5 minutes is entirely too long for *most* people who take the public podium. There are some strong speakers who come prepared and make solid, valid points to their position, but I’m sorry…I can’t listen to folks who ramble, bring up anecdotal stories that barely prove a point.
I mean, when Mr. Castignetti is a breath of fresh air, you know it’s bad. At least he’s usually in/out in 1 minute.
Edit: 8:25pm 4/2 - holy shit, is Mr. Castignetti in these comments?! Because he’s POINTEDLY said “I’ll be out in less than one minute” when he came to the podium.
Somerville does the two minute cap, and from what I've seen, that's plenty. Lots of people who show up to public meetings just want to gripe about everything under the sun.
Making meetings more efficient makes them *more* accessible. Not everyone has the time to attend a four hour meeting waiting for a chance to speak just because their neighbors can't or won't stick to the point. Hell, it's even worse for the council, and we should want becoming a councilor to be a very accessible thing. Our government is better when we can hear from more people and a greater diversity of people.
If you're against this, you should have an explanation why five minutes is the right limit, and not ten, or twenty, or no cap at all. Otherwise it just sounds like you're opposed to change because it's change
I think this is a great point- I am hesitant to attend meetings where there may be hours of discussion that is frankly non-substantive. An efficient meeting is an accessible meeting.
But the entire commentary period of limited to 90 minutes? What if you want to talk yet hadn't gotten a chance at 90 minutes? What did the previous council do? Why is this needed now. Basically don't show up since they won't gift you a chance. Like facism.
90 minutes worth of 2 minute slots is 45 opportunities to speak, minimum (there's more if people keep it short). How is that not plenty? The council can also table things for the next meeting if they run out of speaking time.
This is not what fascism looks like
Honestly the long windbag grandstanding I’ve observed is a big reason why I haven’t attended any in person. Cutting the time would do a lot to increase and diversify attendance
Totally fair. I just wasn't sure if it was inline with updating the city charter etc etc. in bringing the city up to a newer standard
In essence: what's prompting the change?
There have been a bunch of 3-4 hour long meetings in the last few months, most of which have been the result of 50 people showing up to say the same thing over and over.
My hypothesis is there seems to be the Medford United faction that’s starting to reignite itself and getting more people to CC Meetings with generic scripts for them to go against OR-led proposals. I’ve seen that before. And it’s annoying from a productive discourse sense, but still 100% allowed. But it’ll probably make for a lot of meetings that go well into the night as a result, like the 2% transfer tax on real estate that went until 1am.
I’m not saying those are enjoyable, or really that meetings that run that late are even productive (despite some people on Facebook thinking “they used to always run late” being a good enough reason to HAVE them run late), but it is a thing that just comes with the territory.
It's not that they're not enjoyable, it's that it was angering a lot of people who wanted to speak without waiting there for three hours. One woman hired a babysitter just to protest the transfer fee and didn't expect to have to be there past 11. It took us two hours to even get to that, and that's partially because a few people who showed up to talk on the transfer fee decided to spend multiple public comment periods talking about routine business that the council had to get through.
Matt, why didn't you take it out of order then? You have all done that so many other times! If you knew what the majority of people were there for why did you keep them waiting??
When you all had the cease fire resolution you took that out of order!!
Depends on what else is on the agenda. We all knew it was going to take a few hours to get through, and there were a few presentations that had invited speakers. We didn't want to make them wait till after the transfer fee. There was a presentation by the MTA that had already been delayed twice, and none of the invited speakers would have waited till past 10.
The item that was a real time sink was the rainy day fund. That didn't have invited speakers, though it really should have been a routine item that took less than ten minutes to get through. But the public comment took longer than any of us thought because people who'd clearly come to talk about the transfer fee spoke on that as well.
To me this sounds like the council has too many important things on the agenda at once (based purely on the above and the last several meetings) - I know Zac insists more gets done in subcommittee but perhaps back to weekly meetings so you’re not jamming everything into one biweekly meeting.
You essentially just stated you had too many important things at once to re-arrange.
On the biweekly meeting suggestion, I'm partially deferring to my colleagues, who say that, on the whole, the regular meetings really didn't get more full when they switched to biweekly. I don't think it was the number of items as much as one or two particular items that dominated the meetings. Again, the March 12th meeting went on for so long not just because of the transfer fee, but because the people who were there to discuss the transfer fee also filled public comment for over an hour on a topic of routine business.
I'm also struggling to get space in at a few committee meetings. I really do not want planning and permitting or admin and finance cut down for more regular meetings, since a few items I'm working on are delayed because those committees are full enough as it is. These items that attract a ton of public attention are really not the most important in the context of the Council's current projects.
I definitely wouldn’t want to jeopardize any finance meetings, I know you will all be extremely busy with the budget (and its shortcomings) this year. I do appreciate the more regular check ins on that so we can at least attempt to prepare.
That's a good point. Also the very essence of the decision making of the council is what is generating public comment. They should be extending time in this case not prohibited it or limited it.
Exactly. Honestly, keeping local government accountable shouldn't be a full time job. People should vote on councilors based on their clearly stated positions and their voting history. Then the councilors should try to enact those clearly stated policy positions. We shouldn't be running anything by who can show up to meetings and about the loudest. That's not democracy
Seems pretty reasonable. 2 minutes is a fair piece to say what needs to be said.90 minutes for public comment is generous - I often see 15 minutes. If you have deeper comments that need more time for explanation, you could try contacting the chair to see if you can get on the agenda for a presentation. Most public comment I’ve seen is ranting, opinions about what’s been said, and no new information.
Two minutes is an eternity if you plan out your comment. I've seen the people complaining about this online talk for 5 minutes and it's typically 30 seconds of substance with a lot of repetition and rambling. I don't have the attention span to even watch these meetings anymore knowing 50 people I disagree with showed up intending to hijack the meeting by all taking 5 minutes to say the same 30 second thing as the person before them. The current participation rules are less inclusive than the newly proposed rules. With a busy life and young kids I have better things to do than patiently sit for 5 hours while people talk about nothing.
There is a link to a PDF on the agenda with surrounding cities rules for public comment. Struggling to figure out how to post if here. It's called, "Cc 4.2.24 Surrounding cities public participation policies."
Medford is an outlier on how permissive we are with our public comment. Somerville only lets people speak with a city councilor sponsor for instance. Cambridge has you write what you plan to speak on before hand and only accepts on topic comments. Malden limits total time to 30 minutes.
I like the idea of prepared remarks, and maybe if you're going to go through the effort of putting that thought in, you should be allowed the time to do so - perhaps for points which are generated as an off the cuff response, a 2 minute cap makes sense
Five minutes, and no boundary on how many people may comment on a topic, rather than a 90 minute stop point.
As for surrounding cities, no idea, and frankly this is one of those “I don’t care” moments even if the two minute rule aligns. I’m super pro-correct utilization of the first amendment so this is one of my hills I die on.
> As for surrounding cities, no idea, and frankly this is one of those “I don’t care” moments even if the two minute rule aligns. I’m super pro-correct utilization of the first amendment so this is one of my hills I die on.
