For decades the Coos County Board of Commissioners (BOC) has allowed citizen comments limited to 3 minutes at regular BOC meetings. Previous BOC Meeting Agendas said, these remarks could be about “agenda items or general comments.” This practice changed at the February 7 meeting. The agenda now said comments are, “restricted to agenda items only.”
Since agenda items are usually narrow in scope this change prohibits comments about most of what County government does or plans to do. For example, the County is considering making the Coos Health & Wellness Department an independent, non-government agency. Few people know about this possibility. However, until or unless this idea is an agenda item citizens are prohibited from commenting about it at BOC meetings.
On February 7 people without an agenda (most of the crowd) quickly found what had changed. Chair Robert Main told the first three citizen speakers to sit down because their remarks were not about agenda items. He said any person refusing to sit down would be told to leave and if necessary, “escorted” out by police. Would be commenter Rob Taylor told Chair Main he was “authoritarian” and said, “Heil Hitler” before sitting down.
Oregon’s Public Meetings Law authorizes citizens to attend government meetings except in specific circumstances. However this attendance does not include the right to comment except on a narrow range of issues set by law. Most governing bodies do allow public testimony even when they are not required to do so.
We do not know who changed the BOC public comment rule. Was it Chair Main alone or all three Commissioners? Regardless, Coos County has gone from having one of the most expansive policies on citizen comments to one of the most restrictive.
UPDATE ON BOC PUBLIC COMMENT RESTRICTIONS
On his February 13 talk show Rob Taylor reported BOC Chair Bob Main acted alone in restricting citizen comments at meetings to “agenda items only.” According to Mr. Taylor Chair Main’s restriction was in response to a prayer given at a previous meeting. On January 24 a speaker used his comment time to make a Christian prayer.
Mr. Taylor said he talked to Mr. Main and he thinks the comment rule will change. He also reported that County Commissioner Rod Taylor is working to eliminate the “agenda item only” comment rule.
I am opposed to the comments at the beginning for a very good reason. Most of the department heads are waiting there to make presentations. They are not your minimum wage workers, they probably average with benefits etc over $100 an hour. For economic reasons alone, the comments should be at the end. Why should they have to sit through comments that have absolutely no bearing on their department or presentation? Comments are accepted during each agenda item, and after all the items. The same people get up and make the same type of statements at every meeting. The last meeting someone called the US Fish and Wildlife “ the devil.” The lady up there presenting didn’t deserve that. The commenter could have stated what he did without that barb. As for yelling, I think that any commenters who yells should be asked not to. When you listen to the meeting on line you have to turn it up for all the soft spoken voices, then you get blasted out by one person. Where did common courtesy go?
While I don’t support public comments being so curtailed as to almost eliminate them, I suspect the decision by Commissioner Main was a response to the regular hijacking of the meetings by Danessa Rains, Rob Taylor and others, who seem to see these meetings as events scheduled in order for them to speechify on whatever subject they wanted to. Both of them also tended to shout at the commissioners, an experience that is pleasant for no one but themselves, and to bring with them cheerleaders, who shout out and applaud their comments, while also regularly shouting at and booing those whose comments they disagree with, turning meetings into their own private circus, rather than a forum for serious and important County business. I can hardly blame Commissioner Main for wanting this sort of thing to stop.
At the meeting after the request for prayer was denied and a moment of silence voted in so that people could pray if they want to, someone used the public comments time to pray out loud, in an obvious attempt to get around the “no praying out loud” decision. Rather than use his time to object to the decision, he prayed to his version of the Christian god, thereby subjecting the entire room to that prayer. The commissioners’ decision not to do this was clear, but ignored. Perhaps Commissioner Main didn’t want to risk that again?
I appreciate Rod Taylor’s comment above, except for the part where he simultaneously wants decorum, but approves of yelling! And things don’t need to rise to the point where the Sheriff needs to be involved for them to be very unpleasant and counterproductive. If people could control themselves better, maybe this wouldn’t have been the decision. I’ve spoken at meetings (via Zoom, sounding like a voice from beyond the grave!), and made strong and assertive comments without raising my voice or yelling, and managed to let others speak without interruption or booing those who passionately disagreed with me. It is possible to do, but those who want drama to accompany their comments demonstrably don’t care about decorum or even basic civility.
I don’t know what the solution is, but maybe it will have to include some kind of agreement with attendees to keep themselves in check or else be taken out, enforced until people get it. The meetings are meant for all of us in the County to be able to attend, view, and comment on County business. When a few people insist on being loud and extremely obnoxious to the commissioners and worse, to their fellow concerned citizens, then something has to be done. No one who comments should have to endure insults and booing from others.
The sheriff’s inaction should not be taken as an affirmation that the CRL clan behaved appropriately. It was a shameful display of bullying and ignorance and showed a complete disregard for the safety of people responsibly treating COVID as the terrible health threat it is. A million people lost their lives to COVID, they lost their liberty forever while a bunch of thoughtless thugs are whining about wearing masks.
For the record, I strongly support the freedom of public comments at the beginning of BOC meetings, regardless of their content as long as standards of decorum are observed. I even support the right of the people to yell, and I commit to never run out of the room crying like a little girl if people are upset – especially if the Sheriff is still just sitting there, making no moves indicating he’s concerned. Commissioners are not omniscient, thus can be edified through this free exchange of ideas. As a matter of fact, I support public comments both before AND after the agenda so as to afford the public an opportunity to weigh in on agenda actions taken in the meeting.
I don’t believe yelling is a “standard of decorum”, it’s a form of bullying Nor is using comment time meant for questions, and/or opinions, being used to say prayers, something that had been previously voted on with the compromise of silence before every meeting. These meetings do follow an agenda, so when grandstanding is done for the sole purpose of disruption it shouldn’t be tolerated.