City Council - Regular Meeting

All right. Good evening everybody. We're going to go and get started. I don't have a

That's pretty small. All right. Thank you everybody for being here tonight. Uh tonight is a joint training session between our planning commission and uh the city council. It's all to learn about Robert's rules of order. This is how we manage our meetings. And we have a great instructor with us, uh, Tisha from Jurassic Parliament. I'll turn it over to her in just a moment. Couple housekeeping items. Uh, if you are going to ask a question today, and it is meant to be interactive, so please feel free to raise your hand and the instructor will call on you. But when you go to ask your question, make sure your mic is turned on. All of you in this room should know how to do that. But if you if you don't remember, it is the person button. Red is on. There is no queuing tonight, so we'll go straight into uh to live mode. If you have a handheld mic, green is on. And I know we have uh handheld mics at the staff table as well as for the instructor. Uh last but not certainly least, this is a training session. It's a meant to be a interactive uh session for you all as the leaders and and commission and commissioners. There is no public comment tonight. So, if you have any questions for staff uh and you're here from the public, we're happy to talk to you offline. So, I'll turn that over to Tisha then.

Doug, I'm sorry. Did you have a question? Questions need to be. So, the question is, do questions need to be second? You know what? That's a great leadin for our instructor. So, [laughter]

no, the answer is no. A request for information is what that is called in parliamentary terms, and it doesn't require a second. Um, so hi everybody. Um, thanks for being here tonight. I feel like it is really unfair that I am training the night after the Seahawks won the Super Bowl. Like, how can I possibly top that excitement from last night, but hopefully you're still all happy, feeling good. Um, so my name is Tisha Gizer. I'm a registered parliamentarian and a trainer with Jurassic Parliament, which is a local company that focuses on parliamentary training. I think we're really lucky to have them in our region. Um, I have been working uh in the public sector my whole career. So, I worked for the Alaska State Legislature up in Juno for 10 years where I worked on the House floor and supported the House of Representatives. And I really um I was perplexed and excited by the parliamentary procedure that I saw unfold there. There's a lot of rules, but the rules have to be flexible because the ultimate goal is that policy gets made. And so, I was kind of um compelled by that and really enjoyed my time there. And now I work for the city clerk in Isiziqua. I've been there for 10 years and um on the side I do training in local communities like this and I really enjoy it. Um because let me let's get to the why the why of the training. Let's see if I can There we go. Um so the the purpose of this training is to help invigorate you to run effective meetings in the service of your community. I'm sure that's why you're all here spending your free time um helping Sumar be a better place. And uh the reason I'm so passionate about this training is because I've seen over my time working um for elected and appointed officials how challenging your roles are. So you often have mandates coming at you from the federal, state, county level. You have limited budgetary resources. You are making decisions where you you can't really make everyone happy. So your community members and constituents have different ideas of of what the best

approach is. and you're making all of these decisions in the wide open on camera. You know, it's vulnerable. It's challenging. Um, and so what we're going to talk about tonight is we're I'm not going to talk to you about how to make good policy, but I am going to talk to you about kind of the scaffolding by which you're making your decisions up here. So, um, I'm going to be giving you a process. We're going to be going over a process that you can use when you have really hard decisions. And it's not necessarily going to make the decision easier, but it's going to ensure there's this consistent, repeatable process by which all of your decisions, the easy ones and the hard ones will go through. And I I think that helps a bit. Um, also, we're aiming for civility um at your meetings and we're also aiming for a safe space where you all can safely share your viewpoints and then figure out what the group is going to move forward. So um these are the specific things that uh outcomes we're looking for tonight. So the first is applying the principle the authority of the group is more important than any single individual. We're going to talk about best practices for discussion, responding to disorder and difficult people, making motions and running effective public comment. And again I believe that all of this together is going to help you u make better decisions. And I do want to reiterate what Jason said. Um I want this to be interactive. So please questions staff if you have something to add that I didn't get quite right or you'd like to augment please let me know. Okay. All right. So this is the order we're going to go in the chronology. We're going to start a little theoretical with authority and roles and then we're going to move into the logistics of your meetings. Opening them making motions discussion or it can be called debate and public comment. Then we'll wrap up at 8:00 and we'll take a break about 7:10 7:15. All right. Um, this is the disclaimer that I'm not an attorney. Being a parliamentarian is not the same thing. I understand here your parliamentarian is also an attorney, which is awesome. Um, so nothing in this training should be

construed as legal advice. And it's really good to uh consult with your attorney on some matters and I'll be mentioning a few during the training tonight. All right. So, has anyone taken a training from Jurassic Parliament? Oh, a few. Okay, awesome. I'm still getting the hang of the dinosaurs, so don't be too critical of me. Um, the woman pictured in the center here is Anne McFarland. She's the founder of Jurassic Parliament. She was the chair of a nonprofit board, and she was trying to figure out how to convey to the members some of these parliamentary procedures she was getting herself trained up on as the chair, and she thought she needed to make it a little more interesting and complex by bringing in dinosaurs. Um, and so we're going to use the dinosaurs tonight because we're uh to do some practicing. So, you have a script that I'm going to have you break into groups in in a little bit here just to get some practice saying these things because it's really helpful and we're going to be in a fictitious land when we do this. We're going to have some fun with it. So, we're um in the maps in front of you um are our maps of the League of Northwest Dino Cities and specifically we're going to be the city council in the city of Dinopoulos. Um Ann had fun developing this region which looks suspiciously like the Puet Sound. Um, and the motto of the city council of the city of Dinopoulos is we do our best for all our residents whether we like them or not. And I'd like you to repeat that with me. Let's like get into it here a little bit. Okay. We do our best for all our residents whether we like them or not. Okay. Sorry. Hopefully that's not offensive to our our public who's here, but we're gonna have a little fun with this. [laughter] [gasps] Um, okay. So, let's get into let's talk a little theoretical for a few minutes about rolls. This is important. and it kind of sets the basis for the rest of the training. So, what's parliamentary procedure? Let's talk about that for a minute. Um, basically rules related to your meetings and roles in your meetings like the role of the chair. Um, the parliamentary procedure is really about efficiency and settling disputes in the meeting. So, those are two of the things that Robert's Rules

does really well and you'll hear that as a theme throughout. Um so Robert's rules of order is um the premier the most widely used book of parliamentary procedure in the world. It was drafted in the late 19th century by an army uh general and engineer an army engineer named Henry M. Robert and he was a civically engaged fellow living in San Francisco and he was frustrated that these different groups that he was a part of um were spending a lot of time wasting a lot of time trying to figure out how to do things, how to move through their business. And when he went looking around for a guide, all he could find were things like at the federal level or the state level for the legislature which weren't a good fit for these community organizations. And so he wrote a pocket guide at that time um to provide a sort of common understanding and agreed to rules and it's still you know pervasive today. So the Roberts family still has the rights to the book and which is I know kind of amazing. Um it's on its 12th edition. It has grown. This would not fit in my pocket remotely. Um it's over 630 pages but there are some great kind of consolidated versions if you're interested in learning more after the training today. There's Robert's rules in brief which is pictured there which I think I saw Andrea's got which covers a lot of common situations and then Jurassic Parliament has [clears throat] a book that is nice because it's specific to local government. Robert's rules applies to all kinds of organizations. It's used at political party conventions you know the boy scouts of America board. So when you read it a lot of it doesn't quite fit with local government and Jurassic Parliament has kind of tailored the elements that do which is is nice and I will be doing that tonight during the training. Both your planning commission and your city council have adopted Robert's rules as your parliamentary authority, which is great. Uh, so I want to talk to you about where it fits in. And this might feel a little intuitive here, but I think it's worth spending a minute on. So, as government agencies, we've got a we got a lot of