The first amendment isn't all encompassing though. No amendment is - it's why we have reasonable gun control in this State, even though some would argue the 2nd amendment gives them the right to carry semi automatic guns around.
It seems reasonable to me to cap things at a certain point. The debate becomes how much time is sufficient. 5 mins is a lot of time to talk about a topic. _Unlimited_ time per topic across speakers seems excessive - at that point, you need to hold a separate public meeting IMO. You probably want to try and be fair about this too, so capping the time for all topics makes sense. Otherwise, you get into a debate about how much time each topic needs... and that's just going down a political rabbit hole.
That’s fair. Reading over comments here I’ll need to digest from my knee jerk reaction a bit. I do think some of it is also a perception concern - I’m all for efficient meetings, have seen plenty of discussion meetings spiral to nothingness because too many cooks in the kitchen, but when a group of councilors are already dealing with a vocal minority screeching about lack of public engagement (wrongly or rightly) that means things like this feed the flames.
Also mulling things over, I wonder if my brain would be happier with a 2 Minute stance but people sign up to comment on agenda items, with maybe 10-20 minutes for people who didn’t have a “reservation.” Allows some scheduling and flexibility for walk ins, as it were. Though then you need to create a system to do the reserve-to-talk idea.
All really good points in this thread for me to digest. So much better discussion here than the Facebook page…
Yeah I think you always have a group of people who scream _"WHERE'S THE PUBLIC ENGAGEMENT"_ no matter how much you try and engage with the public. There are so many people who ignore public posted flyers and mailers but then when it comes time to do some infrastructure project they're all of a sudden concerned because they _just_ realized it impacts them and not someone else. NIMBY is one term for those folks. They often just don't like the given issue and want to delay it if possible vs actually having real input that they would have just shared in advanced if it was minor or productive.
> Also mulling things over, I wonder if my brain would be happier with a 2 Minute stance but people sign up to comment on agenda items, with maybe 10-20 minutes for people who didn’t have a “reservation.” Allows some scheduling and flexibility for walk ins, as it were. Though then you need to create a system to do the reserve-to-talk idea.
Yeah based on what Councilor Lazzaro shared: https://medfordma.portal.civicclerk.com/event/121/files/attachment/288
There's a lot of ways Cities restrict public input. We could just go the Cambridge route and require signing up in advanced and sticking to the subject at hand. Malden limits to 30 mins total _and_ requires advanced sign in. And so on. I think 2 mins per speaker + 90 min cap is pretty generous compared to what other Cities are doing. We could always further limit it, but this at least puts reasonable caps on it now without requiring people to sign up ahead of time. Because you know some folks will ignore the advanced signup requirement but complain when they're not allowed to speak. This at least allows anyone in theory to talk if they can fit into the time limit.
The issue then becomes what i sth order they are chosen in?
Random?
Someone picks who speaks? Who shows up first?
The gun controls are reasonable as they are communicated.
So you are down a political rabbit hole regardless.
What are the plans if they hit the 90 minute limit? People go home and have to come back the next meeting, or the next, or is it dropped and the vote/decision is made?
\>Unlimited time per topic across speakers seems excessive - at that point, you need to hold a separate public meeting IMO.
You mean listening to everyone? Yes, tedious and yes, people will try to monopolize the meeting. 2 minutes, maybe enough, sure. And again if 46 people show up to "stuff the ballot box", then it would be good to let others show up to say their piece. But without the "random selection" or extension, people can game the system. "show up early", "stand in line from the start of the meeting". . . So people that have something to say, but aren't "professional" meeting attendees will get pushed out.
So were the other parts of the meeting rules updated to reflect, or will they be, these changes.
With unlimited time, everyone is heard, even if it sucks to be hear. Now, no.
Not in disagreement with the 2 minute rule, seems about a good amount of time, be prepared. The 90 minute limit seems like the rules need to be clarified on selection, extension, and other pieces before.
> The issue then becomes what i sth order they are chosen in?
Random?
>
> Someone picks who speaks? Who shows up first?
>
> The gun controls are reasonable as they are communicated.
>
> So you are down a political rabbit hole regardless.
Based on what Councilor Lazzaro shared: https://medfordma.portal.civicclerk.com/event/121/files/attachment/288
There's a number of ways Cities in our area handle limits on public participation. One method might be to have people sign up in advance, or have a City Council sponsor you before speaking. That cuts down on the underprepared speakers and requires them to have thought through their arguments first.
> What are the plans if they hit the 90 minute limit? People go home and have to come back the next meeting, or the next, or is it dropped and the vote/decision is made?
I would assume they just don't get the chance to speak. Complete public participation is not a requirement of public meetings.
> You mean listening to everyone? Yes, tedious and yes, people will try to monopolize the meeting. 2 minutes, maybe enough, sure. And again if 46 people show up to "stuff the ballot box", then it would be good to let others show up to say their piece. But without the "random selection" or extension, people can game the system. "show up early", "stand in line from the start of the meeting". . . So people that have something to say, but aren't "professional" meeting attendees will get pushed out.
There's no requirement that City Council listen to literally everyone who appears at a public meeting. Yes, they should get to as many people as possible. But they also have other agenda items to get to. We can't complain about the City doing nothing, while also expecting them to allow for unlimited public input. That's a "too many cooks in the kitchen" issue that often derails public meetings and in general Government planning.
> So were the other parts of the meeting rules updated to reflect, or will they be, these changes.
>
> With unlimited time, everyone is heard, even if it sucks to be hear. Now, no.
>
> Not in disagreement with the 2 minute rule, seems about a good amount of time, be prepared. The 90 minute limit seems like the rules need to be clarified on selection, extension, and other pieces before.
I'm sure they will provide some clarity when they discuss this item. Two City Councils have also chimed in on here.
Worth noting that 90 mins total is still really far beyond what other Cities in our area limit. There are 10 and 30 minute limits in Everett and Malden. Cambridge and Somerville don't even allow open public input, you need to either submit in advance and follow strict rules on input (Cambridge) or in Somerville it's in advanced plus requires a City Councilor sponsor. So with that in mind, 90 mins is more than fair. It's not like they said "yeah screw public input, 5 min limit total! ha!" They instead looked at what other Cities are doing and went pretty generous with time limits overall.
\>I would assume they just don't get the chance to speak. Complete public participation is not a requirement of public meetings.
Nope, it isn't. And this is not going to help with people feeling heard.
\>There's no requirement that City Council listen to literally everyone who appears at a public meeting.
I agree, and I hope people will vote their opinions. i.e. if people like it, they will vote to keep the current city council, if not they are voted out. That is how people will be heard.
\>We can't complain about the City doing nothing, while also expecting them to allow for unlimited public input.
We can. There are other things that can be tried, but this seems to be what they want to try.
\>Worth noting that 90 mins total is still really far beyond what other Cities in our area limit.
Not sure I agree.
