CITY COUNCIL
In the vein of starting off the way you want to continue, Mayor Dwayne Ariola has set up guidelines governing how the public can speak at Taylor City Council meetings.
“This particular citizens communication is thrown in here because we have decided to throw it in here in prior councils. The open citizens communication topic is not required by law, but we want to hear from the citizens,” Ariola said before opening the public comment portion of the meeting.
“But unlike the past I’m going to hold you to three minutes and I’m not going to allow just three minutes of chastising either somebody on staff or a fellow council member.”
While the U.S.
Supreme Court has ruled that the First Amendment means the government may not restrict speech because of its content, some leeway is given to certain types of meetings such as councils and school boards.
“Most courts consider public comment periods to be designated public forums — forums that government officials have opened up or designated for freedom of expression.
When the government creates a designated public forum, the government cannot make viewpoint or contentbased restrictions on speech unless they meet strict scrutiny, the highest form of judicial review,” reads a statement by First Amendment advocacy organization The Fire. The agency lists examples, including a mayor in Michigan who they successfully sued for silencing speakers during public comment periods, and a California school district that was sued over a policy that prohibited the public from making complaints against district employees.
“If you have something say and a topic that you have and recommendations that we can better this community we will take those and write those down and take further actions. We cannot respond to citizens communication, but the three minutes of just coming up here and just chastising and personally insulting somebody, I personally will not stand for. Just to make that clear,” Ariola said.
Kent Kunze, a frequent speaker during the citizens communication segments, asked the mayor to possibly extend his guidelines to Council members on social media.
“I made a comment and Mr. Garcia decides he wants to post one of my mugshots up on Facebook.” Kunze said “If y’all could come up with some rules to kind of rein in some of your more rambunctious members up there it would be much appreciated.”
Ariola said that he does intend to extend his reach into social media as well.
“I can’t control social media in the community or from council, but we will be addressing our social media standards in the future, but as a team on what those rules say.”
“ We cannot respond to citizens communication, but the three minutes of just coming up here and just chastising and personally insulting somebody, I personally will not stand for.”
-Mayor Dwayne Ariola