rules we've got to follow. It's a lot. Um, starting with the US Constitution and Federal Law, and we'll talk a little bit under public comment about how First Amendment rights play a role in your public comment period. Um, but anything in the Constitution, federal, state, or local law is going to supersede Robert's rules. In Washington state, we have a number of provisions related to your meetings that are in state law in the open public meetings act. And then the council has a number of voting thresholds, things like public hearings that are required. Those are going to supersede Robert's rules. Next comes your charter charter articles of incorporation which are more pertain to a nonprofit or your city code which your code it looks like has a little bit to say about the planning commission. Um and then you have your adopted rules the bylaws or council rules listed there. You both bodies have adopted rules which are in your um power to amend. And again anything in those are going to supersede Robert's rules. And both of your sets of rules are different. And both of your sets of rules do have things that are different from Robert's rules. and I'll try and call those out. And then where those all of those laws and rules are silent, that's where Robert's rules fits in and scenarios not uh covered there. So uh during the training tonight or sometime uh when you're conducting your meetings, you might be made aware that something you're doing isn't quite in it's not the way Robert's rules does it, it's the way you do it and you like to do it. That's fine. But if someone challenges that, you've got to default to the written rule. So that's why it's great to incorporate things that your body likes to do and likes to do differently in your adopted rules. Um so you just have that um standing for uh for them. All right, that was kind of a lot but um again let me know if you have any questions. Okay, let's talk a bit about roles. We're again going to start high level and then we'll drill down. So, um, this is again probably pretty intuitive, but I just want to spend a minute talking about it because we have two really different groups in the room,

right? Actually, let's I I council members, you have your nice name tags, which is really helpful. Planning commissioners, can you raise a hand here? Which this is reminding me that I totally flew by. We were going to do an introduction. I wonder if now would still be okay to take a minute and do that. Sorry, I just got going. Um, and so they have mics here and then Okay, let's let's take a minute before we talk about roles and do a round the room um introduction. Um, can we start with you, Council Member Evers, and down and around? Mark Evers, um, city council for about 40 days.

Nicole Wily, city council since December. I didn't count the days. Michael Hawksteader, city council. Matthew Kenna, city council. Greg Ranki, city council. Two years. Sure. Jason Wilson, city administrator. Andrea Marquez, city. Andrea Marquez, city attorney. Chrisondo Walker, associate planner. Maria Pariso, deputy city clerk. Doug Ruth, deputy city attorney. Michelle Conver, city clerk.

Ryan Windish, city community and economic development director. Mark Malcolm, planning commission. Sharon Fotman, planning commission. Andy Alfers, deputy mayor. Carla Bowman, mayor. 40 days. I counted. You were right. All right. Anyone? We have someone in the back here. You You don't have to. Hi. [laughter] Anyone? And we might have someone online with us. I understand possibly. Okay. One of

one more planning commissioner. Okay. Welcome. Welcome. Okay. Sorry about Thank you for doing that. Um All right. So, we have a few planning commissioners, number of city council members and staff. We'll talk about all all roles. So, city councils are governing your governing body, right? So, you're uh the lucky ones who get to make decisions. um and decide policy for the entire city, which is a lot. Um and you're taking final action for the on behalf of the city. Your advisory bodies, it looks like you have a handful of them here. They are valuable to you because they are taking the deep dive into specific policy areas. Um and so for our planning commissioners, they're looking closely at that land use policy. I do not envy that. Um and your zoning code and making uh recommendations. And as part of that, they are hearing from the public, maybe taking some public hearings and then giving you their best recommendation, which really helps you do your job more efficiently. Um, but I do want to acknowledge that for our advisory bodies that you you do have a bit of a challenging role because you are getting your work kind of funneled to you from the mayor's work plan and the city council's budget setting and you're kind of being said, okay, here, give us input on this. And I know in the city I work for that can feel a little limiting sometimes to the advisory bodies um and I know sometimes they in doing their work they come across areas where they would they would like to spend more time looking at things. So sometimes they will at a meeting make a motion to um provide a recommendation to the mayor because there's something they want to look into further and would like to see it on a future agenda. So just wanted to acknowledge that and then uh I'm going to be talking about both of your bodies today just as bodies or the body. That's what we're going to be saying. Um, but might touch on those differences there. There's another important difference here. Um, this slide isn't organized as well as I would like, but what it's trying to say is that you all, both of you, both bodies are um, debating,

you're considering policy, ideas, strategy, um, to make the city a better place. And that is an important role. And it's also important that you stay at that level of uh input and decision-m and leave those details to the mayor and city staff. And so what does that mean like mean practically? What that means practically is if you have questions for staff, send them to the department director, let the city administrator know, copy him so that everyone's aware uh what you're reaching out on um and can get you the help that you need. Uh also uh it's important and actually observe that it's in state law that um you know you are not individually to be directing staff. So how you are going to provide that direction is at your meetings and we're going to talk about how to do that and the value and importance of that. Um but just being aware of that when you are um interacting with staff. And then the last bullet point here is um a suggestion that when you're interacting with the community, it might not be every communication that you need to copy city staff on, but certainly um there may be some where it is valuable to loop them in and possibly have them attend a meeting with you if you're meeting with someone in the community who wants to talk to you about a particular issue. I think uh something I've seen happen sometimes at the agency I work for is uh someone is kind of shopping for some some answers or some um sympathetic perspectives which is just fine but it's also really important that we're all working from the same information, right? And um not committing to something that can't be followed through on. So just remembering that staff are a resource. They want to help. They want to help get things done. They want to help people out. Um but again that need to be brought in at a time where they can actually um best assist before things get too far. Anything to add over here? Okay. Awesome. All right. So that was a real quick

touch on some more agencywide roles and now we're going to talk about roles in your meetings. So the chair is our planning commission chair here tonight by chance. He's not. He's not. Okay. And then mayor, are you a chair of the city council meetings? Are there does the council have any other committees or anything like that that are chaired by a council member?

Yes. All right. So, is any council members, any of you chairing currently? A couple of you. Okay. Okay. Awesome. All right. So, this applies to current chairs and anyone who might be a future chair. So, uh, one of the things Jurassic Parliament has seen is there's a lot of misunderstanding around this rule. And so um a fundamental guideline is during meetings the chair is the servant of the group and the group as the final authority. So we need to think of a well let me move to the next slide. In our society we typically um think of the chair or the decision as a decision maker as someone at the top of a pyramid. So we're used to you know the CEO of a corporation, the principal of a school. The person at the top has more power in decision- making or maybe they unilaterally make decisions. um that is really different than how both of your bodies are gonna function. So there you each get one vote. It doesn't matter if you've been on the council 10 years or a month. [laughter] Um you you get one vote and chairs it it depends. Generally you also are voting with the exception of the mayor who votes in case of a tie on certain issues. But the rest of you chairing your committee meetings or the planning commission chair they get to vote but their vote doesn't count for any more than anyone else's. really they're facilitating the group getting to a decision. And so just wanting to stop and think about that. We're going to talk a little bit more what that can look like practically. Um so the what does the chair need? They need to know uh that they're supporting a deliberative body so they don't get to they don't get to speak louder, vote twice, um misuse their authority. Uh they also need a majority of the body in favor of civility which um the fact that you've shown up here tonight makes me believe that you are in favor of that. So that is wonderful. Um and they also need some energy and moxy to kind of pull it all together. And I will say um and anyone who's chaired hopefully agrees with this. Chairing is a lot of work can be a lot of work depending on what kind of conversation you're

navigating. It can require a lot of focus. So that's also why I think it's good as members that you have some training because you can help the chair. The chair might miss something as they're trying to kind of pay attention to the the public and pay attention to what they have to facilitate next. They might miss something and you can help them out by uh we'll talk about raising a point of order. So these are some things specifically in the meeting that the chair does. They should be recognizing anyone to speak. If you aren't recognized by the chair, you shouldn't be talking unless you um will there's just a few exceptions to that. Um the chair should be facilitating the discussion and be empowered to interrupt a member who breaks the rules. Uh the chair should be fair, remain calm, and they're helping to manage time. Their goal is to get the group through the agenda. So this means that the chair needs to be comfortable kind of holding some boundaries in place, right? So if someone, and this could be accidental. If someone just they have something they want to say and they just start blurting it out, the chair should really respectfully and kindly stop them. Um, interruptions are really not a thing in Robert's rules. There's again a few exceptions, but in general, someone shouldn't be interrupted when they're making their remarks, and the chair should be willing to cut them off. All right. Um, and the chair should not be doing these things. And this is all about in Robert's rules, the chair is the neutral facilitator. And so, um, while, and I'll talk to you in just a minute about what this can look like in larger groups, where in smaller groups, generally your chair is voting, but they shouldn't be participating too much in discussion. They shouldn't be the one talking the most at the meetings. They shouldn't be trying to control the content. They're trying to facilitate. Um, they shouldn't be overly persuasive. Certainly can still try and be persuasive. They shouldn't be getting emotional or interrupting because they have, you know, maybe more information or want to correct someone. So, they shouldn't be misusing that authority.