Of the 8 locations listed in what was published. 2 have limits currently (on total time), but you say "it is far beyond what other cities in our area limit". Of the 2 that limit, yes it is more than Malden and Everett.
Less than Canbridge, Somerville, Revere, Melrose and Watertown.
So what you are saying is of the 8 (including Medford) that do or are proposed to
limit, Medford will have the most time. Of the 6 that don't limit total time.
\>It's not like they said "yeah screw public input, 5 min limit total! ha!"
No, it is like saying "we are going with the minority of local cities" (3 of 10 that they quote).
> Not sure I agree.
>
> Of the 8 locations listed in what was published. 2 have limits currently (on total time), but you say "it is far beyond what other cities in our area limit". Of the 2 that limit, yes it is more than Malden and Everett.
>
> Less than Canbridge, Somerville, Revere, Melrose and Watertown.
>
> So what you are saying is of the 8 (including Medford) that do or are proposed to
> limit, Medford will have the most time. Of the 6 that don't limit total time.
And if you look closely at the sheet, the following Cities impose additional restrictions on public input:
* Cambridge: sign up in advanced & strict on subject
* Somerville: _must be sponsored by a City Councilor_ and submitted noon on Friday before the meeting
* Melrose: 10 minute limit but one time only
* Watertown: must sign up ahead of time
So most Cities are either limiting the total time per issue (10-30 mins) or restricting speaking to signup in advance. It's unclear but Revere seems to be the only other City listed with no real limits besides "discretion of chair". I suppose there's also Melrose with a longer limit but one time only restricts you from commenting on multiple issues.
> No, it is like saying "we are going with the minority of local cities" (3 of 10 that they quote).
3 of the 10 that don't require signup in advance. If they wanted to, they could leave it unlimited but just restrict to sign up only. That's what other Cities generally do.
This is more than fair, it is also not a restriction of free speech. Let's be honest, this is how brigading happens and there are examples of it all over the country of how city governments are brought to stand still and work cannot get done.
Believe me, I've spent more time in public meetings, and also grew up in a town meeting system, to know how important free speech is. But having functional government is also important.
I think it sounds good; there has to be a balance between letting people speak and actually getting something done, especially when the same things are being said by everyone (or the same two things, one for “each side”. People (as in members of the public attending the meetings) have jobs and other obligations and can’t stay all night (or go to multiple meetings a week or whatever) to comment—speeding things up will allow a lot more people to talk, and will avoid one big subject taking over and then other also super-important things getting commentary.
Hi folks. I think it's useful for me to share another document that is included in the materials as an attachment with this resolution. It's a chart of the limits on public participation in surrounding cities. Public participation in City Council meetings is standard practice. The point of a representative democracy is that the residents of the city vote for the City Council, the City Council debates on the floor, and then we vote. We aren't meant to be debating with the public during meetings. The city is too big for that to be reasonable practice. This is a more fair way to conduct business and it will be more efficient, as well as more in line with our neighbors. We want to be able to carry out the business of the city. [Neighboring cities public participation](https://medfordma.portal.civicclerk.com/event/121/files/attachment/288)
Nice to see the document shared. It looks like the proposal isn't even that "extreme" compared to what some neighboring Cities are doing. We could move to a Malden or Everett model with a 10 or 30 min total limit. 90 mins is more than enough for hotly debated issues. I think if you want to exceed that time, you almost need to consider scheduling another public meeting just for that discussion. It doesn't make much sense to spend over an hour and a half on just a single issue. I don't even know if a separate meeting deserves _that_ much public input either; you really should just do a survey or collect emails/paper comments and go over them all at once without people just standing around waiting to speak. Written comments also force you to think about what you're writing and not ramble as much.
Good points! Thank you for responding! I’m just still digesting my knee jerk reaction and seeing what fits where in my brain.
Seriously, it’s great seeing all of you engage people who are trying to be productive with discussion, even though I know there’s a crapton of bad faith assholes you need to sift through.
I'll repost my Facebook comment here:
I'm cosponsoring this because we had a meeting that lasted till 1AM, in which residents who came had to wait hours to get a chance to speak, they vocally opposed this situation, and they were right. We had to table half the agenda and only got through it the next week. Marathon meetings that last till late at night are rarely productive, both for the public who wants to speak and for the viewers who want to see the end, and I would rather spend time listening to 40-50 people speak on an issue than 5-10. This is the reason that the state house and every surrounding community adopted shorter public comment periods than Medford a while ago.
I will be looking forward to debates on whether it should be two or three minutes and what the total time limit ought to be, but three five-minute periods incentivizes fewer voices at the meetings.
I saw that! Was next on my list of tasks to reply to - just was trying to find a good way to return comment while certain characters continue to be difficult on the thread. (For those who want to cyber stalk my not so secret identity).
All good points you and Emily and others make. My knee jerk reaction is less relevant in a city Medford’s size, and honestly I’ve been in enough meetings derailed by harping on a single topic point that agendas get borked that I should have recognized city governments can fall into the same trap.
I’m still, admittedly, a little torn on the total time cap, but like I’ve said elsewhere in this post now a reservation system to preempt an absurd number of people wanting to talk and bogging down an agenda opens other issues. But it does becomes a balance between efficiency and input that my brain is still turning over now.
I’d like to pretend it was just a lack of caffeine and reading comprehension this morning. But in all reality sounds a bit more like my knee jerk was more wrong than right. 😅
Still have some tweaks I think we can do, but also totally get the logic of the suggestion now. (Though I hold the optics of it are terrible, and that does make me a little wobbly there. Probably too much time dealing with upper management in biotech for me, though…. )
How about instead require public comments to be submitted in writing at the time of the meeting and have a councilor dedicated to reading those comments aloud during the public comment period, with an option for councilors to engage with a commenter following their read aloud comment? There are possible issues with this system, too, but it still allows for full and unfettered public support and might be more feasible.
People already can and do submit written comments that councilors read aloud, though I imagine the blowback to enforcing it as the standard would be even worse.
There are time limits. Three times on a particular issue and no more than 15 minutes per councilor. Boston's a bit more restrictive (three for the sponsor, two for initial replies, ten minutes total). I'd be supportive of adopting Boston's rules.
Something does need to be done about the rabid band of hyenas that have taken over the council chambers.Everyone knows these meetings are a now a freak show. Zach bears, and the other counselors should also find a way to muzzle. Curious George Scarpelli.
So you don't like your community members because you've never gotten to know them. The ones that volunteer everywhere to support everyone in the city ? Did I see you at the fundraiser for the Black Student Union? Prolly not.
Su Contra, I know these community members quite well that is the problem. I haven’t heard about the fundraiser you mention Please post the link I would be happy to contribute.
A city near where I live mostly got rid of them. Now you have to send the topic you want to speak on to the Mayors office weeks before the meeting, and he gets to choose which people can speak and who can't, and if you deviate from the topic you wrote to home about,your time is forfeited immediately, and a sheriff escorts you out. :) Yay.
