At a July 9 Redmond City Council meeting, Mayor Ed Fitch announced that the City will modify its rules on public comment, allowing it to only occur at the end of council meetings, once official City business has been completed. Before July 9, individuals were allowed the opportunity for public comment both at the beginning and end of the meeting.The Redmond City Council decided to make this change, first, to focus on City business. The second reason, Fitch explained at the meeting, had to do with a rise in offensive statements.
The Council noted that over the past 18 months, with increasing frequency, there have been objectively offensive comments at each meeting, including racist and homophobic comments, personal attacks on individuals not associated with the City Council and comments that in no way reflect the opinions and values of the City Council or the character of the City.
"Some of the Council were uncomfortable with having pretty derogatory comments made about other people at the beginning of meeting that tends to distract from what the purpose of the meeting is," said Fitch.
According to the July 9 agenda, the City Council unanimously felt it was best for comments to occur after City business is completed. Redmond City Councilor Kathryn Osbourne noted that some comments take away from the work at hand.
"This is a really busy and effective City Council, so we have a lot of business that we need to get through," said Osbourne. "There are individuals who have utilized that time to share with us their own opinions and beliefs and sometimes to promote agendas that are not relevant to official business. I do know that those can be distracting or hurtful to other people who may be in attendance."
According to Osborne, public comment is supposed to be based on official city business. She believes getting through important City businesses first and then addressing public comment at the end is the most appropriate and the best use of everyone's time.
The City is not at liberty to censor or halt any comments, due to free speech protections. The First Amendment and Oregon's free expression provision protect popular speech and the most offensive and controversial speech from government suppression.
According to the ACLU of Oregon, the best way to counter obnoxious speech is with more speech. "Persuasion, not coercion, is the solution," reads a statement from its website.
According to Fitch, it's one person, primarily, who is making these comments. "It's just constant at every meeting. I think the majority of the Council is just tired of having to listen to it at the beginning," he told the Source Weekly.
Some individuals disagreed with the council's decision. Scott Stuart lives in Redmond and spoke at the July 9 council meeting in response to the changes made.
"In your new rules for the public comment, I feel personally that citizens are coming last now in the public testimony towards the end. We've been placed in the back of the bus," he said at the meeting. Stuart added that he felt the Council had self-appointed themselves as the "word police."
The decision, Fitch said, is not to dissuade or remove public comment, but to focus first on the work at hand.
"We don't want to stifle speech. It's unfortunate that one person comes up with those comments every single meeting and it's unfortunate that that's become an issue," said Fitch. "The best thing to do is for us, on the City business, is to get that conducted first. I think that's what most people are interested in."