Go ahead. Yeah. Uh, in particular, the role of the mayor, I it sounds like the chairs, you know, still have um voting capability discussion and and those types of things. But uh in terms of the mayor um my understanding is they are allowed to participate in discussion offer their perspective like you're saying not take over the agenda item or the discussion too much but is it also appropriate for council members to ask you know for the mayor's perspective on something and to try to follow the rules that way? Um I you know I don't know if you can offer any more guidance than you have on that.

Yeah. No, I think what you said absolutely they they can speak they can speak at the meeting. They can share the administration's viewpoints. they can respond to questions. It just shouldn't be um they they shouldn't be doing a bunch of sort of lobbying for their position on the dis. I mean, not that there can't be some of that. It just it should there should be some restraint. Um and that there's a balance there's a balance there, but certainly information has to be shared and context, you know, so the mayor might have some context. It's really helpful for you to know. So, um it doesn't mean they can't talk. Can can you so if I'm a chair of a committee and I report at a meeting the chair as a chair

saying that the three members of this committee recommended a do pass recommendation for this thing now that says do not try to make people vote your way but that's kind of what we're doing right it is kind of what you're doing I think what it's meaning is not so you're the as the chair you recognize members to speak and maybe you choose to have a little more informality at the committee meeting but ideally even with a three-person committee you would call on the members So let's say every time you called and remember they spoke, you took a turn to speak to push your agenda

after each speaker. That I think would be a bit of a misuse of the mic. Okay. So it would be better and actually um right here is Jurassic Parliament recommends that you speak last. So give the others a turn to speak then share your viewpoint on the issue. Also in voting, vote last. Um, and this was something when I worked for the legislature, they took it to a different level, which I'm not suggesting you do at your committees. Um, there was a 40 member body and the speaker of the house um didn't didn't speak at all in this case, larger body, different rules. Actually, they follow different rules. But, um, in his case, he I only saw him do it once, but he wanted to speak on something he really cared about. He called someone up and gave them the gavl and went and walked down and sat where the rest of the members were and he stayed there. He spoke very passionately and he stayed there through the vote, right? Because it could have been perceived. Everyone then knew how he felt and so maybe they couldn't trust him to be fair and impartial as the chair. So again, that's you don't need to do that. You can share your viewpoints, but just suggesting a little bit a little bit of a restraint. All right, good questions. This is what we don't want to happen. I believe this actually h this was a photo taken in black diamond. I think this did actually happen sadly, but and I'm not sure which I'm assuming the woman sitting was the chair and we don't want this. This is what we don't want. [laughter] Robert's rule says the chair should never get excited. They're they're calm calm steady presence. Okay. Um there's a cheat sheet that I'll give. I have have a couple that I'll hand out, but Jurassic Parliament has a couple great cheat sheets that are available on their website. I think you have one in your handout. Um, and it has some language that can be helpful pertaining to things we're covering today. Okay, I'm going to keep clipping along here. So, role of members, you have an important role. One of them is to show

up. Um, and so just wanting to reiterate, if you can't attend a meeting, please let staff know. Uh, we'll talk about a quorum in just a minute. You can't have a meeting without a quorum of members. So, if you can't make a meeting, please tell someone. Um, we're going to be talking about efficient meetings. Efficient meetings are are good. You get things done and you're not here for four hours. Um, so one of the best ways that you can have an efficient meeting is by preparing. Uh, that's reading your agenda packets. Um, and the third bullet here, um, is kind of like a I feel like it's extra credit. So, if you have questions and amendments, so when you're reading through your packet, you have some questions. if you can send those questions to staff. Um, what's really unfortunate is when there's some big questions, maybe staff aren't aware of them in advance, which is fine. You can still ask questions off the cuff, but maybe they don't have the answers. And then maybe the group isn't comfortable moving forward because they really feel like they need this answer. And so then you're not, you know, you haven't used that meeting time as well as if maybe on um Sunday you send a note saying these are my questions. Um, so just a suggestion. I think the same of an amendment. So you're reading through something, you're like, I don't agree. I'm going to I'd like to propose a change to this. Let staff know. They can help you with the wording because sometimes it's hard to know what exactly the wording should be. Um, I know at the city council I support, they also like if then the clerk distributes uh proposed amendments to the council members in advance of the meeting. The council members like this because I think that they feel more comfortable knowing in advance of something they'll be asked to vote on. So, it gives them a few minutes to sort of gather their thoughts. So, again, these aren't requirements. Um, but I think having a no surprise rule and doing your best to communicate changes or questions is really helpful and helps an efficient meeting.

Yes. Commission or just Well, maybe we'll have the planning director. What What is your practice or what's your preference? We would prefer individual questions.

Uh so this is Ryan Windish, community development director. Uh we would prefer that if planning commissioner has a question or council has a question on something that we're putting on your agenda that it come to it did not go to the whole. The answer doesn't go to the whole. Uh I guess staff might be able to send it out to the hole. What we're really trying to avoid there is any open public meetings violation where you have you it's too easy to get into a conversation that's reply all. Uh so if you have a question, send it to staff. Staff can be ready to answer that question before the meeting even. So I think that covers it. Thanks.

Yeah. And then you could certainly share out that answer at the meeting or staff could as well so that everyone could benefit from it. All right. So um a few more points here on individual on members role. Um so what's your authority in these deliberative bodies? This is a trick question. It's zero. Um this is kind of something to get accustomed to. But really in in the groups that you're a part of, it's really about what a majority of you decide. Um which means this your effectiveness is going to depend on your ability to persuade a majority of the members present voting to support your position. So I think this is kind of a powerful thing to sit with for a minute. Um your viewpoints matter. Um but really it is about what what is the group going to move forward. So um you all have an equal right to persuade others towards your viewpoint. Um you should have robust discussion. That's part of part of what this is, right? Working through hard issues. Um so express your views freely and don't hold back. None of none of this is about holding back. We want you to give your viewpoints, but we just we want to do it in a somewhat controlled environment. Um, but at the end of the day, you need to accept what the majority decided, unless there's a higher vote threshold, but the default vote threshold is a majority of those present. Um, I saw a powerful example of this when I worked for the legislature. They had some really intense policy discussions and the lead majority leader and the minority leader sat next to each other just like the two of you. And I remember one particular day there was a lot of heated discussion from both sides of the issue, really impassioned. And the meeting was adjourned and I was sitting there kind of like kind of just absorbing what had just happened. Um, and I noticed the majority leader and minority leader get up and walk in the middle of the aisle like actually and shake hands and ask about each other's families. And uh, it kind of makes me

emotional to think about because they were very opposed on this issue. strongly opposed. Both made very eloquent and passioned remarks. The minority lost, but that didn't stop them from shaking it off the minute the meeting was over. I was quite impressed about how quick they I think I would have needed a few minutes to get there, but um and just showed respect as colleagues, right? So, really powerful. Robert Troll says that it's not appropriate to take talk negatively of past action the group has taken. There's actually a rule around this. You got to get comfortable accepting what a majority of your colleagues decide. [snorts] All right, last role we're going to cover real quick. Staff. So staff are not members. So they need to be acknowledged by the chair to speak. Um but their participation is crucial to you as decision makers. And so they they do need to be able to talk in order to fulfill their function of service. So their responsibility is to remind you of the laws, regulations, and fiscal constraints that apply. So though they technically need your acknowledgement to participate in the meetings, you really want to create an environment where staff are empowered to speak up. If a member has an idea and other members are jelling around it, but there's a significant issue with it actually happening that staff know about, you need them to feel safe to tell you so you don't go down a bad path. So critical role that staff um provide at your meetings. And uh this probably doesn't need to be said, but just for the sake of it, you know, you also have a responsibility to be courteous to staff. And if you you should not be criticizing them at your meetings. Not that you couldn't criticize an approach or a viewpoint, that would be fine, but certainly not their performance or them personally. That would be something you would want to do in a private conversation with the city administrator. So a a public meeting is not the place for that. And again probably just stating the obvious there

