At the June 26 meeting, Boulder City Council will discuss further changes to open comment, the period preceding regular business meetings in which members of the public can speak for two minutes on a topic of their choosing. The discussion was added to the agenda this week.
Open comment is one of the ways community members can speak face-to-face with city council, and the only one where the topic of speech is not restricted; comments during public hearings must be related to the issue at hand. Council has faced disruption over the past several months as participants use open comment to speak on Israel’s ongoing military action in Gaza that has resulted in more than 54,000 Palestinian deaths. Meetings have been forced to pause several times, and council suspended open comment at its June 5 meeting, the first to follow the June 1 attack on a Boulder group advocating for the release of Israeli hostages.
In response to the upheaval, council last year passed limits on the size and display of signs. Since then, at least three speakers have been temporarily suspended from speaking at council meetings for violations. Council also instituted time limits on their own members’ response to open comment, offered at the end of meetings.
Council members were given until Wednesday to suggest changes via Hotline, a public email service. As of Thursday afternoon, ideas included:
- Moving open comment the end of meetings, which councilman Matt Benjamin suggested in May.
- Shortening the length of open comment to a set amount of time. The length is currently dictated by the number of speakers (up to 20) and a set time limit for each (2 minutes). Nicole Speer suggested this change, which would align with Denver City Council practices. Ryan Schuchard also wrote that he supports this approach.
- Prioritizing speakers who have not participated in recent open comment sessions. Speer suggested this, and Schuchard wrote that he was "open" to that approach.
- Starting open comment at 5:30 p.m. and council meetings at 6:30 p.m., with a recess in between. Currently, council members start at 6 p.m., and open comments immediately follow a call to order, roll call and announced changes to the meeting agenda. Council members Lauren Folkerts and Aaron Brockett advocated for this change, with Brockett further suggesting that only audio from open comment be recorded and broadcast.
Currently, audio and video from all portions of council meetings are recorded and broadcast. Virtual participants share audio only.
"This approach would allow people to continue to speak to the City Council and city staff about items of concern in the community, but would mean that any divisive and disruptive behaviors that we have seen frequently at open comment would be confined to that section of the meeting and would not have an impact on anyone attending the meeting for the regular business of the city," Brockett wrote in his email. "I have heard loud and clear from the community about the seriousness of those impacts and the need for open comment to change.
- Limiting what topics can be discussed at open comment, either by restricting speakers to topics on the agenda of the current meeting, most recent meeting or next scheduled meeting; or by prohibiting certain topics altogether — such as Israel and Palestine.
As long as the ban was viewpoint neutral, council is within its authority to do so, wrote councilman Mark Wallach, who made the suggestion, since the body operates as a limited public forum.
- Longer bans for speakers who violate rules. Currently, council is issuing 30-day bans. Wallach suggested bans of three to 12 months.
"We owe it to the community to provide its members the opportunity to express themselves on matters of city business," he wrote. "We do not owe it to anyone to permit political ramblings on matters outside of our concern followed by disruptions of our meetings."
Schuchard also wrote that he supported "higher and/or progressive sanctions for violations of rules of conduct."
Other suggestions included allowing only City of Boulder residents to participate in open comment and further restrictions on how much time council members should be given to respond to open comment speakers. Tara Winer suggested 30 seconds per member, down from the current two-minute limit, and Wallach advocated for 1 minute.
The discussion will be held after public hearings on the historic landmark of 3375 16th St. and updates to neighborhood parking permit programs and discussion of polling results for potential tax-related ballot measures, according to a meeting agenda.
Editor's note: This article has been updated to include emailed comments from Ryan Schuchard and to further clarify council members' positions on proposals.