§ 2-104. Remarks from public.

(a)

The council shall only hear remarks from those individuals who sign up to speak prior to the convening of each regularly scheduled council meeting. The sign-up sheets or speaker cards will be made available to the public, by the municipal clerk, at the entrance of the council chambers or other authorized meeting location 30 minutes prior to the scheduled council meeting time; and sign up will terminate upon the convening of each meeting with the lists or cards delivered to the presiding officer at that time. Members of the public shall be allowed to speak for a maximum of two minutes. Currently serving elected officials shall be allowed to speak for a maximum of ten minutes. Former elected officials shall be allowed to speak for a maximum of six minutes.

Any individual may speak to the council on matters of public concern, including matters of general policy, efficiency and the conduct of city government, provided that the president may rule out of order personal, abusive or indecorous language, or matters that the city has no purview over. No person shall cede his/her time to another person who has not previously signed up to speak. However, a speaker may yield his/her time to another speaker on the list; provided that the person to whom time has been yielded may be placed at the end of the speakers' list; and provided that no speaker to whom time has been yielded shall speak for more than ten minutes.

(b)

The presiding officer of the city council is hereby authorized to disallow members of the public from attendance at two future meetings of the city council under the following circumstances:

(1)

Where the person has previously engaged in inappropriate, unseemly, obstructive behavior causing the presiding officer of the city council to remove the person from two consecutive city council meetings; or

(2)

Where the person engages in behavior so extremely hostile and rancorous that the announced purpose of the meeting is frustrated.

(c)

Upon a finding that the penalty in subsection (a) of this section shall be imposed, the presiding officer of the city council shall notify the affected person in writing that he (she) is prohibited from attending certain future council meetings and the effective dates of the prohibition. Notification shall be served by certified mail and by regular mail.

(d)

This section is adopted as a ban against any person or persons engaging in behavior deemed inappropriate, unseemly and obstructive and not aimed at any one individual or set of individuals nor at the content of the person's speech or expression.

(e)

The person or persons disallowed from attending future meetings of the city council are by no means or fashion banned or forbidden from engaging in the expression of ideas with any other member of the public on any street, sidewalk, other parts of the public buildings owned or occupied by the city, before any standing committee allowing an opportunity for such expression to be heard, or by any other alternative channel permitted by any other law or ordinance.

(f)

Those persons disallowed from attending future meetings of the city council are by no means or fashion banned or forbidden from obtaining the minutes or any other recorded version of those proceedings that are maintained and made available to the public.

(Code 1977, § 1-1041; Ord. No. 1996-34, § 2, 6-12-96; Ord. No. 1997-23, §§ 1—6, 5-13-97; Ord. No. 2000-57, § 1, 10-25-00; Ord. No. 2006-57, § 1, 8-30-06; Ord. No. 2007-68(07-O-0094), § 1, 11-14-07; Ord. No. 2013-09(13-O-0508), § 1, 3-27-13; Ord. No. 2014-32(14-O-1328), § 1, 7-16-14 ; Ord. No. 2018-65(18-O-1671), § 2, 12-12-18 ; Ord. No. 2019-12(19-O-1000), § 1, 1-31-19 )