but want to cover that. So this um slide I think is really this concept is important. So you're responsible to give clarity to staff. So we what doesn't work well is floating an idea and then expecting staff to move it forward. If you want to direct staff, there should be a motion and a vote to determine if a majority of your colleagues agree. If you un if you're unsure if staff have what they need from you, ask them. And I want to talk about a couple ways that you can do this as chairs in particular and I actually think at committees this can be a common situation. So you have one member who has an idea that they state I want to I want to have I'm going to make something up. I want to have a joint meeting with the city of Bonny Lake to get resolution here and no one else says anything like maybe the next speaker goes on to a different topic or so chair. So the question always is well was that direction or not? Um, so as chair, you know, you can do a couple things. You can say, do any other members have have a perspective on that idea? Or you can say, um, member, would you like to make a motion to provide that direction? Which would allows the members to vote. If you think it's something that everyone's supportive, maybe they're nodding or you could say, is there any objection to directing staff to schedule a joint meeting with the city of Bonnie Lake? Pause. All right. Hearing no objection staff, we would like to proceed to have a joint meeting the city of Bonnie Lake scheduled. So those are a couple avenues you can take. The idea here is just does a majority support um that I have seen a lot I've been in a lot of meetings where there's a meeting and a presentation and talking and the meeting ends and staff don't know what they're supposed to do next which just feels really unfortunate, right? everyone just gave a lot of their time to this issue and so it's it's so crucial which again why that last point is there at at a minimum check with them the chair can do that and if you're sitting there as a member and you're like I'm not quite sure what the next

steps are say something right it'll help everyone to be clear on those um those next steps yes we like that we like clear direction [laughter] [snorts] all right any questions on that before we move into some okay I'm going to have a real short five minute section here and then we're going to do a little practicing. So, we just talked a little theoretical. Now, we're going to talk about starting your meeting. It's what what time do your meeting start? Is it seven? 6 p.m. 6. Okay. Planning commission 2. Okay. 6. Okay. So, it's 5:59. What do you need? You need a quorum. A quorum is the minimum number of voting members who must be present for business to be done. If you lose your quorum, you can't do business. It's an important number. Anyone know what your quorum is? It's the same for both groups.

Four.

Four. It's four. Need four of you. Um here is your attendance pretty good generally your meetings. Yeah. Okay. Good. All right. So then the chair is going to wrap the gavvel and say this meeting of the um city council of the city of Donopoulos is called to order. They're going to maybe ask staff to take a role and handle excused absences announcing those. Maybe a motion is made to excuse folks. Yes. Okay. then that's going to happen at the beginning of the meeting and then you're going to move through your meeting agenda. But I did want to take just a moment to say your quorum is one thing and then your voting requirement is a different thing. Let's just talk about that for just a moment. Um so a default vote requirement is a majority of those present in voting. So if you have a quorum of four, what's that going to be? How many pe votes do you need to pass something? Three. Yes. Um that's a big difference. Well, it's not I guess such a big difference if there are seven of you and four. Um, but it can it it can be squishy if someone has a conflict of interest. Um, because then that brings your voting number down to three, which is a problem. So, this is why we want to know about your attendance and I'll be talking to you in a little bit later about conflict of interest. We want to know about those two because it kind of helps determine what those voting thresholds are. Yes.

I guess I had a question for Andrea. I'm so sorry. I'm just learning this right now how to act as a councilman. But um I'm just curious. I think during our orientation it said that if we were out of the state or out of town, we could be at a meeting via uh like Zoom or online. Do we still have the voting and able to vote and everything? Yeah, according to your rules, remote attendance gives you all the same rights and privileges as attending here in person. So, you would be able to vote.

Thank you. Great. That's a great option. All right. Robert Schru says, uh, so now we're your meeting has started. You're following your agenda. Your agenda is your guide for the meeting. Robert Shu says if you have a standard order of business, which both of your bodies do, you don't have to adopt an agenda. You can amend an agenda. Uh, that should be happening at the beginning of your meeting if there's a change that requires a majority vote. Uh, I do think having estimated times for agenda items is a helpful tool. I think it can help the chair a bit with managing time, but it's important if times are added, they're noted as approximate. Um, so you're not pigeonholed into those exact times. But so you're going to follow your agenda. You're going to get everything everything done. And then I wanted to quickly touch on the end of the meeting and then we'll go back to the middle. Um, so once you're say you get through all your agenda items, the chair there doesn't need to be a motion to adjurnn. The chair can just say there being no further business, the meeting is adjourned. gavel done. Um, if you're in the middle of an agenda item and it's getting late, uh, someone can make a motion to adjurnn before your items are complete. And if that happens, there's a lots of variations on this in Robert's rules, but a simple motion to adjurnn would just stop the meeting kind of exactly where you're at, and the items would carry over to your next regular meeting. There are lots of different things you can do like schedule special meetings or continue a meeting. But um if you just if the meeting's late and you just need to put a stop to it or someone wants to put a stop to it, you can you can make that motion. All right, we're going to take about 15 minutes. Um and I need you in groups of six. So I'll need you to do a little chair dragging here and we'll turn the microphones off for this portion. Um and I'm going to have you just read through a script. Uh now a quick comment here. I just talked to you about how typically in a body you need to be recognized by the chair to speak in the script. You're not going to do that. Just when you see

the role that you've picked for yourself there, you're just going to read it. Okay? So, it probably will take about 10 15 minutes. Find five other people to gather up.

All right, you guys. We're gonna I need a bigger gavvel. We're going to call back to order. Some great acting was happening during this exercise. I felt like you guys were really getting into it. Is there any uh observations or questions that came up? There was a lot covered in that script. A lot of funniness, a lot of different scenarios definitely. Yeah. I had a I had a question. So, uh, a motion can be amended more than once then. Is that what it can? Okay. Which gets when you amend motions, it gets pretty confusing anyway. And now you can amend it more than once. Okay.

Yes. Yes. Those are both true true statements. Yes. So in in that uh to that question, is it the chair or the mayor's responsibility to keep track of those amendments and and keep the group in the same direction in terms of okay, we have multiple amendments or we have an amendment on an amendment and like how we vote in what order and we process all those. Is that their responsibility?

Yeah. And your clerk and parliamentarian can assist with that. If there's multiple amendments, it can be really helpful to number them, kind of go through them one at a time and but yeah, you likely will want a little support um from staff keep to keep everyone clear. I know I've also, you know, pulled amendments up on screen if they're being amended to just the and we're just a great segue because we're just going to talk about the eight steps to make a motion. And there are eight steps for a reason and it's to make sure everyone is clear what's being voted on um every time. So yes,

is it um can we address a point of order to staff in in those meetings like for clarification on the amendment process or anything?

Um I you you could raise a point of order. Technically, the chair is always the one who's supposed to rule on those, but they could ask staff to answer. And that could happen live or that could happen, we'll talk about at at a brief um at ease, which is like a pause in the meeting where everyone stays seated, but the mics are off. If there if the chair needs to do a quick consultation, but also the chair could just say, "Staff, can you assist? Are you prepared to help us get on track? Which amendment are we on?" Amendments can get confusing, but they're also really important because not everything that comes before you is perfect. So, sometimes changes need to be made and it just requires some patience and good documentation. Yes. Okay. So, let's talk about motions. So, um a motion is a and then we're going to take a break, a fivem minute break. A motion is a formal proposal by a member in a meeting that the body take certain action. That's that's what a motion is. And this is where the dinosaurs come in. Um, in Jurassic Parliament, the main motion is represented by the Tyrannosaurus Rex. Um, because only one main motion can be offered at a time. And a main motion are your agenda items. Approving a contract, recommending adoption of a change to your land use code. Those are main motions. And this is a sort of uh typical flow. Even though I did observe that uh I know at least the council level you're doing this in a slightly different order which is fine. Um a typical flow might be that staff presents the uh main motion sort of topic gives you information. Members ask a question or two. The motion is moved and seconded. That should really happen before debating or there can be a little bit of discussion but the motion should be made and seconded pretty quickly before the group starts de debating. Then members discuss the motion and may amend it and then members vote on the motion. So council, I see you make your motion kind of at the very

beginning and then I also see that you have public comment in here which is after the staff presentation. Believe that that happens. Yep. Um planning commission, when are you typically making your motions? Before staff present. After staff present. After. Okay. Yeah. So it's okay. This is not a this is not a required order but just to think about um the flow. So a couple attributes that are important for uh main motions I would say actually really any motion. Um they should be in writing if possible. I'm guessing your agenda packets include proposed motions typically. Is that typical? Yes. Okay. So that's really helpful. So those are in writing. Um, but it you may have an amendment or a change to the motion and that's also helpful to have in writing. If you get this idea when the meeting is happening and you need a minute to write something down, request a brief at ease, brief break in the meeting where you can jot something down. It is hard when something isn't in writing because the chair has to restate the motion. That's hard for them to do if they don't have it written in front of them. It's hard for the clerk to get the accurate wording of the motion into the minutes. The wording of the motion should be clear and unambiguous. Um, so the so moved thing is is not something that is is that's challenging. It's better to have a clear statement. It should be phrased in the grammatical positive. So you want to make a motion to not approve a contract. You'd have a motion to approve approve a contract and then vote against it. And then it has to comply with the laws of the land and only again one main motion at a time.

