to ask additional questions of something.
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