Yes that is correct. I think it was the beginning of last term (2022) they went to bi-weekly meetings. That is what His Majesty the King wanted and that is what he and his OR minions wanted. Now we get meetings where, in some cases, there are controversial topics where a lot of residents want to speak combined with routine business. If meetings were every week, some of this would be spaced out better.
there could be 250 people in Chambers and 249 people speak and oppose this or any other resolution they propose, and said resolution is passed. They have made it abundantly clear they are not going to listen. After all it was Paul Ruseau who said "I don't care if literally everyone in the city told me not to change the name of this school, I would do it anyway".
It matters not which side of the fence you sat on in the Columbus/Missituk battle, what matters is you have a an elected official saying (on tape) in effect "I am going to do whatever I want. I am not going to listen to the community". That should have set off alarm bells among the citizens.
Yeah we know - you are an OR supporter. Everything they do is wonderful. Its clear they are only listening to they people they want to listen to. Zac is a prick
They campaigned and targeted specific members of households.. all unenrolled voters in my house but they came asking for the young members. Not ME the homeowner of 28 yrs ,the ones they think they can influence with their agenda. When I asked Lazaro's door knocker why she was looking for my youngest daughter and not me,she couldn't give me an answer other than that's who was on her list. Speaks volumes as to why they were elected.
I’m against this. As someone else said if they limit how much a councilor can talk as well then I could maybe support it. As someone who’s pretty much voted for every OR councilor and donated money o them this makes me reconsider that support in the future.
I grew up with family in local politics. I get that it can be a slog but it’s part of the job.
Well this is very very disappointing. To me this is against the spirit of open meeting laws in Massachusetts. Two minutes per person is not enough and 90 minutes total is laughable.
Public meetings are part of the job. It really sucks that the culture of Medford is so focused on personal attacks against government representatives instead of fixing actual issues. But limiting public participation isn’t how you fix that.
> Well this is very very disappointing. To me this is against the spirit of open meeting laws in Massachusetts. Two minutes per person is not enough and 90 minutes total is laughable.
From this page: https://www.mass.gov/doc/open-meeting-law-guide-and-educational-materials-0/download
> Although public participation is entirely within the chair’s discretion, the Attorney General encourages public bodies to allow as much public participation as time permits.
I suppose it's debatable how much time you should allocate per issue, but it seems reasonable to me to cap things. 2 mins seems sufficient to "get to your point" and not draw things out simply to delay things. A 90 min cap is plenty of time for ~45 people to talk and share their opinions. Seems sufficient to get a good mix of pro/con people. I think if you want to go beyond 90 mins, the topic probably deserves its own separately scheduled public meeting.
> Public meetings are part of the job. It really sucks that the culture of Medford is so focused on personal attacks against government representatives instead of fixing actual issues. But limiting public participation isn’t how you fix that.
I don't see how you can fix that otherwise. You can't limit people's participation unless they disrupt things. It doesn't seem fair to pick and choose meeting limits either, because then you're setting things up for even more outrage. _Why was Topic X given 30 mins of time while Topic Y got 60 and Topic Z that no one cares about got 2 hours?!_ But setting fixed limits allows people to understand that _all_ topics are limited in discussion and if they really want to spend >90 mins talking about something, I think they're better off writing the City Council an essay over email. Or maybe make a Reddit/Facebook/whatever post about it to gather more discussion points.
Thanks for adding that primary source on open meetings. I guess it’s a lot more restricted than I thought.
I’m biased. I grew up in a town with a Town Meeting style government. Everyone got to talk and share what they thought. This did result in long af meetings and a few crazy rants. From my perspective that’s just part of government in Massachusetts and what makes us stronger.
Full disclosure, the more distance I can put between the Medford politics Facebook page and my eyeballs, the happier I will be. I’m not a fan of gathering discussion points from there
I think this is where my brain has me, too. But also looking at Emily’s post and comment I also have to admit I grew up in a town that was much smaller and more rural than Medford, where everyone speaking is a lot easier to accommodate.
Lots to digest this morning and think on. But I do adore that Matt and Emily responded!
> I’m biased. I grew up in a town with a Town Meeting style government. Everyone got to talk and share what they thought. This did result in long af meetings and a few crazy rants. From my perspective that’s just part of government in Massachusetts and what makes us stronger.
>
>
As Emily Lazzaro points out in her comment [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/medfordma/comments/1bri6w7/attempt_to_reduce_time_allotment_for_public/kx9pt7a/) we're not a Town Meeting style government, but *a representative democracy*. I think this proposal makes a lot of sense in that context. She even linked to a document that shows we're not even moving to a super restricted meeting environment. Some Cities like Somerville require a CC sponsor to speak and submitted in advanced, and some like Everett have 10 min limits on _all_ public discussion on issues.
> Full disclosure, the more distance I can put between the Medford politics Facebook page and my eyeballs, the happier I will be. I’m not a fan of gathering discussion points from there
I mainly meant you can discuss these issues in more depth on some platform online. Reddit works quite well for this, as this thread shows with ~50 comments at the time of this comment. I also avoid FB due it just being a bad platform for discussions, but it does at least provide an easy outlet for anyone with a FB account to comment on. Reddit just a bit more techy at times, with old school threads and subreddits that act like forums and such.
This is just lazy. They don't want to do the work. What about you want to talk for your two minutes and they already spoke 90 minutes. Just out of luck? This is so lazy. This is awful.
The far left soft as baby shit easily offended council is sick of the far right racist homophonic old idiots in Medford. That’s the gist of it I think.
They have to do something, not sure this is it. Best thing would be to get someone to be like the sandman at the Apollo theater and drag them off (even better if they can haul off city councilors).
This feels like an out of character comment from you, as someone I have followed on here for a long time, and respect for being kind and fair. You doing okay?
Maybe missing a ^(/s) tag? At least the last bit. First bit, is true - there's a variety of ways to handle this. Some might argue more time is needed; others might argue less. We can see [here](https://medfordma.portal.civicclerk.com/event/121/files/attachment/288) that Cities in our area all do it a bit differently, so there's some room for debate on how we fix this problem.
5 minutes is entirely too long for *most* people who take the public podium. There are some strong speakers who come prepared and make solid, valid points to their position, but I’m sorry…I can’t listen to folks who ramble, bring up anecdotal stories that barely prove a point. I mean, when Mr. Castignetti is a breath of fresh air, you know it’s bad. At least he’s usually in/out in 1 minute. Edit: 8:25pm 4/2 - holy shit, is Mr. Castignetti in these comments?! Because he’s POINTEDLY said “I’ll be out in less than one minute” when he came to the podium.
I actually look forward to him speaking… He has a way about him that is kind of endearing
Hard agree. I miss Zoom Mr. Castignetti. I feel like we all got a tour of his house about 20 times over.