[snorts]

Um, so I'm going to give you just a second to read this statement on the screen, right? Is there a motion in there? Maybe it's a viewpoint. And you know, there might be times where you have a viewpoint and you're not sure if you have support for that viewpoint and you're not sure you want to act use the political capital to make a a motion or an amendment. Like, so maybe you just want to be on the record as saying what you think. That's okay. You don't have to turn everything into a motion. But if you want to see where your colleagues are at and maybe move something forward, then you do need to come up with with a motion. And let's look at what that sounds like in just one moment. One more slide. Um, so these are the eight steps to process a motion. So the member a member makes one, another member seconds it, the chair restates it, then you get to the discussion and amending. Then when that's done, the chair restates the motion one more time, and then the vote is taken. Step six. Step seven, the chair announces the outcome. And step eight, uh, the chair states the next item of business. This can feel kind of long. The, if you read this, the chair is saying the motion is said three times. Once by the member making it, second by the chair before they open debate, and then third before the vote. This is exactly to your earlier point, what are we voting on? Let's be really clear what we are voting on. If you're ever unclear on that, you should um [clears throat] it wouldn't really be a po a point of order. It' be a point of information or a parliamentary inquiry. And you don't even have to be exact with your words, but just ask ask for clarification. If you're unsure, someone else is, too. All right. So, we're going to just quickly, you just did this with the script, but I'm going to quickly talk through this. So, the general contractor makes a motion. I move that residents be authorized to build catios in their private yards. Second. If there's no second, the motion dies, the chair can just say that. It's really awkward when that happens. That

happens sometimes. Again, you're in hard positions. Sometimes you have an idea, you're putting it out there, and maybe someone doesn't doesn't want to discuss it. When you're seconding something, you're not saying you're going to vote for it. You're just saying you think it's worth listening. It's worth hearing more. Yeah. All right. Okay. Now, the chair is going to restate the motion. It has been moved and seconded that residents be authorized to build patios in their private yards. Is there any discussion? The first person who gets to speak is the maker of the motion. They don't have to speak, but they get the first right of refusal. And after that, it's kind of first come, first serve. Uh you can't, according to Robert's rules, you can't speak against your own motion, but you can vote against it. I think that's strange. I'm sure there's some rationale behind that. I just it hasn't been shared with me yet, so I'm unsure, but okay. So, the general contractor says, "Katios are a safe and effective way to protect cats from predators and birds from cats. Here's an example of a nice little catio. I urge my colleagues to vote in favor of this motion. It's actually pretty pretty attractive. I think the photographer says, "I'm in favor. My cousin has built a catio and her little pet fuzzy is completely at home in it, as you can see from this photo." Very sweet. Okay. Architect. I think this is a terrible idea. Catios are intrusive and will ruin the look of our city. Here's an example I saw when I visited Dino Dome last week. We don't want this kind of ugly building in beautiful Dinopoulos. So bad. Okay. [sighs] So ugly. And then the chair. So there's been some debate and the chair is going to say, "Is there any further discussion or are you ready to vote?" If no one responds, then the chair is going to move to take the vote. Are you typically taking your votes by roll call vote or voice vote? Roll call.

Roll call. Okay. Yes. Question about the discussion. So is the chair then managing the discussion like you know you spoke you spoke you spoke and you spoke twice and you can't is like that supposed to be okay.

Yeah. And we're going to talk a little bit more about that after the break. Yes. And I I'm interested to hear how that's um working in your groups. Yes. They are absolutely facilitating. And in fact if you've been to like a legislative body they'll say through the chair. Have you heard that when people are testifying in Olympia? they'll when they're speaking to um like a legislative committee, they'll say through the chair, Senator So and so and they're they're taking that really literally, which is that really the the chair is everything goes through them from you to them. They acknowledge you, you speak. Um so absolutely. Okay. So then if it's a voice vote, the chair says, you know, all those in favor say I. Um roll call staff, I imagine, are the ones reading the names. Does the clerk do that? Yeah. And you're responding with your vote. In the planning commission, how do you typically vote? Do you Is it Are your names called? Yes. Roll call vote. Okay, great. A note here, no discussion during voting. You shouldn't qualify your vote. So, when your name is called, you you don't it's not really appropriate for you to say anything other than, you know, I or no, or maybe you say yes or no. You can say a strong yes, I suppose, but no other words. That's just what you get to say. I or no, yes or no. Um, nothing should interrupt the voting process. It's kind of a sanctimonious time. I feel like the vote is always exciting. Um, you know, we're finally to that point, so nothing should happen. Even if you think a rule's been broken, it all has to wait till after that votes over. All right. And then the chair is going to announce the outcome of the vote. Um, the wording is on the screen here. A note that the chair well this is if you're not doing roll call votes this isn't so important but so you know if you're doing a roll call or a voice vote where you're saying all those in favor all those opposed you always have to call for that negative vote even if it seems unanimous that's something Robert's rules specifies and then the chair is going to move the meeting along. All right this eight steps this is the process used for a main motion. It's also the process used for an amendment or an amendment to an amendment or a

motion to refer something to committee or to postpone it to another meeting. You use those eight steps for any [clears throat] motion. And so just like this traffic the traffic lights here. We all know what that means. We don't even have to think of it. We want you in your meetings to just get used to get used to these eight steps of processing motions. There are a few shortcuts. We'll talk about um abstaining. under Robert rules to abstain is to do nothing and it's basically like the absence of a vote. I do see in Sumner that uh abstensions are not allowed um really for either of your bodies definitely for the city council. The planning commission rules also seem to infer that that wasn't an option unless you have a conflict of interest which we'll talk about. So this is just good for you to know you if you're here you are voting unless you have a conflict of interest. Um, and uh, those are established in state law. You might have something in your city code uh, or ethics policy about them as well. The really important thing, if you think you have a conflict, you have a financial interest or personal interest in something that's coming before the council, the planning commission, reach out to staff. It impacts the quorum. It impacts the voting requirements and you need to know how to handle it in the meeting. So, please send them a note. And if you're unsure, they'll let you know if it's a real conflict, if it's a perceived conflict. And if you do have a conflict of interest, then you are excused from voting. It's called a recusal, and you likely will be coming off the dis and possibly leaving the room. All right. Uh fasttrack unanimous consent. We I mentioned this earlier. This is good for chairs to know. It's very efficient and it's an efficient way to deal with very minor amendments. Um it's basically a a vote that's t it's not really a vote. It's um there's no discussion. It's the chair facilitating something quickly to get to an outcome. Let's look at what it sounds like here. So, it's great to use for the minutes. The chair can say, "Is there

any objection to approval of the minutes?" Pause. If there's no objection, the chair says, "Hearing none, the minutes are approved." So, it's really quick. So again for a minor amendment like maybe some wording got maybe there's a word missing or there's a better word and it's people seem supportive of that the chair can say is there any objection to this amendment hearing none the amendment is approved. Um if you don't agree if you want to vote no if you want to talk about it if you just want to be on record voting a certain way then you object and then you go through the eight steps. Okay. Um, it works great for things like a recess to something procedural that you know may not warrant a full vote. It's a great tool. We're just briefly going to touch on amendments. Not going to go because there's a lot we could talk about, but um, an amendment is represented by the Demetradon in Jurassic Parliament. And an amendment is a change um, in the motion to make it better. Um, the idea is before you take your final vote, you should get that motion as good as it can be. or if the motion is adopting an ordinance um you want that ordinance to be as good as it can be. So you will likely have a need for these at times um in your work and they sort of block the main motion once an amendment has been moved at step four. It's in step four. It's so discussion and amendments happen at the same time. Um it prevents further action on the main motion until it is dealt with. So this might sound like I move that we amend the motion by adding the words provided that the plan for each patio has been approved by the design review board and then if adopted it will read and this can be helpful sometimes if you're like I need to see it in context you can ask staff to help with this too if you want something read or uh potentially shown on screen if they have some time that they can make that happen. Um, so this is or the chair could also read what it would sound like as amended. The amendment is processed using those

