Restricting public comment
Bless the citizens who take the trouble to attend meetings of their government bodies, sign up as speakers and address elected officials on matters that affect their neighborhoods, their children, their quality of life. What kinds of foolish and destructive policies would be approved if these patient, attentive souls didn’t show up and give their say?
Elected officials generally won’t admit it, but when they’re sitting at the front of chambers, they don’t want to hear much from the unwashed masses. They’d much rather hear themselves talk, then get on with the business of sausage-making and bureaucracy-building.
But Thursday’s meeting of the Clark County School Board brought a rare moment of brazen honesty from trustees. They voted 6-1 to restrict public comment during board meetings by limiting speakers to three minutes of monologue, down from five minutes.
The board already had some limits on speechifying, and trustees occasionally allow public speakers to go long if they’re staying on topic and making sense. But rather than encourage public discussion during meetings, the School Board is perilously close to establishing a default setting of “sit down and shut up.”
“What we’re trying to do is have people be succinct and precise in their comments,” Trustee Carolyn Edwards told the Review-Journal last month. “This isn’t an opportunity to just get up and ramble.”
What Ms. Edwards might consider rambling could be poetry to others. Taxpayers have a right to be heard by their government, even if they aren’t members of Toastmasters International.
The board’s vote also approved a provision that large groups of citizens who attend a meeting to address a single issue appoint one or two representatives to speak on their behalf. So if 100 people show up to protest a change in attendance zone boundaries, but only one person attends to speak in favor of it, each perspective would get the same amount of time to address the board.
By limiting the expression of individual citizens, the School Board is sending a mixed message. They’re all for public and parental involvement in education — as long as they aren’t burdened with too much of it during board meetings.
The School Board should reverse this insulting policy at its next meeting.