Council passes decorum policy

A resolution passed by the Custer City Council at its May 1 meeting seeks to regulate public decorum when addressing the council at council meetings.

The policy states the Custer City Council encourages residents to attend its meetings and welcomes their views on matters within the council’s jurisdiction, but states all comments made by the public and members of the city council must be “civil and respectful.”

The policy also lays out rules for people presenting on an agenda item or during the public comment period. Those rules include:

• Individuals wishing to speak must sign in prior to the scheduled start of the meeting.

• No person shall address the city council until the presiding officer has recognized and given him or her leave to speak.

• Each person shall state their name and their address of residence for the record before making their comment. The speaker shall also state the topic they wish to discuss, and what, if any, future action is desired for the city council to take upon this subject.

• Whenever a group wishes to address the city council on the same subject, the presiding officer may request that a spokesperson be chosen by the group.

• Speakers must refrain from using profanity; language likely to incite violence or outbursts from the audience; language that is disruptive to the orderly process of the meeting; engaging in conversations with individual council members or staff; making comments of a personal nature regarding others; shouting, yelling or screaming.

• Speakers must not continue to address the city council once they have left the podium and must not engage in conversation with council members or staff from their seat.

• All demonstrations including cheering, yelling, whistling, handclapping, and foot stomping which disrupts, disturbs or otherwise impedes the order conduct of the council meeting are prohibited.

• Each person speaking shall be limited to three minutes. If more than one person speaks upon the same subject, the total time allowed for discussion on single topic will be no longer than 15 minutes. The maximum time allowed for verbal communication shall be 30 minutes. For good cause, the mayor may extend or shorten the time for individual speakers or the maximum time for verbal communications.

• Subject to the approval of the mayor, persons who did not sign in may be allowed to speak provided maximum time limits are not exceeded.

• Person speaking before the council shall refrain from questioning council. The purpose of comment is to simply make comment.

Mayor Bob Brown said the resolution isn’t a product of anything that has been taking place at city council meetings, but rather, to make sure the city both has a policy regarding its public comment to make it more orderly and is following Roberts Rule of Order regarding public meetings. Brown said he is “not a politician,” and he hadn’t been following Roberts Rule of Order to the letter of the law.

“We aren’t changing things. This has been around for years and years,” Brown said.

Brown also said the resolution is not an effort to stifle discussion or questions to the council.

“That’s not true,” he said.

Brown said the council still welcomes questions and discussion, just within the bounds of Roberts Rule of Order.

Brown added the policy is in line with what many boards across the country are doing considering increasing hostility toward government boards.

State law requires public boards allow public comment, but entities are given leeway to craft policy regarding how the comment is presented.