By Noah Dawson
The opening of the public comment meeting this week followed a familiar pattern. Following the harsh criticism the public has levied against the council throughout the year, the council has made a point of “reading the riot act,” reminding us of their rules of decorum, which have been used, in multiple cases, against those who’ve criticized the council. It feels like the crackdown on decorum violations has been aimed at limiting dissenting viewpoints in our city.
I’m not going to pretend that having rules of decorum itself is bad. They give the meeting structure, allowing it to function. However, when rules of decorum are implemented and enforced badly, they negate the reason they exist, and that is precisely what has happened during the public comment meetings over the last few months.
I spoke at the public comment meeting this week, and pointed out some of the flaws in the rules of decorum as they currently exist. One topic I mentioned was the fact that the public conduct of our city leaders is a natural extension of city policy. I’ve previously written and spoken about that topic, so I won’t expound on it here, but I will mention this brief example. Last month, Mayor Nelson visited Washington D.C. About the trip, she remarked that it was “to represent Amarillo.” If city policy was wholly independent from conduct, how can a leader represent the city? Do they simply stand around meetings as a statue, referring any person wishing to make conversation to a prepared binder of city policy? I don’t think so.
The second topic that I brought up was the double standard in the way that the rules of decorum are enforced. Several weeks ago, some commenters were criticizing posts that council members made on Facebook. The council interrupted, claiming the comments were personal. It’s easy to imagine that a person openly questioning whether or not the council was even listening to the public would be interrupted. Meanwhile, there are occasional instances where commenters praise the council rather than criticizing them. This week, a commenter praised the fact that the council listens to the people “with humility and kindness.” This comment was clearly directed at their personalities, but was not interrupted. Now, I don’t think they should be interrupting people who criticize them, but, as long as they don’t interrupt praise, they need to stop interrupting critics. Our council needs to recognize that personal statements are relevant to city policy, and refrain from interrupting either supporters or critics.
Since conduct is related to city policy, stopping people from speaking about personal conduct of our leaders stops them from speaking about policy, which is the reason for public comment meetings in the first place. Even more dangerous, by selectively enforcing this rule, the council attempts to build itself an echo chamber, preventing them from listening to the diversity of views in the city, which is another key reason that public comment exists.
Mayor Nelson mentioned this week that she wants the public to “respect the rules of decorum.” Mayor Nelson, you need to respect the reason we have public comment meetings in the first place.
Nelson