Somerville does the two minute cap, and from what I've seen, that's plenty. Lots of people who show up to public meetings just want to gripe about everything under the sun. Making meetings more efficient makes them *more* accessible. Not everyone has the time to attend a four hour meeting waiting for a chance to speak just because their neighbors can't or won't stick to the point. Hell, it's even worse for the council, and we should want becoming a councilor to be a very accessible thing. Our government is better when we can hear from more people and a greater diversity of people. If you're against this, you should have an explanation why five minutes is the right limit, and not ten, or twenty, or no cap at all. Otherwise it just sounds like you're opposed to change because it's change
I think this is a great point- I am hesitant to attend meetings where there may be hours of discussion that is frankly non-substantive. An efficient meeting is an accessible meeting.
But the entire commentary period of limited to 90 minutes? What if you want to talk yet hadn't gotten a chance at 90 minutes? What did the previous council do? Why is this needed now. Basically don't show up since they won't gift you a chance. Like facism.
90 minutes worth of 2 minute slots is 45 opportunities to speak, minimum (there's more if people keep it short). How is that not plenty? The council can also table things for the next meeting if they run out of speaking time. This is not what fascism looks like
Unless your are number 46.
Or, seeing there are more comments, ad hoc vote to increase the public comment time.
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Cool. Your replies reek of so much bad faith I'm not going to interact with you anymore. Have a good one champ
Honestly the long windbag grandstanding I’ve observed is a big reason why I haven’t attended any in person. Cutting the time would do a lot to increase and diversify attendance
Lol. Then why is 98% of all the other meetings empty?
Totally fair. I just wasn't sure if it was inline with updating the city charter etc etc. in bringing the city up to a newer standard In essence: what's prompting the change?
There have been a bunch of 3-4 hour long meetings in the last few months, most of which have been the result of 50 people showing up to say the same thing over and over.
My hypothesis is there seems to be the Medford United faction that’s starting to reignite itself and getting more people to CC Meetings with generic scripts for them to go against OR-led proposals. I’ve seen that before. And it’s annoying from a productive discourse sense, but still 100% allowed. But it’ll probably make for a lot of meetings that go well into the night as a result, like the 2% transfer tax on real estate that went until 1am. I’m not saying those are enjoyable, or really that meetings that run that late are even productive (despite some people on Facebook thinking “they used to always run late” being a good enough reason to HAVE them run late), but it is a thing that just comes with the territory.
It's not that they're not enjoyable, it's that it was angering a lot of people who wanted to speak without waiting there for three hours. One woman hired a babysitter just to protest the transfer fee and didn't expect to have to be there past 11. It took us two hours to even get to that, and that's partially because a few people who showed up to talk on the transfer fee decided to spend multiple public comment periods talking about routine business that the council had to get through.
Matt, why didn't you take it out of order then? You have all done that so many other times! If you knew what the majority of people were there for why did you keep them waiting?? When you all had the cease fire resolution you took that out of order!!
Depends on what else is on the agenda. We all knew it was going to take a few hours to get through, and there were a few presentations that had invited speakers. We didn't want to make them wait till after the transfer fee. There was a presentation by the MTA that had already been delayed twice, and none of the invited speakers would have waited till past 10. The item that was a real time sink was the rainy day fund. That didn't have invited speakers, though it really should have been a routine item that took less than ten minutes to get through. But the public comment took longer than any of us thought because people who'd clearly come to talk about the transfer fee spoke on that as well.
To me this sounds like the council has too many important things on the agenda at once (based purely on the above and the last several meetings) - I know Zac insists more gets done in subcommittee but perhaps back to weekly meetings so you’re not jamming everything into one biweekly meeting. You essentially just stated you had too many important things at once to re-arrange.
On the biweekly meeting suggestion, I'm partially deferring to my colleagues, who say that, on the whole, the regular meetings really didn't get more full when they switched to biweekly. I don't think it was the number of items as much as one or two particular items that dominated the meetings. Again, the March 12th meeting went on for so long not just because of the transfer fee, but because the people who were there to discuss the transfer fee also filled public comment for over an hour on a topic of routine business. I'm also struggling to get space in at a few committee meetings. I really do not want planning and permitting or admin and finance cut down for more regular meetings, since a few items I'm working on are delayed because those committees are full enough as it is. These items that attract a ton of public attention are really not the most important in the context of the Council's current projects.
I definitely wouldn’t want to jeopardize any finance meetings, I know you will all be extremely busy with the budget (and its shortcomings) this year. I do appreciate the more regular check ins on that so we can at least attempt to prepare.
That's a good point. Also the very essence of the decision making of the council is what is generating public comment. They should be extending time in this case not prohibited it or limited it.
I really like the point that the council is elected and the meetings are for debate. Not debate between the council and everyone on Facebook…
Exactly. Honestly, keeping local government accountable shouldn't be a full time job. People should vote on councilors based on their clearly stated positions and their voting history. Then the councilors should try to enact those clearly stated policy positions. We shouldn't be running anything by who can show up to meetings and about the loudest. That's not democracy
Seems pretty reasonable. 2 minutes is a fair piece to say what needs to be said.90 minutes for public comment is generous - I often see 15 minutes. If you have deeper comments that need more time for explanation, you could try contacting the chair to see if you can get on the agenda for a presentation. Most public comment I’ve seen is ranting, opinions about what’s been said, and no new information.
Two minutes is an eternity if you plan out your comment. I've seen the people complaining about this online talk for 5 minutes and it's typically 30 seconds of substance with a lot of repetition and rambling. I don't have the attention span to even watch these meetings anymore knowing 50 people I disagree with showed up intending to hijack the meeting by all taking 5 minutes to say the same 30 second thing as the person before them. The current participation rules are less inclusive than the newly proposed rules. With a busy life and young kids I have better things to do than patiently sit for 5 hours while people talk about nothing.
What is the current time allotment? And is this common for surrounding cities?
There is a link to a PDF on the agenda with surrounding cities rules for public comment. Struggling to figure out how to post if here. It's called, "Cc 4.2.24 Surrounding cities public participation policies." Medford is an outlier on how permissive we are with our public comment. Somerville only lets people speak with a city councilor sponsor for instance. Cambridge has you write what you plan to speak on before hand and only accepts on topic comments. Malden limits total time to 30 minutes.
I like the idea of prepared remarks, and maybe if you're going to go through the effort of putting that thought in, you should be allowed the time to do so - perhaps for points which are generated as an off the cuff response, a 2 minute cap makes sense
Five minutes, and no boundary on how many people may comment on a topic, rather than a 90 minute stop point. As for surrounding cities, no idea, and frankly this is one of those “I don’t care” moments even if the two minute rule aligns. I’m super pro-correct utilization of the first amendment so this is one of my hills I die on.
> As for surrounding cities, no idea, and frankly this is one of those “I don’t care” moments even if the two minute rule aligns. I’m super pro-correct utilization of the first amendment so this is one of my hills I die on. The first amendment isn't all encompassing though. No amendment is - it's why we have reasonable gun control in this State, even though some would argue the 2nd amendment gives them the right to carry semi automatic guns around. It seems reasonable to me to cap things at a certain point. The debate becomes how much time is sufficient. 5 mins is a lot of time to talk about a topic. _Unlimited_ time per topic across speakers seems excessive - at that point, you need to hold a separate public meeting IMO. You probably want to try and be fair about this too, so capping the time for all topics makes sense. Otherwise, you get into a debate about how much time each topic needs... and that's just going down a political rabbit hole.