same eight steps. Uh, comment here. When you're discussing an amendment, you shouldn't be discussing the whole thing. So when you're discussing that, should the design review board be looking at these? You wouldn't say uh under discussion, I don't like these catios. I'll be voting against the c. We're not talking about the concept in general right now. We're just talking about the amendment to add a review by the design review board. So your comments need to be germanine to that. they need to be focused on the amendment and then you vote on the amendment before you vote on the main motion. Um, if the amendment's adopted, it kind of like hangs out with the main motion as amended. If it's not, it it goes away. Um, and other amendments can be brought up. Um, and you can't, again, we're not going to go dive deep into amendments, but you can amend an amendment to one degree. Thank goodness, just one degree. You can't go beyond that. Um, but you do want to try if you're addressing a certain area of a motion or an orance, you want to try and get that where you want it before you uh again vote on the main motion. Okay. I think we're just about at the end of this section. Okay. Yes, we've already talked about this. There is a way you can undo your action. That is possible, but takes more work. So, it's good to take this part slow and get it right the first time. Okay. Now, we're going to take a five minute break. So, come back at 7:15 and we'll hit our last two sections. Thank you.

All right, I found the real gavl. That's pretty good.

Yeah, that's that's pretty good. All right. Okay, you ready? We're going to we have two more sections to cover and we'll we'll wrap up. All right, in this next one we're going to talk about meeting discussion. That's where you spend a lot of your time, right? Um and then we're going to talk about a point of order and appealing, which is hopefully there's not a lot of that happening at your meetings, but it's good to know it's available. All right. So, um this is this is something different to get used to. I think um for I know we have um the city I work for, we have a lot of advisory boards and so a lot of volunteers and you know I think this part is a little a little tricky. Um in these groups it's not a free form discussion. So there's little formality around it and it's that formality is there for a reason. Um and so we're going to talk a little bit about what that looks like. So in Robert Schules discussion isn't a conversation. It has its own rules and they're not really just best practices. They're actual rules. Um and the many of them are around this principle of equality. All members have equal rights, privileges, and obligations. So this is a big part of why these rules for discussion are here to make sure everyone has a chance to be heard. the number of members on your council and on your planning commission those were those numbers were selected with some intent actually I think in the case of the city council I think there's something in state law that kind of I think there's less flexibility on that but your planning commission is established in your code and there was some decision behind having seven individuals and seven viewpoints right so a goal is to try and hear hear from everybody so we've already talked about one of these things and I'd like to hear how this is working

in your meetings. So, you need to be recognized by the chair to speak in discussion. Council, how are you letting the mayor know you have comments? Do you raise your hand? Do you put your mic up? How is that happening now? Recognizing Mike Oh, their name shows up. Oh, that's cool. On the Oh, okay. So, and does it keep the order for you? Yeah, I mean, I can swap it, but yeah. Oh, that's nice. Okay, that's a great tool. [snorts] and planning commission. Are you sitting up here also? Yes, but I'm not doing that. You're not doing that? It's kind of cool when it says the chair recognizes it. Is it okay? Is it kind of a free-for-all? It's It's a more robust discussion. Yeah. [laughter]

Okay. Kind of back and forth. They recognize each other. We're not trying to shame anyone here. No shaming. [laughter] You just [snorts] It feels like we're just a wee bit more casual than the Robert's rules allow for. [snorts]

Yeah. And you know there's a balance here because I realize you know it's good to work together. The problem though is you you can end up with someone who all of a sudden wants to dominate your meetings and if you're not following these they can what are you going to do? You haven't been enforcing any protocols. So why would you know and it's so much harder to change things. So I do think it's ideal not that you have to be rigid about this but it would be good to work towards a little more formality. So things I've seen done I mean raising your hand, tipping your name tag up or putting your microphone up. Yes.

Oh uh the person online has a question. Yes, please. see me. Okay, Amy, if you're with us, you're welcome to ask your question. Okay. Okay. And if Okay. And can someone see the chat? Jeff can. Okay, Jeff, if you see something, Jeff, let let us know. Yes.

Yeah, this is all very informative. I'm just thinking some of the stuff seems I don't know if it's too formal for our committee meetings. I mean, like Michael is the chair of the community development committee. And I don't know if he wants me I'm supposed to get his approval before I say anything or I it seems like the committee level at the summer anyway is a little more informal than this is I don't know.

Yeah. No, that's a valid that's a valid point. So I have seen um I have seen at the committee level the see I work for we have committees of three and they do this. It's they don't make it a big deal. They just acknowledge the person. All right. Um you have something to say. I think the goal here is to prevent back and forth dialogue. We don't want that. We don't want two members even on a three-person committee or two members of the seven member planning commission having a back and forth dialogue. That is what we don't want. That is not a good use of anyone's time. You're not hearing from the other five people. And so again, you know, you you can have some informality your meetings, but how are you going to prevent that if you you know, if you're just totally free flowing? So I think if the chair is comfortable with it being more organic and people are being respectful, it's probably not a huge issue. Um, and especially if the committee committees are by nature a little less formal. Um, you could play around with it too and see it might not be a big deal for you know to you to get the uh chair's recognition. So you you can make some decisions there, but I I definitely think for the seven member planning commission, I think there'd be value and being a little bit more intentional with the discussion. And let's talk about a few more reasons why. And nothing in the chat. Well, stay tuned if there's a question online. Oh, sorry. Oh, okay. All good. There we go. So, another guideline here, a rule is no one may speak a second time until everyone who wishes to do so has spoken once. And so, um, this I'm thinking this could come up at a committee meeting. There's a staff presentation and one member is asking question after question after question after question and the other two members aren't getting a chance to ask their questions. That's really not okay. The chair should be helping to ensure, okay, you've asked three questions. Let's see if the other member um so again, I would recommend to chairs that, you know, you you're responsible to help ensure that this equality is happening at the meetings. Um, and this again is a rule.

So, um, mayor, you have a, it looks like a tool, um, with the microphones where you kind of have a little bit of track here. What you say chairs is if someone's wishing to speak, like indicating they want to speak a second time, you would say, okay, for those members who haven't spoken, would any of you like to say anything before um, the council member goes again. So, just giving an opportunity. And I think this is also really powerful because some people aren't just aren't as vocal as others. Or you might have some members who are have these like passion issues where they have a lot to say which again is fine but you know we want to try and hear from as many folks as possible. So giving them space to do so. I should mention your planning. Well I'll get into that in just a minute. Um so I've already kind of talked about this but you know dominant people can tend to dominate. This can be well intended or not. Um but these rules are to try and help protect um your meetings from from being dominated by one or two people and then um it helps ensure in quality. I think we've pretty much touched on this so let's move ahead. Um another option and I think this can work at committee meetings or account any meeting. Uh I think this works well when there's hesitance to be the first one to speak in discussion is the chair can do a roundroin basically start calling from folks maybe based on the end of the dis and moving in and the pe people called on don't have to say anything they can pass but just to try and kind of get the discussion going if no one is is raising a hand but the other thing you can do is just first come first serve um which I call the the popcorn style but regardless um the chair should be recognizing you. Um, there shouldn't be interruptions in general. There's a few exceptions, but in general, no. And there should not be sidebar conversations. And this can be really distracting for some people. So, I think this is important to be aware of. Um, that means that two members shouldn't be talking to each other. If you need to to say something to someone during the meeting, you can request an at ease,

which is the pause in the meeting, or a recess, which is a break in the meeting. And then the next couple bullets there are really about using other devices to communicate in writing during your meeting via text, chat, whatever. Just, you know, again, I probably don't need to say this to you, but there is a perception when people see that happening. They could they can misconrue it. I mean, maybe you're communicating with your child at home, but I I think it's just be mindful of the fact that that can people can, you know, make make things up, make assumptions. So being aware and then if you are participating virtually in a meeting, try and keep your camera on. It can create this kind of odd dynamic when you have the people in the room who are visible and then you know just like a a black screen on screen. It also is tricky to know for a vote and things like that if you're really there. So encourage you to keep your camera on if at all possible. Yes.

