I want to look at a proposed City Charter change for the May 3 municipal election.
That change is having only one regular council meeting a month.
The City Attorney is presenting this change as efficiency.
I don’t agree with that.
She does say that council will continue to have special meetings and workshops along with that solitary regular meeting.
Oh, like that will streamline matters.
So, instead of two regular meetings, there would be one monthly meeting stretching from 6 p.m. to 2 a.m.
Of course that’s not how the attorney is proposing it.
Not only would the single meeting per month be “efficient,” it would save money.
I’m assuming a workshop is cheaper to run than a regular meeting.
Another way of stream lining things for that single meeting will be bundling - her words not mine - the consent agenda items.
Consent agendas contain one or more action items that generally don’t require explanation or discussion and pass through quickly.
But many city hall presentations can be lengthy and certainly don’t fit in a consent agenda format.
For example, the Police Department, Public Works, Finance, Airport, Tourism, Library, Main Street and Municipal Court department are clearly not bundle-up consent agenda items.
Nor is Engineering Tech Gabriel Lopez’s reports on different projects handled in a one-sentence summary.
I’m not looking to add another night of fun to my schedule, but after 50 years of covering council meetings, I don’t see packing two into one.
Here’s another example.
When Commissioners Court misses its regular Monday morning session for holidays or disaster – weather or cyber – the next time the court meets, the agenda swells from two to three pages.
There’s an urgency to pass the proposed charter changes onto the May 3 ballot, because the Feb. 11 meeting is the last possible date for action and still meet the state election deadline requirements for the May 3 election.
The first time most of us learned the City Charter changes were considered was at the Jan. 28 meeting and there was even a possible vote to place the proposition on the May 3 election.
So council looks at the Sentinel’s three staff members – MaLinda, Jessica and I – and wants to know if we can cover all of the salient points.
How about holding more meetings in public?
Judging by the dearth of council comments last week, I’m thinking the charter has been discussed before that meeting.