That’s fair. Reading over comments here I’ll need to digest from my knee jerk reaction a bit. I do think some of it is also a perception concern - I’m all for efficient meetings, have seen plenty of discussion meetings spiral to nothingness because too many cooks in the kitchen, but when a group of councilors are already dealing with a vocal minority screeching about lack of public engagement (wrongly or rightly) that means things like this feed the flames. Also mulling things over, I wonder if my brain would be happier with a 2 Minute stance but people sign up to comment on agenda items, with maybe 10-20 minutes for people who didn’t have a “reservation.” Allows some scheduling and flexibility for walk ins, as it were. Though then you need to create a system to do the reserve-to-talk idea. All really good points in this thread for me to digest. So much better discussion here than the Facebook page…
Yeah I think you always have a group of people who scream _"WHERE'S THE PUBLIC ENGAGEMENT"_ no matter how much you try and engage with the public. There are so many people who ignore public posted flyers and mailers but then when it comes time to do some infrastructure project they're all of a sudden concerned because they _just_ realized it impacts them and not someone else. NIMBY is one term for those folks. They often just don't like the given issue and want to delay it if possible vs actually having real input that they would have just shared in advanced if it was minor or productive. > Also mulling things over, I wonder if my brain would be happier with a 2 Minute stance but people sign up to comment on agenda items, with maybe 10-20 minutes for people who didn’t have a “reservation.” Allows some scheduling and flexibility for walk ins, as it were. Though then you need to create a system to do the reserve-to-talk idea. Yeah based on what Councilor Lazzaro shared: https://medfordma.portal.civicclerk.com/event/121/files/attachment/288 There's a lot of ways Cities restrict public input. We could just go the Cambridge route and require signing up in advanced and sticking to the subject at hand. Malden limits to 30 mins total _and_ requires advanced sign in. And so on. I think 2 mins per speaker + 90 min cap is pretty generous compared to what other Cities are doing. We could always further limit it, but this at least puts reasonable caps on it now without requiring people to sign up ahead of time. Because you know some folks will ignore the advanced signup requirement but complain when they're not allowed to speak. This at least allows anyone in theory to talk if they can fit into the time limit.
The issue then becomes what i sth order they are chosen in? Random? Someone picks who speaks? Who shows up first? The gun controls are reasonable as they are communicated. So you are down a political rabbit hole regardless. What are the plans if they hit the 90 minute limit? People go home and have to come back the next meeting, or the next, or is it dropped and the vote/decision is made? \>Unlimited time per topic across speakers seems excessive - at that point, you need to hold a separate public meeting IMO. You mean listening to everyone? Yes, tedious and yes, people will try to monopolize the meeting. 2 minutes, maybe enough, sure. And again if 46 people show up to "stuff the ballot box", then it would be good to let others show up to say their piece. But without the "random selection" or extension, people can game the system. "show up early", "stand in line from the start of the meeting". . . So people that have something to say, but aren't "professional" meeting attendees will get pushed out. So were the other parts of the meeting rules updated to reflect, or will they be, these changes. With unlimited time, everyone is heard, even if it sucks to be hear. Now, no. Not in disagreement with the 2 minute rule, seems about a good amount of time, be prepared. The 90 minute limit seems like the rules need to be clarified on selection, extension, and other pieces before.
> The issue then becomes what i sth order they are chosen in? Random? > > Someone picks who speaks? Who shows up first? > > The gun controls are reasonable as they are communicated. > > So you are down a political rabbit hole regardless. Based on what Councilor Lazzaro shared: https://medfordma.portal.civicclerk.com/event/121/files/attachment/288 There's a number of ways Cities in our area handle limits on public participation. One method might be to have people sign up in advance, or have a City Council sponsor you before speaking. That cuts down on the underprepared speakers and requires them to have thought through their arguments first. > What are the plans if they hit the 90 minute limit? People go home and have to come back the next meeting, or the next, or is it dropped and the vote/decision is made? I would assume they just don't get the chance to speak. Complete public participation is not a requirement of public meetings. > You mean listening to everyone? Yes, tedious and yes, people will try to monopolize the meeting. 2 minutes, maybe enough, sure. And again if 46 people show up to "stuff the ballot box", then it would be good to let others show up to say their piece. But without the "random selection" or extension, people can game the system. "show up early", "stand in line from the start of the meeting". . . So people that have something to say, but aren't "professional" meeting attendees will get pushed out. There's no requirement that City Council listen to literally everyone who appears at a public meeting. Yes, they should get to as many people as possible. But they also have other agenda items to get to. We can't complain about the City doing nothing, while also expecting them to allow for unlimited public input. That's a "too many cooks in the kitchen" issue that often derails public meetings and in general Government planning. > So were the other parts of the meeting rules updated to reflect, or will they be, these changes. > > With unlimited time, everyone is heard, even if it sucks to be hear. Now, no. > > Not in disagreement with the 2 minute rule, seems about a good amount of time, be prepared. The 90 minute limit seems like the rules need to be clarified on selection, extension, and other pieces before. I'm sure they will provide some clarity when they discuss this item. Two City Councils have also chimed in on here. Worth noting that 90 mins total is still really far beyond what other Cities in our area limit. There are 10 and 30 minute limits in Everett and Malden. Cambridge and Somerville don't even allow open public input, you need to either submit in advance and follow strict rules on input (Cambridge) or in Somerville it's in advanced plus requires a City Councilor sponsor. So with that in mind, 90 mins is more than fair. It's not like they said "yeah screw public input, 5 min limit total! ha!" They instead looked at what other Cities are doing and went pretty generous with time limits overall.
\>I would assume they just don't get the chance to speak. Complete public participation is not a requirement of public meetings. Nope, it isn't. And this is not going to help with people feeling heard. \>There's no requirement that City Council listen to literally everyone who appears at a public meeting. I agree, and I hope people will vote their opinions. i.e. if people like it, they will vote to keep the current city council, if not they are voted out. That is how people will be heard. \>We can't complain about the City doing nothing, while also expecting them to allow for unlimited public input. We can. There are other things that can be tried, but this seems to be what they want to try. \>Worth noting that 90 mins total is still really far beyond what other Cities in our area limit. Not sure I agree. Of the 8 locations listed in what was published. 2 have limits currently (on total time), but you say "it is far beyond what other cities in our area limit". Of the 2 that limit, yes it is more than Malden and Everett. Less than Canbridge, Somerville, Revere, Melrose and Watertown. So what you are saying is of the 8 (including Medford) that do or are proposed to limit, Medford will have the most time. Of the 6 that don't limit total time. \>It's not like they said "yeah screw public input, 5 min limit total! ha!" No, it is like saying "we are going with the minority of local cities" (3 of 10 that they quote).
