Akron City Council is limiting opportunities for residents to speak directly to members.
In an 8-5 vote at the Dec. 4 meeting, City Council passed significant reductions to the sometimes-contentious and spirited public comment period that, in recent months, often pushed the 7 p.m. meetings to last past 9 p.m. The rules go into effect Jan. 3, 30 days after their passage.
The new rules will bump up the meeting start time to 6:30 p.m. and shift the public comment period from the end of the meeting to the beginning, before council votes on legislative items.
The most consequential change is that only 10 people can speak at any meeting, and individuals cannot speak more often than once every 30 days. People will have to fill out an online form to request to speak by 4 p.m. the day of the meeting. With 10 people allotted the standard three minutes to speak, public comment could be over within a half hour.
Before council passed these rules, there were no restrictions on the number of people who could speak or on how often they could speak, only that they had to sign up in advance. Those who wished to speak remotely were required to sign up online by 4 p.m.; those who wished to speak in person had to sign up by the start of the meeting at 7 p.m. In recent weeks, it was commonplace for more than two dozen speakers to address City Council, and many residents spoke at consecutive meetings.
Public comment rules differ depending on the locale: Read more here.
Council also passed a ban on backpacks and other bags larger than 12” X 6” X 12”, banners, flags, posters, signs, and “noisemakers of any kind.”
“The concept of allowing citizens to be able to vocalize concerns before legislation is voted on is probably the most progressive thought I’ve seen from this council in the last three and a half years I’ve been watching,” said activist and former City Council candidate Fran Wilson, in reference to moving the public comment period to the beginning of the meeting. “But that, mixed with the 30-day restriction, and the 10-person limit, is one of the more fascist things I’ve seen council do in the last three and a half years.”
Council President Margo Sommerville told Signal Akron last month, shortly after she and Vice President Jeff Fusco proposed the legislation, that the changes were needed to make meetings “more efficient, more meaningful, and more professional.” There were significant issues with “decorum,” she said, and the restrictions addressed that.
Sommerville said she didn’t believe the legislation would limit the perspectives that City Council hears from the community.
“It’s really important to know our elected officials are very easily accessible, and there are so many different ways in which constituents can and do communicate with us,” she told Signal Akron. “And it’s not just about public comment period. You’re meeting with constituents every day and all day, through phones and email, and coming out to community meetings.”
That reasoning irked some community members who read the interview.
Charissa Soful, a biology teacher, said she wrote to most members of City Council and Mayor Dan Horrigan when she was passionately advocating against the sale of 29 acres of city-owned land off of White Pond Drive in the Wallhaven neighborhood last year. She said she only got a form letter from Horrigan and an eventual response from Shammas Malik, the council member who will be sworn in as mayor next month.
She said she spoke five times during public comment, the only time she knows for sure that council actually heard her perspective.
“This is ludacris,” Soful said. “The people have every right to present their feelings in the chambers.”
Attorney and organizer Imokhai Okolo referenced the interview with Sommerville during public comment at the Nov. 27 City Council meeting, when the legislation was being debated.
“One of the comments was that you guys are very accessible,” he told council. “I want to push back on the accessibility piece. If we’re being honest with ourselves, you guys are not that accessible.”
Okolo told Signal Akron he tried to contact a council member about his work organizing tenants and got “no response ever.”
When Okolo was a candidate for the Citizens’ Police Oversight Board earlier this year and needed council approval for the role, he said he reached out to Council Members Donnie Kammer, Brad McKitrick, Phil Lombardo, Mike Freeman and Fusco, and only got a call back from Fusco. Okolo was controversially rejected based on their no votes.
“I can’t imagine there is a single citizen willing to speak up who said they called any of these eight (council members who approved the restrictions) and said they wanted these changes to public comment,” he told Signal Akron. “I can’t imagine there’s any legitimate support from everyday Akron folks. This is purely a power move from the voting block who knows they have the power to do it.”
Only one person among the dozens who spoke about limiting public comment in recent weeks spoke in favor of it at the Dec. 4 meeting.
“I commend you for making the changes to public speaking,” said George Johnson, after he praised the board for sticking up for the police union by rejecting rules that the Citizens’ Police Oversight Board proposed and urging that the voter-approved board get repealed all together. “It’s gotten out of hand. You need to rein it in.”
Community leaders weigh in, oppose limits
The Freedom Bloc issued a statement about the changes.
“Akron city council is trying to silence the voices of the people,” it stated. “After the chaos of white pond, the lack of accountability and justice for Jayland Walker, the civilian review board fiasco, and a lack of support for Palestinians, this city council has had enough of people coming to city hall to express their concerns and demand action. Instead they are telling the community to shut up and sit down.”
Wilson, Okolo, the NAACP’s Judi Hill, Love Akron Executive Director and Citizen’s Police Oversight Board Chair Kemp Boyd, former Akron Board of Education Chair NJ Akbar, and other community leaders wrote a letter to the West Side Leader urging council to reject the proposed rules.
“We firmly believe that neither the proposed 10-person limit nor the 30-day restriction is ‘reasonable,’ unduly restricts public participation in council meetings and is out-of-step with how other Ohio cities manage public comment,” it said.
A majority of City Council members had different thoughts.
Council meetings “get frightening sometimes,” Freeman said during the discussion at the Dec. 4 Rules Committee meeting. Freeman, who voted for the restrictions, will attend his last City Council meeting today and frequently participated in meetings virtually on Zoom.
“One of the things that I strongly believe is that we do need to address, and address very sternly, is the disrespect that’s being shown to the council in this room,” he said. “Clapping, catcalling, whatever this is [snapping fingers] – that’s got to be addressed … In these chambers, all we’re missing is three rings and a ringmaster. It’s not a becoming look.”
Council Members Malik, Tara Mosley, Linda Omobien, Russel Neal Jr. and Nancy Holland each spoke and voted against the legislation.
“I think that the general sentiment in the community is that we need more public engagement, not less,” Malik said during the Dec. 4 committee meeting. Malik will be sworn in as Akron mayor in January.
“This is a forum that people don’t have at the state or federal level, and while it may be difficult sometimes, I think that it is important. … I worry that this is too broad and we’re making a mistake with this,” he said in reference to the changes.
Holland said she heard from more than 50 of her Ward 1 constituents who wanted her to reject the rules. Despite being a frequent target of insults and verbal jabs from public commenters, she fought the changes.
“It is purely because of the number of communications I’ve received since this matter has been presented for council consideration that I will vote against these two rule changes,” she said.
New members of the council will soon be sworn in, and Council Members Malik, Neal, Mosley, Freeman and Baylor are on their way out. Opponents of the restrictions, including Malik and Holland, said they shouldn’t be made before the new council is sworn in and can weigh in.
Kammer disagreed.
“If we move forward with this, we as council can always come back later in the future and revisit it,” he said. “We can test the waters out and see how this works out.”
Kammer said Malik, when he becomes mayor, could “open up these chambers after council meetings and have a public forum.”
Editor’s note: An incorrect spelling of Margo Sommerville’s name was corrected in the text.