Many of you have read here and elsewhere about the November 23 City Council meeting where several neighborhood representatives presented their recommendations about the Lookout Transfer Station. Much of the effort put into their presentation was overshadowed by controversy about whether their presentation was finished, or whether their five minutes per person had expired.

As we stated in our article describing the presentation, the three representatives were at the end of their presentation when there was a question about whether or not the residents had used their allotted time or not.

Council rules, put into place in 2007 by a council vote, state that speakers may speak for five minutes each. The question arose about whether or not the three had used a total of 15 minutes between them.

Some visitor’s were upset that the presentation was not allowed to continue. Then Steve Mitchell openly asked that it should continue which, predictably, led to another controversy about whether Mitchell had acted properly, if he had acted out of order, if he was standing up for what was right and so on. Of course, the flip side became about whether or not Mayor Slagel “wanted to hear the presentation” in the ensuing discussion after the meeting had concluded.

And there is that ensuing discussion between residents, residents and council persons, and between council persons. Those discussions consisted mostly of this controversy and some where emotions should have been tempered.

The subsequent accusations were quite predictable. Comments on the Dallas Morning News Richardson Blog contained statements like, “[Slagel] tried to shut up the people” and another blog contained anonymous comments such as “Where do you think you live, Communist China?” Those were countered by views such as one that stated it was, “inappropriate and childish for Mitchell to make a scene” but on The Echo someone said, “thank God Steve Mitchell jumped in.”

Then it turned into ESPN and instant replay. One blog entry looked at the tape after the fact and checked the timing for each speaker. I am sure someone was checking to see if both feet were in-bounds on the reception. I was checking my cell phone time during the meeting. While I did not have a stop watch I thought their time was about up but I knew I wasn’t keeping strict count so I knew I might be wrong.

Likewise, there were more moderate views such Destiny De la Rosa who said, “In all fairness their time was up.” One commenter on The Echo called this a “revolt” and Patrick Maher calmed that down by saying, “That's not a revolt. That's foresight, research, and a spirit of cooperation between citizens and their elected officials.”

I feel a small segment of responsibility for their predicament rests on my shoulders and that of two fellow Heights Presidents when we had a presentation that went 14 minutes 30 seconds. We had a different tact though. We went to the Mayor and council ahead of time and asked how to fit our presentation into the right format. There were no surprises and other than the Mayor and council not knowing the content. The Mayor knew we had everything under control to keep it under 5 minutes per person. Leaders from around the transfer station said we had inspired them because of our three person presentation but they never asked for any advice.

If you have read this far, then you have read about 500 of my own words and you have not heard a bit about the merits of the neighborhoods plan for the transfer station. Now that is the real tragedy in all this. I must sadly report that is par for the course. There is about half a dozen different blog entries on this presentation and either the blog entries or their comments are concentrated on the politics and not the merits and issues of the subject matter.

Mayor Slagel at Monday’s work session stated that at a future work session he would like to visit the time limit issue. “I think we should have a visible way for the speakers, myself, and Pam [Schmidt, City Secretary] to be on the same time or we should eliminate time limits,” he said.

Here are my thoughts on time limits.

To start, Richardson’s limits are in the realm of standard practices. Garland and Dallas both allow 3 minutes and Plano allows 5 minutes. There is not some giant conspiracy to prevent people from speaking throughout Texas.

Further, the visitor’s section of Council meetings is limited and in many cases is not the best venue to carry on conversations of importance. This is because the Texas Open Meetings Act prevents Councils – be they Richarson’s or anywhere else – from deliberating at those times. Council comments are limited to facts and policies.

A visitor’s section is not necessarily the best way to deal with many issues. One reason is outlined above because the Council cannot deliberate. Another reason is that the City Council might not be the best party to resolve certain issues. Those issues might be management issues involving sidewalk repairs or other things that require city management to act. In many cases, talking to council members individually is a better route. However, these are all rules of thumb. Undoubtedly, there are many issues that are best brought forth before the council and that require the Council’s ear and actions in a public setting.

I would suggest one of the following options.

One option: Get rid of the five minute rule. I do not see that as preferable because the visitor’s time can be abused and any ad hoc limitations will be the subject of the types of politically charged furor we have just experienced.

Another is to keep the five minute rule with modifications. It should be plain to anyone that if the council had a policy in place for group presentations in the visitor’s section then this situation would have already been handled. So how about this?

First, groups can give presentations for as much as 15 minutes and they must have 3 speakers. If a group wants to do that it must submit a request to the City Secretary 2 full business days before a meeting and preferably sooner.  This allows group presentations, limits time, ensures groups speak and not individuals, and gives the Mayor (or the Mayor’s stand-in should he/she be absent) time to inquire about the presentation. The Council may defer a presentation if more than one group asks to give one on the same day.

Second, hold the mayor to the 5 minute or 15 minute group limit. Do not give the Mayor (or the Mayor’s stand-in should the Mayor be absent) a choice. That eliminates accusations of favoritism and sets expectations of visitors.

Third, allow other council members to yield additional time up to a specific amount to a speaker should a speaker (or a group) exhaust their 5 or 15 minutes. A council member must ask the Mayor publicly and on record in the meeting, which the City Secretary will be record in the minutes. The council member could say at the end of a speaker’s five minutes, “I would like to give Mr. Jones an additional 2 minutes.” Any council member may do this once per meeting except the Mayor who cannot. If a group of council members is interested a single speaker could be there from 5 to 17 minutes depending on the interest of council members.

That is my solution. I am not married to it but I think if these policies were in place then we would be talking about the merits of the plan and not about stop watches.