I think we made a council rule that we have to have your cameras on. Okay. Is that correct? Yeah, that's correct.

Okay, I like I like that. That's good. All right. So, these are some rules for discussion. This is what I was going to bring up earlier. So, Robert Schills has some like limits. Um, however, these are a little more flexible for groups of 12 or fewer. Robert Schules has some carveouts for small groups that are about 12 or fewer. So, um, each member can speak an unlimited number of times on each motion for groups of about 12 or fewer. So, there's no limit to the number of rounds of discussion, but each speech should be less than 10 minutes, which probably isn't an issue. 10 minutes is a long time. I'm guessing generally you're not speaking for 10 minutes at once. Your planning commission rules do say that there's two rounds of debate on each motion. Um, so if you're not doing that, you might want to consider a change to those at some point. Um, because it, you know, it's again, it's fine until someone kind of brings it up. Um but you could the group could decide to extend the rounds. Um and again the chair is kind of just facilitating this rounds of voting. Okay, we talked about sort of the logistics of discussion. Let's talk about content. What's not okay? So in general, want you to be courteous, want you to be respectful. Again, these are probably known things, but let's just put them out there. So let's these are the inappropriate remarks and some of these came up in the script. There was some real snarky comments being made at the in the pickle festival script. But what's not okay are personal remarks about other members. If you want to say them about yourself, that's one thing. But about others, not okay. Discourteous remarks or insulting language, inflammatory language, criticizing past actions we talked about, or going off topic. That's also not okay and can be called out as sort of a break in the rules. We want to use people's time. Well, you need to speak about the the main motion that's before the group at that time and the chair can help with this. Now, these things are all a little subjective. So, we'll talk about like who decides really the chair

is going to kind of decide, but they can ask the group to to weigh in or the chair can make a decision and that decision can be appealed. So, there's a like some different ways to handle this, but these are all not appropriate in your discussion time. Oh. Jeff, I think I'm stuck again. It's okay. It's okay.

Okay. So, what happens when things are kind of building at your meetings and there's some behavior that's getting some comments are getting a little borderline? This is when that point of order comes up. So, the point of order is a a motion claiming that a procedural mistake has been made. And in Jurassic Parliament, it is um represented by the flying dinosaur, the pterodactyl, because it kind of um it kind of comes in and it has to be addressed like right away. So, it sort of stops the business. Um this is one of those motions you could interrupt a speaker if the the point of order is related to their comments. So, we were just talking about a situation during the break that that can happen a lot, which is um you're heatedly debating an amendment and the amendment finally gets passed and then the chair moves on because they're like, "Amendments passed. We're going to the next item." Okay, but you need to vote on your amended main motion. That's something you could raise a point of order for. That's not something that you would necessarily interrupt a member who's like members talking and all of a sudden you're like, "Oh, we didn't vote on that. I need to say something. I would say maybe maybe wait maybe wait till they're done. You really want to avoid interrupting people. Um unless again you feel that their comments are inflammatory. They're you feel they're really off topic. That's when you would interrupt. You'd get the chair's attention and the chair would say yes and you'd say point of order and the chair Oh, I'm jumping ahead. Would say state your point. I'm going to slow down a little bit. Um, we'll get to the script and what it sounds like in just a minute. So, um, you don't have to be recognized for this one. You're just going to get the chair's attention. Can interrupt, but it must be timely. Made at the time of the offense. And I would say it I would encourage you to avoid interrupting folks unless the um

point of order is related to their comments. Uh, and I want to say that I don't think of these points of order as being an annoying person who's trying to ensure the rules are followed. I see this as being helpful because the chair is managing a lot at the meeting and sometimes they might just need a reminder that something is they miss something or um maybe you just have a different viewpoint about someone's comments. This is what it sounds like. Point of order. The chair says state your point. So you don't need a second here. And the member, you would say, um, for example, I am the maker of the motion. It should have been recognized first to speak under discussion. And then the chair makes their ruling. The chair needs to make a ruling. In this case, the chair likely would go, "Oh, right. You're right. Go ahead. You have the floor." Um, chairs, if you're unsure, you can ask for brief at ease in the meeting and consult with your parliamentarian, your clerk, possibly a colleague. Um, again, that's a short pause in the meeting. I think these are really helpful because I've seen how sometimes a short break can really help the meeting proceed more swiftly. Um, so if you need help, phone a friend. Um, and before we get to appeal, let's stay here for a minute. Um, also you can ask the group. So if for example, let's say someone's uh one of the council members is talking and they're kind of veering like a little off topic and so another council member says point of order. I don't I feel like these comments aren't gerine to the motion we're considering right now. And chair, you're like, I I'm not sure. I'm not sure what I think here. So, uh she could say, so I'd like to bring a vote to the body and have the group decide if the comments are germanine or not. And so, that is a totally okay thing to do. Um so, now we're going to talk about, okay, so say that scenario happened. Say someone was going a little off topic. Another member calls them out. the chair uh goes ahead and makes a decision.

Let's say that she says, "I think those comments do pertain for this reason. I'm going to speaker, please continue with your comments and you're the one who brought up the point of order and you're like, they're not relevant. They're not relevant." You don't get to argue with the chair, but you can appeal the chair's decision if you disagree with them. And Jurassic Parliament feels like this is kind of a powerful thing. It is a powerful thing. If you have a chair who's not being fair and impartial, if you have a chair who is showing favoritism, um this is a tool that the members have to kind of call them on that and and challenge their ruling. So again, I hope this isn't happening a lot at your meetings, but it's good for you to know about. So if the chair makes a ruling and you disagree with them, don't argue with them. Arguments are not a not a thing at these meetings. Um the chair could just say, "Would you like to appeal this ruling?" And then the chair is going to facilitate a vote. Now, uh, you both of your bodies have special rules about this that differ from Robert's rules. Um, and say that there's no debate on this appeal. Well, Robert's allows some debate. And my memory is that in your council rules say that a second is not needed to appeal, but I think your planning commission rules require a second if my memory is serving me right. So, just know again, I'm hoping I'm hoping you don't need to appeal anyone, but um there are some slight differences in how you handle this and it's not debatable. So, the chair would just say, "Would you like to appeal my decision?" And then the chair is going to facilitate the vote. The question is, shall the decision of the chair be sustained? The wording is kind of formal, but shall it be sustained and then you're going to vote. A tie vote sustains the the chair the chair's ruling stands. If a tie vote takes a majority to overturn the chair's decision. Okay. So, this is a process again that's important for you to be aware of as members, important for you to be aware of as chairs. Um, hope it's not a common

occurrence. There are uh this is a cheat another cheat sheet. Is this the one I have with me? Yes, this is the cheat sheet that I have a few laminated copies with me. I'll hand to a couple of our our mayor and two other folks here um because this is a lot that we're covering tonight and and these um cheat sheets do have some helpful language if you that might be helpful to bring these to a meeting so if something comes up you have it. Okay, our last section is public comment. This is really important part of your meetings. We're we saved it for last. Save the best for last. So let's talk a little bit about public comment at your meetings. I might be looking for a little information from you um about how this is going at your meetings. But uh first a disclaimer that uh Robert Tules of Order doesn't have much to say about public comment. So what I'm sharing with you today are some best practices and advice we have based on our experience working with local government agencies for around 20 years here. But you're not going to necessarily find this in Robert's rules. So let's talk a little bit about your meetings. So, your meetings are business meetings. They're not meetings of the public. They're meetings of the planning commission or of the city council um that the public is invited to attend, right? So, the point of the public comment is it's allowing you to become informed about the public's views before you make your recommendations or decisions. Um but it should be carefully structured. And I think something I want to emphasize here is we're talking about your business meetings. These are your regular council meetings, your committee meetings where you're providing recommendations, your planning commission meetings where it sounds like you meet once a month to make decisions. So keep that keep this all in context because clearly getting the public's input on your issues is one of the most important things to do, right? Because you're representing your community in your positions. Um but think and I'll touch on this at the end too. There's a