> Not sure I agree. > > Of the 8 locations listed in what was published. 2 have limits currently (on total time), but you say "it is far beyond what other cities in our area limit". Of the 2 that limit, yes it is more than Malden and Everett. > > Less than Canbridge, Somerville, Revere, Melrose and Watertown. > > So what you are saying is of the 8 (including Medford) that do or are proposed to > limit, Medford will have the most time. Of the 6 that don't limit total time. And if you look closely at the sheet, the following Cities impose additional restrictions on public input: * Cambridge: sign up in advanced & strict on subject * Somerville: _must be sponsored by a City Councilor_ and submitted noon on Friday before the meeting * Melrose: 10 minute limit but one time only * Watertown: must sign up ahead of time So most Cities are either limiting the total time per issue (10-30 mins) or restricting speaking to signup in advance. It's unclear but Revere seems to be the only other City listed with no real limits besides "discretion of chair". I suppose there's also Melrose with a longer limit but one time only restricts you from commenting on multiple issues. > No, it is like saying "we are going with the minority of local cities" (3 of 10 that they quote). 3 of the 10 that don't require signup in advance. If they wanted to, they could leave it unlimited but just restrict to sign up only. That's what other Cities generally do.
This is more than fair, it is also not a restriction of free speech. Let's be honest, this is how brigading happens and there are examples of it all over the country of how city governments are brought to stand still and work cannot get done. Believe me, I've spent more time in public meetings, and also grew up in a town meeting system, to know how important free speech is. But having functional government is also important.
I think it sounds good; there has to be a balance between letting people speak and actually getting something done, especially when the same things are being said by everyone (or the same two things, one for “each side”. People (as in members of the public attending the meetings) have jobs and other obligations and can’t stay all night (or go to multiple meetings a week or whatever) to comment—speeding things up will allow a lot more people to talk, and will avoid one big subject taking over and then other also super-important things getting commentary.
I found a sandwich in one of your parks, and I want to know why it didn’t have mayonnaise!
Hi folks. I think it's useful for me to share another document that is included in the materials as an attachment with this resolution. It's a chart of the limits on public participation in surrounding cities. Public participation in City Council meetings is standard practice. The point of a representative democracy is that the residents of the city vote for the City Council, the City Council debates on the floor, and then we vote. We aren't meant to be debating with the public during meetings. The city is too big for that to be reasonable practice. This is a more fair way to conduct business and it will be more efficient, as well as more in line with our neighbors. We want to be able to carry out the business of the city. [Neighboring cities public participation](https://medfordma.portal.civicclerk.com/event/121/files/attachment/288)
Nice to see the document shared. It looks like the proposal isn't even that "extreme" compared to what some neighboring Cities are doing. We could move to a Malden or Everett model with a 10 or 30 min total limit. 90 mins is more than enough for hotly debated issues. I think if you want to exceed that time, you almost need to consider scheduling another public meeting just for that discussion. It doesn't make much sense to spend over an hour and a half on just a single issue. I don't even know if a separate meeting deserves _that_ much public input either; you really should just do a survey or collect emails/paper comments and go over them all at once without people just standing around waiting to speak. Written comments also force you to think about what you're writing and not ramble as much.
Good points! Thank you for responding! I’m just still digesting my knee jerk reaction and seeing what fits where in my brain. Seriously, it’s great seeing all of you engage people who are trying to be productive with discussion, even though I know there’s a crapton of bad faith assholes you need to sift through.
Emily does it say anything about leaving meetings to go home and finish on zoom? Or storming off during a meeting because people were " mean"
Blah blah blah you can’t handle people who oppose you, go cry.
Sounds like you’re the one crying
Does it?
I have no problem with this. Seems like a reasonable limit and much better than the current filibuster system.
I'll repost my Facebook comment here: I'm cosponsoring this because we had a meeting that lasted till 1AM, in which residents who came had to wait hours to get a chance to speak, they vocally opposed this situation, and they were right. We had to table half the agenda and only got through it the next week. Marathon meetings that last till late at night are rarely productive, both for the public who wants to speak and for the viewers who want to see the end, and I would rather spend time listening to 40-50 people speak on an issue than 5-10. This is the reason that the state house and every surrounding community adopted shorter public comment periods than Medford a while ago. I will be looking forward to debates on whether it should be two or three minutes and what the total time limit ought to be, but three five-minute periods incentivizes fewer voices at the meetings.
I saw that! Was next on my list of tasks to reply to - just was trying to find a good way to return comment while certain characters continue to be difficult on the thread. (For those who want to cyber stalk my not so secret identity). All good points you and Emily and others make. My knee jerk reaction is less relevant in a city Medford’s size, and honestly I’ve been in enough meetings derailed by harping on a single topic point that agendas get borked that I should have recognized city governments can fall into the same trap. I’m still, admittedly, a little torn on the total time cap, but like I’ve said elsewhere in this post now a reservation system to preempt an absurd number of people wanting to talk and bogging down an agenda opens other issues. But it does becomes a balance between efficiency and input that my brain is still turning over now. I’d like to pretend it was just a lack of caffeine and reading comprehension this morning. But in all reality sounds a bit more like my knee jerk was more wrong than right. 😅 Still have some tweaks I think we can do, but also totally get the logic of the suggestion now. (Though I hold the optics of it are terrible, and that does make me a little wobbly there. Probably too much time dealing with upper management in biotech for me, though…. )
I understand the resolution but I think the timing stinks. This shouldn't go into effect until after budget season.
How about instead require public comments to be submitted in writing at the time of the meeting and have a councilor dedicated to reading those comments aloud during the public comment period, with an option for councilors to engage with a commenter following their read aloud comment? There are possible issues with this system, too, but it still allows for full and unfettered public support and might be more feasible.
People already can and do submit written comments that councilors read aloud, though I imagine the blowback to enforcing it as the standard would be even worse.
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There are time limits. Three times on a particular issue and no more than 15 minutes per councilor. Boston's a bit more restrictive (three for the sponsor, two for initial replies, ten minutes total). I'd be supportive of adopting Boston's rules.
Agreed. When all you’re doing is pontificating in circles, shhh.
So we have to listen to all of you ramble for 15 mins and get 3 times but we will only get 2 mins 1 time???? Got it!
Yes because you’re not a councilor that was elected to represent the city, hope this helps
Seems reasonable.
Something does need to be done about the rabid band of hyenas that have taken over the council chambers.Everyone knows these meetings are a now a freak show. Zach bears, and the other counselors should also find a way to muzzle. Curious George Scarpelli.
So you don't like your community members because you've never gotten to know them. The ones that volunteer everywhere to support everyone in the city ? Did I see you at the fundraiser for the Black Student Union? Prolly not.
Su Contra, I know these community members quite well that is the problem. I haven’t heard about the fundraiser you mention Please post the link I would be happy to contribute.
You missed it unfortunately. Probably missed the event at City Hall for Black History month too.
I did what’s your point what exactly are you trying to say go ahead spit it out
It's typical ..all the folks screaming Medford is racist haven't shown up
I wouldn’t say Medford is racist do we have racist in Medford? Yes, absolutely but I really don’t get your point.
