Lengthy meeting brings Temple’s rules of decorum into question – Times-Georgian: News

The Temple City Council’s three-hour, 51-minute meeting earlier this month was a memorable one.

A boisterous, overflow crowd at city hall weighed in on a variety of issues throughout the night, filling the room with enough ideas and public comment that two full hours passed before the council took a first vote. Members of the audience did not need to give their names or addresses or come to a podium, and had no time limit, with some speaking more often than some of the council members that night.

The meeting caused the city’s rules of decorum to come under question.

Those rules state that public comment only happens during a certain part of the meeting, after the invocation and before invited guests are recognized. They also state that when audience members make public comments, “the speaker shall come to the podium and state their name and address … the speaker will have three minutes to speak and … a citizen may speak for or against agenda items during public comment by signing in before the assigned items for the meeting to begin.”

The rules state that the mayor can waive the three-minute requirement or allow an open forum “by a majority vote of the council” and that the mayor “shall enforce Robert’s Rules of Order.”

No vote was taken during the Feb. 3 meeting regarding public comment.

But there are different opinions as to whether those rules are still in effect.

Temple Mayor Lester Harmon, who took office Jan. 1, said they are not.

“They had rules of decorum that were with the old charter,” he said. “When the new charter came into effect (in 2010) all of that stuff was changed. We now go by the new charter. The new charter states the mayor presides over and runs the meeting. … They cannot pass anything contrary to what the mayor has in that charter. Anything contrary to that is not going to fly.”

Harmon said he’s open to having speakers walk to a podium and give their name and address, but stood firm on his power to run the meetings. The charter says the mayor shall “preside at all meetings of the city council.” Preside is defined as “holding a position of authority, acting as chairperson or president and possessing or exercising authority or control.”

via Lengthy meeting brings Temple’s rules of decorum into question – Times-Georgian: News.