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Tuesday, May 22, 2012
City Council Discourages Public Comment
by Justin Wandro, published on August 20, 2010 at 1:28 PM
Storyline: Sacramento Homeless Issues
I am concerned about a proposed change regarding City Council meetings. Currently, people wishing to address the Council on items not on the agenda may address the council (for 2 minutes each) at the 6 PM start of the evening’s agenda. The Council has voted to move the open comment period back to the very end of the agenda-which is sometimes very late at night, and discourages people from bringing their issues before the elected body that is supposed to represent them. This action is directly targeted against Safe Ground’s homeless activists who have been speaking before the Council every week about the need for Safe Ground and yet another attempt to disenfranchise Safe Ground’s homeless activists, and others with little power. It will impact all organizations and citizens who also use the public comment period to raise timely issues with the Council, and awareness about their concerns.
I’ve had the opportunity to watch as the public addresses the Council. It is truly moving to hear ordinary people speak up for themselves. Some are articulate; some are visibly nervous; each has a point to make. It is a pure form of democracy in action to be cherished. Yet the City Council’s action shows their lack of respect for their constituents. The amount of time that Public Comment takes is not long – usually well under 20 minutes.
To their credit, Mayor Johnson and Councilmembers Kevin McCarty and Ray Tretheway voted against this change. Steve Cohn was absent so did not vote. Councilmembers Waters, Pannell, Sheedy, Fong and Hammond unfortunately did vote for this change.
The Sacramento Bee’s editorial opposing the change is here: City Council Plays Meeting Games
I am asking as many individuals and groups as I can get to turn out next Tuesday evening, August 24th at 6pm at City Hall and express their opposition to the change. If you can make it to the next meeting, I would appreciate your support for keeping the Public Comment period at the front of the weekly agendas. Your presence alone will show support; you’re also welcome to speak to the Council if you wish.
Thank you for anything you can do! Please forward this information to anyone who you think will attend and/or call or email their City Council representatives and voice their opposition to the change.
Contact info for our City Council representatives is below.
Mayor Kevin Johnson– Mayor@cityofsacramento.org
916.808.5300
District 1, Ray Tretheway- RTretheway@CityofSacramento.org
916.808.7001
District 2, Sandy Sheedy– SSheedy@CityofSacramento.org
916.808.7002
District 3, Steve Cohn– SCohn@CityofSacramento.org
916.808.7003
District 4, Robert King Fong– RKFong@CityofSacramento.org
916.808.7004
District 5, Lauren Hammond– LHammond@CityofSacramento.org
916.808.7005
District 6, Kevin McCarty– KMcCarty@CityofSacramento.org
916.808.7006
District 7, Robbie Waters– RWaters@CityofSacramento.org
916.808.7007
District 8, Bonnie Pannell– BPannell@CityofSacramento.org
916.808.7008
(This is an excerpt from an Action Alert email sent out by Joan Burke, the Director of Advocacy at Sacramento Loaves & Fishes)
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Kathleen
Bd of Sups is also the group who is charged with distributing via county staff the funding which goes to many decades old ineffective homeless service providers. These organizations have no financial incentive to reduce their homeless caseloads and have never done so--even objected to being held to measurable performance results. Since 1989 these politically powerful non-profits have received millions more each year, even during the 1990's best of financial times, but had no measurable impact (as SF Mayor Willie Brown found out in SF) except to maintain their expensive administrative overheads. Most of whom they are supposed to help have become the victims as a homeless and prior author pointed out in his articles in Sacpressa few months back.
Except at funding allocation time, they rarely show up at Bd of Supvs because they know they don't have a very sympathetic ear from at least three board members who would like to see more accountability and significant impact on reducing the homeless numbers not just a couple hundred here and there who may not be able to remain in housing for any length of time.
One thing it certainly shouldn't be is ever enlarging the empire of certain homeless-help nonprofits who use 'complaint' as a method of getting funding and donations, yet don't have much interest in improving their services -- or, really, seeing the goals they set be achieved, because then they might lose having their complaints, *which* *raise* *cash*.
Joan Burke & Justin Wandro's Loaves & Fishes amassed another quarter million dollars in calendar year 2009 to add to their Empire, while SafeGround, in the winter of 2009-2010, stayed in a hotel [Hawthorn Suites near the Richards exit on I-5]. Most ot the public and the rest of the homeless suffered from a bad economy, with one homeless man downtown freezing to death, in December, while SafeGround frolicked.
Let us get real. This public comments imbroglio is a fake out, used just to ratchet up complaint and donations, donations, donations.
Public Comment speakers will appear in order that their speaker slips are submitted -- no exceptions.
Public Comment on agenda at start of meeting but limited to 10 minutes (four speakers, 2 minutes and 30 seconds maximum, strictly enforced with mic cut off when time is up) -- all four names called in advance, lined up, and ready to go at the start of the meeting.
Public Comment also on agenda at end of meeting but limited to one hour, extendable by motion and majority vote of council.
Names of up to 24 speakers who are scheduled to appear for end-of- meeting Public Comment are announced at conclusion of beginning-of-meeting Public Comment. If there are more than 24 speakers scheduled to speak at that point, the rest are put on notice that they will only be given the opportunity to speak if Council votes to extend Public Comment at the end of the meeting beyond the 60 minute allotment. Those not guaranteed the opportunity to speak are free to depart and return the following week for another chance, or they can roll the dice and stick around, hoping Council gives them the opportunity or that other speakers leave early before they speak.
This may seem complicated at first glance, but I think it would work well for both Council and the general public:
- Those who depend on public transit have the option of arriving early to increase their chances at one of the four valuable beginning-of-meeting slots.
- Those whose schedules do not afford a 6 PM arrival time can (usually/often) still speak at the conclusion of the meeting.
- Matters that draw unusually large crowds will not disrupt agenda timelines.
Thoughts?
A very reasonable solution. During most weeks, the majority of the public comment would occur during the initial period.
The idea of speaking before the City Council is to say something helpful or enlightening or important.
Understand that I am not saying that SafeGround shouldn't speak to the city council, it is just that they mostly now do so in an act of wasting the council's time. If the group has something new to impart, they should come, and have one member say something succinctly and artfully that imparts what's important.
It has been SafeGround's strategy to alienate those that disagree with them instead of trying to engage them and find solutions that meet everybody's needs. They should change their strategy, embrace the idea -- for a period of time -- of having the session when the public speaks to the council be later at night, and try being kindly, wise, and thoughtful.
But, truly, who is MORE able to attend the whole of a city council meeting and speak at its end than the people from SafeGround!!? They are as obligations-free as anyone anywhere. So the nature of the complaint that Joan Burke -- and that now Justin Wandro puppets for her -- slatters sillyness atop sillyness.
I saw an attractive young lady singing on an abandoned street corner under the influence of of a controlled substance, a teenage girl dressed in a soft pink jogging suit carrying newborn baby, a man walking aimlessly down a busy sidewalk talking to himself,a woman trying to raise herself from a cold wet sidewalk to a battered wheelchair,an elderly woman wearing clothing stained with urine as she pushed a loaded shopping cart down a sidewalk, a security guard uniform located in the personal backpack of a young man who after receiving services for the homeless would check it back out to go to a job later on. All of these people are homeless. Before casting judgement, remember that life is unpredictable and everyone who is in a wheelchair was not born that way. I thought and hope we all think, she's some body's daughter; he's some body's son.