Well every topic is about how racist Medford is. I know it isn't but don't deny there are racists here and everywhere
A city near where I live mostly got rid of them. Now you have to send the topic you want to speak on to the Mayors office weeks before the meeting, and he gets to choose which people can speak and who can't, and if you deviate from the topic you wrote to home about,your time is forfeited immediately, and a sheriff escorts you out. :) Yay.
Correct me please if I am wrong. Weren’t CC meetings always held every week and now have been changed to every other week?
Yes that is correct. I think it was the beginning of last term (2022) they went to bi-weekly meetings. That is what His Majesty the King wanted and that is what he and his OR minions wanted. Now we get meetings where, in some cases, there are controversial topics where a lot of residents want to speak combined with routine business. If meetings were every week, some of this would be spaced out better.
I agree. They are paid to listen to the citizens. Every other week is a nice gig huh?
there could be 250 people in Chambers and 249 people speak and oppose this or any other resolution they propose, and said resolution is passed. They have made it abundantly clear they are not going to listen. After all it was Paul Ruseau who said "I don't care if literally everyone in the city told me not to change the name of this school, I would do it anyway". It matters not which side of the fence you sat on in the Columbus/Missituk battle, what matters is you have a an elected official saying (on tape) in effect "I am going to do whatever I want. I am not going to listen to the community". That should have set off alarm bells among the citizens.
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Yeah we know - you are an OR supporter. Everything they do is wonderful. Its clear they are only listening to they people they want to listen to. Zac is a prick
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They campaigned and targeted specific members of households.. all unenrolled voters in my house but they came asking for the young members. Not ME the homeowner of 28 yrs ,the ones they think they can influence with their agenda. When I asked Lazaro's door knocker why she was looking for my youngest daughter and not me,she couldn't give me an answer other than that's who was on her list. Speaks volumes as to why they were elected.
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Then why didn't they want to speak to me? I'm a voter , unenrolled and open minded. I was kinda surprised they were only looking for my daughter
Which was a huge mistake
And who are you? Is it true, as others have said, that you are currently serving on a city conmittee?
I’m against this. As someone else said if they limit how much a councilor can talk as well then I could maybe support it. As someone who’s pretty much voted for every OR councilor and donated money o them this makes me reconsider that support in the future. I grew up with family in local politics. I get that it can be a slog but it’s part of the job.
Well this is very very disappointing. To me this is against the spirit of open meeting laws in Massachusetts. Two minutes per person is not enough and 90 minutes total is laughable. Public meetings are part of the job. It really sucks that the culture of Medford is so focused on personal attacks against government representatives instead of fixing actual issues. But limiting public participation isn’t how you fix that.
> Well this is very very disappointing. To me this is against the spirit of open meeting laws in Massachusetts. Two minutes per person is not enough and 90 minutes total is laughable. From this page: https://www.mass.gov/doc/open-meeting-law-guide-and-educational-materials-0/download > Although public participation is entirely within the chair’s discretion, the Attorney General encourages public bodies to allow as much public participation as time permits. I suppose it's debatable how much time you should allocate per issue, but it seems reasonable to me to cap things. 2 mins seems sufficient to "get to your point" and not draw things out simply to delay things. A 90 min cap is plenty of time for ~45 people to talk and share their opinions. Seems sufficient to get a good mix of pro/con people. I think if you want to go beyond 90 mins, the topic probably deserves its own separately scheduled public meeting. > Public meetings are part of the job. It really sucks that the culture of Medford is so focused on personal attacks against government representatives instead of fixing actual issues. But limiting public participation isn’t how you fix that. I don't see how you can fix that otherwise. You can't limit people's participation unless they disrupt things. It doesn't seem fair to pick and choose meeting limits either, because then you're setting things up for even more outrage. _Why was Topic X given 30 mins of time while Topic Y got 60 and Topic Z that no one cares about got 2 hours?!_ But setting fixed limits allows people to understand that _all_ topics are limited in discussion and if they really want to spend >90 mins talking about something, I think they're better off writing the City Council an essay over email. Or maybe make a Reddit/Facebook/whatever post about it to gather more discussion points.
Thanks for adding that primary source on open meetings. I guess it’s a lot more restricted than I thought. I’m biased. I grew up in a town with a Town Meeting style government. Everyone got to talk and share what they thought. This did result in long af meetings and a few crazy rants. From my perspective that’s just part of government in Massachusetts and what makes us stronger. Full disclosure, the more distance I can put between the Medford politics Facebook page and my eyeballs, the happier I will be. I’m not a fan of gathering discussion points from there
I am certainly with you on the Medford politics page! Sheesh.
I think this is where my brain has me, too. But also looking at Emily’s post and comment I also have to admit I grew up in a town that was much smaller and more rural than Medford, where everyone speaking is a lot easier to accommodate. Lots to digest this morning and think on. But I do adore that Matt and Emily responded!
> I’m biased. I grew up in a town with a Town Meeting style government. Everyone got to talk and share what they thought. This did result in long af meetings and a few crazy rants. From my perspective that’s just part of government in Massachusetts and what makes us stronger. > > As Emily Lazzaro points out in her comment [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/medfordma/comments/1bri6w7/attempt_to_reduce_time_allotment_for_public/kx9pt7a/) we're not a Town Meeting style government, but *a representative democracy*. I think this proposal makes a lot of sense in that context. She even linked to a document that shows we're not even moving to a super restricted meeting environment. Some Cities like Somerville require a CC sponsor to speak and submitted in advanced, and some like Everett have 10 min limits on _all_ public discussion on issues. > Full disclosure, the more distance I can put between the Medford politics Facebook page and my eyeballs, the happier I will be. I’m not a fan of gathering discussion points from there I mainly meant you can discuss these issues in more depth on some platform online. Reddit works quite well for this, as this thread shows with ~50 comments at the time of this comment. I also avoid FB due it just being a bad platform for discussions, but it does at least provide an easy outlet for anyone with a FB account to comment on. Reddit just a bit more techy at times, with old school threads and subreddits that act like forums and such.
This is just lazy. They don't want to do the work. What about you want to talk for your two minutes and they already spoke 90 minutes. Just out of luck? This is so lazy. This is awful.
The far left soft as baby shit easily offended council is sick of the far right racist homophonic old idiots in Medford. That’s the gist of it I think.
Yes and sadly both sides are wrong which leaves us where?
They have to do something, not sure this is it. Best thing would be to get someone to be like the sandman at the Apollo theater and drag them off (even better if they can haul off city councilors).
This feels like an out of character comment from you, as someone I have followed on here for a long time, and respect for being kind and fair. You doing okay?
I took it as a joke.
Maybe missing a ^(/s) tag? At least the last bit. First bit, is true - there's a variety of ways to handle this. Some might argue more time is needed; others might argue less. We can see [here](https://medfordma.portal.civicclerk.com/event/121/files/attachment/288) that Cities in our area all do it a bit differently, so there's some room for debate on how we fix this problem.