Proposed council meeting agenda changes limit public’s access to their government

(This article originally appeared in the West Orange Chronicle September 12, 2013. The proposed ordinance is here.)

A proposed ordinance up for final approval at the September 17 council meeting would significantly restrict the ability of your council members to respond to your comments and concerns as well as to raise and discuss issues that are otherwise not on the meeting agenda but could have interest or impact for many residents. The proposed changes to the existing council meeting ordinance would also reduce the likelihood that you will hear these issues, since they would be moved to the least attended parts of the meeting.

I believe these proposed restrictions negatively impact the transparency and accountability of your government and its use of your tax dollars. The council meeting is the designated time for the public to question, and provide opinion on, any town matter with their elected representatives. We should not be putting any arbitrary restrictions on a council member’s ability to receive public guidance and react to it.

The proposed restrictions, described in the proposed ordinance as “minor changes to the order of business at regular Council meetings,” would do the following:

-  Limit the total Public Comment response of each council member to five minutes.

-  Make permanent the council president’s recent elimination of General Matters Pending -- a forum for council members to speak about and discuss whatever news, facts and issues they believe are of potential interest to residents -- from the opening of the meeting.

-  Create a new agenda item called “Pending Matters/New Matters/Council Discussions” at the absolute end of the meeting. This agenda item would limit each council member and an Administration representative to five total minutes to speak -- “the total time for this section to be no longer than 30 minutes unless a majority of the Council votes to expand that time.”

-  Create a new agenda item in the Conference Agenda, which starts 30 minutes before the Public Meeting, for “Council Liaison Announcements - an opportunity for council members to announce upcoming events and/or to express appreciation to local clubs/organizations/volunteers, etc.”

By moving and limiting discussion of issues not otherwise on the agenda, the proposed ordinance would reduce the likelihood that residents, both attending the meeting and watching it on video, will hear what their representatives have to say. This is in sharp contrast to General Matters Pending, which was near the start of the regular council meeting when the audience is usually largest.

General Matters Pending has been an agenda item for several years, although it was never part of the ordinance. At the outset of her third term as Council President, Councilwoman Susan McCartney eliminated this section of the meeting, citing its absence from the existing ordinance. The powers of her office would have allowed her to continue the practice or include it in the revised ordinance.

I confess. I have seen General Matters Pending as a wonderful opportunity to increase transparency and accountability of our government. More than any other council member since I joined the council in 2010, I’ve raised and discussed issues that I believed were important for residents to know. Topics have included:

-  The frequent property tax delinquencies of our designated downtown redeveloper, urging the administration to take advantage of legal provisions to improve the company’s performance under the 2006 Redevelopment Agreement.

-  Attempts to get the administration to provide more information about downtown redevelopment.

-  The weekend and overnight stays in town hall of a former employee who downloaded inappropriate material to a town computer and damaged it.

-  The need for the council to investigate the hiring process of the new executive director at the Downtown West Orange Alliance.

These and other issues that would otherwise not be widely known in town have come out of General Matters Pending. They have prompted limited council debate and administration response, but they’ve frequently given residents opportunities to provide input on these issues during Public Comment.

Many of these issues are not simple, and sometimes they require time to adequately describe and address them. It is similar to council’s and the administration’s response to Public Comment. Council members should have the time to debate issues and respond to each resident’s comments. And residents should be able to hear their representatives’ comments – or their decision not to respond. That is the way to respect the time and interest of residents – the people for whom the entire government exists to serve.

At the last council meeting where this proposed ordinance was discussed, some of my colleagues – all of whom voted for this proposed ordinance on first reading – said they supported the changes because they wanted to focus on doing the “people’s business.” By that, I assume they meant follow the meeting agenda. To me, however, doing the “people’s business” means making every effort to increase their knowledge of what their government is doing (or not doing, as the case may be) in their name and with their tax dollars -- and allowing them a voice in the decision-making process. And in my opinion, none of these proposed changes contribute to that goal. 

I urge you to consider communicating your opinion on this proposed ordinance to the council by speaking at the next council meeting, writing to council@westorange.org, or calling 973.325.4144 and leaving your name and phone number for us to speak with you. You can reach me directly at jkrakoviak@westorange.org and 973.736.7285.

I’m a West Orange Township councilman since 2010, reachable at jkrakoviak@westorange.org. I'm a business communications consultant in my spare time.