lot of other outlets for public input, right? open houses, community forums. I've we've seen I've seen this at our city. We in fact we had one a couple weekends ago where there was community a community meeting on a kind of a hot political issue in our community. So it wasn't a council meeting. It you know they scheduled a separate meeting separate place for the community to come in a more open and natural and organic conversation with the community about community about these issues. There's an absolute need in place for those kinds of conversations and your need for input. But at your business meetings, we do encourage you to put some parameters around the public comment in part to ensure that you can get to the business of the city. So the courts have found that local governments can limit the time, place, and manner of public comment, but the restrictions have to be viewpoint neutral and respect those first amendment protections. However, attendees don't have the right to disrupt a meeting. H though typically words themselves are not have not been considered a disruption. So um just being aware and again you can this is a time when you can um turn to your city attorney for some assistance but if you have some really volatile comments or possibly a little bit of a physical disruption. That's when it would be good to to check to see you you want to be you don't want to be uh shutting people's comments down or asking them to leave the room. You don't want to be doing that lightly because it's that's a significant thing to remove someone from a public meeting or to prohibit their comments in a meeting. So, just want you to have awareness and the courts have been pretty um for forgiving in this area. In fact, I don't Were you Did you receive any of the Zoom bombing? Did you you did? I'm so sorry. Um I know a lot of communities did and a lot of communities really tightened their public comment rules. In fact, in fact, I spoke to a council member from a community where they actually stopped their verbal public comments, which seems so unfortunate to me, but I think

it that was upsetting to folks. So, there's some challenges here. Um, but having some limitations is good. Um, so just not around the content. Um, so it's important when folks come into your room, your meeting room, I'm sure you have some folks who come to many meetings. um maybe maybe the folks with us tonight and so they kind of know the drill, right? They know where to stand. They know what how much time they have. But you might have people coming into the room who who have no idea. So being really clear with them, having the chair say, I think at the beginning of the meeting, you know, when the public comment can be taken or near the beginning of the meeting and then maybe stating some of the guidelines where they stand. Maybe some of this is in your agenda, too, or I'm sure it's on the I'm sure it's in a number of places, but it's just an important thing to remember to help these folks out who are being brave and coming to speak to you. Um, so the public should be addressing their comments to the group and really to the chair ideally. So, it wouldn't really be it wouldn't be appropriate for them with to be turning and kind of facing the audience as they're commenting. I've seen some folks do that. the city I work for. That would be something where the chair could say ple please address your comments to to the city council to me and the city council. Um so that's something I would encourage. Um we don't recommend dialoguing and this this is hard because people often are coming sincerely wanting information but there are some challenges with dialoguing. Um, one of the biggest ones is it's hard to be consistent. And uh, my next slide is about it's really important to be consistent with how you treat people who come to your meetings, no matter what their viewpoints are, no matter if they've been here a hundred times or zero times before. And I think dialoguing um, so I I think if you're going to dialogue with one person, you need to be willing to dialogue with all people. And I think that's ch a challenging thing to be consistent with. I'm going to talk a little bit more about that in a minute, but let's keep

moving through these. Um, discourage demonstrations. So, um, you know, clapping and booing can be pretty distracting. So, maybe encouraging some more passive ways to show support like raising hands. Um, being consistent with time limits is important. Again, you're looking to treat folks the same way. So, um, that's the goal. And then do not allow remaining time to be donated. Do you allow people to donate time? No. That's great. That's complicated. Let me see. Yeah, bottom line be consistent. So, something I want to um mention about the um dialoguing as well. So, I think it's totally appropriate for the mayor to state some brief factual information that is helpful. Um, for example, if they're saying, I'm not sure if this will be discussed tonight, but I'm speaking, you know, the chair say yes, this is on our agenda. Brief factual information for more involved responses. I would highly encourage and maybe you're already doing this, ask staff, staff, can you please, you know, connect with this individual and make sure you follow up with them to answer their questions. It's really tempting when you have staff in the room to to call them up and have them answer the questions on the spot. I'd really discourage that. I think that puts a lot of pressure on staff. And again, there's this consistency thing where maybe with one question that would be fine, but another one that might be challenging. So, while tempting, I'd highly encourage you to encourage offline connection. Maybe it's even in the back of the room or out outside in the hallway. Um, and also acknowledging this this is ch it's hard. It's hard when people come asking for answers and it feels um it feels hard to not give them exactly what they need in that moment, but it's not always possible. Uh and I would say at your regular meetings is not the the best um time to do that. So what can you do when you're sitting up here listening to people's um passionate public comments? These are probably obvious, but let's just talk about them for a minute. You know, give your attention. Show them that you're listening to them. Um, being aware of

your facial expression. This is one I have to work on. What are you grimacing? Maybe maybe try not to grimace. Um, and then like I said, explaining that while it's not a time for dialogue, that you do want to help them get their questions answered and you'll make sure the staff connect with them. At the end of the comment period, I think it's nice for the chair to thank the public commenters. And I think it can even be helpful to to say like, "We appreciate hearing comments about X, Y, and Z to kind of really let them know that they were heard. These are some don'ts. We don't recommend back and forth dialogue, showing favoritism or preference for commenters, and putting stuff on the spot." [snorts] Like I mentioned before, um I think it's important to put some context around this. You should be getting input. You can be doing that through surveys. You can be doing that through some meetings outside of your regular business meetings that are more have a more flexible format. Yes.

Uh just a question about if if you have a topic and somebody wants to they sp they've spoken and they want to get back up and speak again like they heard something somebody else said and they want to whatever add on. What what do we do about that?

Yeah. So what are your rules? And this is good because you're actually bringing up another um point I wanted to make. So thank you for the question. Um what do your rules allow? Do they allow for comment at various points in your meetings at the top and then like on each agenda regular business item? Okay. So, the same person can talk multiple times, but you're saying coming up twice in the same public. Well, I would say in general, I guess unless it's allowed in your rules, I would say that that seems unfair to me. They could come up then like so many times at your meeting, right? Which could then be kind of dominating. Um, so I would I the city I work for, we would not allow that. They they could come up under each opportunity for comments and speak on those various issues, but not multiple times on in one of those segments. And I think kind of to your point, something that I've seen happen in when I've been watching some meet, not your meetings, but uh other cities meetings is when there's when there's a lot of um when there's interaction like dialogue with members of the public and then they go and sit down and then the council's discussing something and then sometimes they think they can interject and that's fair. It's like, well, I'm here and this is my that's really not okay though because um you're you were elected or appointed to represent them and be the decision makers on these issues. And so again, it is ultimately your meeting though their input is valued. Um so I think having some clear boundaries here helps everyone. Um I also want to note um another comment about point of order. Point of order is not something you can use for those in the public and it's also not something they can use towards you. So that's just for the members. Um I also should mention that the chair, sorry I'm going back a step here. Um the chair does not need to use a point of order. The chair

just gets to call things out of order as part of their responsibility. But if you feel like the chair is out of order as a member, you can raise a point of order against them. So that's a good distinction to make. Any other anything else that's happening in public comment that you want to talk about at all? Touch on? No. Okay. All right. Well, I was kind of speeding through this because I was worried I was going to um go over time, but we're right. We're going to be ending a little early actually, which is great. So, um these were kind of our the outcomes we were looking for today. So, applying the principle that the authority of the group is more important than any single individual. Hopefully we get you got that point. Um following best practices for discussion so you have some new knowledge about what those rules are um and can try implementing those in your various um commissioning committee meetings responding to disorder or difficult people which can be both members and potentially members of the public making motions running effective public comment and making better decisions in your role. Again I'm hopeful all of this helps. Um, I believe that the city did purchase some copies of this book. So, if you would like a copy and don't have one, see Michelle, it's a helpful tool, but I also want to highlight something um, real quick, which is know your own rules. So, you saw in the hierarchy, they are above Robert's rules, and so they're smaller documents, and uh, it might be good to to look through those if you haven't done that recently. Just get familiar with those. That's a good starting point. Um, Jurassic Parliament does have a newsletter and does have some useful blog posts and online training. So, if you're interested in that, come up and you're welcome to put your name on the signup sheet here. Um, otherwise, I really appreciate your time. Um, it it is meaningful that you are all here um, newly into 2026 trying to kind of ensure you've got some good governance and structure for your meetings. That is

heartening. So, thank you very much. Appreciate it. And that's it. Any [applause] other business? All right. Meeting adjourned.