City Meeting Dates Changed

At the City Council Special Meeting held on Monday, October 25th, at 6:00 PM there were two agenda items.

The first issue was to change the City Council Meetings to fit Mr. Tom Cloud's, the new Interim City Attorney, schedule.  Mr. Cloud has a scheduling conflict on Tuesday evenings which was apparently not considered when the new Interim City Attorney was chosen.  Councilman Kimsey brought up the fact that the city should have considered other attorneys that could be available when the city needs them, not that the city should conform to meet the attorney's needs.  He recommended that additional resumes of other attorney's should be reviewed to see if other attorney's would be available to fill this position on a permanent basis who would be more flexible.

The meeting time was also moved up to 7:00 PM instead of 7:30 PM.  Per Acting City Manager/Vice Mayor Block, on days that city meetings are held, the day is very long for the employees who end up working all day, then attend the meetings into the evenings.  The city employees' inconvenience appeared to be more of a consideration when making this change than the ability of the public to attend these meetings.  The public also has a long day at work and rushing home to make the now earlier meeting times, is going to be more challenging.  The issue of the public's inconvenience was not discussed in consideration of the meeting time change at all.  The city employees do not have traffic issues to consider when leaving work to attend the monthly meetings, unlike the public. 

The probability of many holidays falling on a Monday came up and a plan B was put in place to go to when that situation occurs. 

The final approved new meeting times will be on the 2nd Monday of each month at 7:00 PM.  In cases that a holiday falls on that day, the meeting date will move to the 3rd Monday of each month at 7:00 PM.  This change will be in effect until a new city attorney is chosen, at which time the date and time MAY be changed again.  Moving the city meetings to the 3rd Monday, in the case of a holiday, may cause issues with getting timely information to the Planning Board, which meets on the 3rd Tuesday of each month.  This possible conflict was not considered in the discussion.  No public comment was taken on this issue until after the vote of the council.