By Jim Bloch
The Port Huron City Council will vote Dec. 8 on whether to adopt changes about how and when public comments are heard at council meetings.
The resolution breaks the existing public comment period into two periods and requires speakers to register on a signup sheet. The first public comment period would be reserved for “city residents and business owners only.” Toward the end of the meeting — after the city manager’s report, consent agenda, unfinished business, communications and petitions, resolutions and ordinances — non-residents would be able to address the council on matters under the city’s jurisdiction.
After several speakers opposed the changes, the city council defeated the new guidelines in a 3-3 vote at its regular meeting Nov.10. Mayor Anita Ashford and council members Barb Payton and Conrad Haremza voted against the measure. Mayor Pro Tem Sherry Archibald and council members Bob Mosurak and Teri Lamb voted for it. Council member Jeff Pemberton was absent.
Pemberton was present at the next meeting Nov. 24, and he made a motion to reconsider the resolution.
“I need to make a motion to add to the agenda the reconsideration of Resolution 25-137,” said Pemberton.
“I second that motion,” said council member Mosurak.
The council voted 5-2 to reconsider the motion, with Mayor Ashford and member Payton voting no.
During public comment, several speakers again opposed the guidelines. No one spoke in favor of the changes.
Residents complained that a signup sheet limited their freedom of speech by denying impromptu comments.
“I wasn’t going to speak tonight,” said one resident Nov. 24. “But a resolution that got turned down last meeting was reintroduced. With the new rules, if I hadn’t signed up on the sheet, I wouldn’t be able to be up here to speak. That was my point last time.”
“I think it’s crap,” said Curtis Karl, a Port Huron Township resident, referring to the bifurcated comment periods. He works in the city and pays city income tax of a half percent.
If the new rules are adopted Dec. 8, nonresidents who work in the city and pay city taxes and just plain nonresidents will not be able to speak in the first comment period — unless they own a business. Some people feel that making property ownership a condition of speech has echoes of property-based voting requirements in the U.S. 200 years ago.
“Trash, the nonresident clown,” said Trash the Clown, introducing herself; she lives in Port Huron Township. “A strong leader doesn’t try to take voices away. A strong council ought to rejoice that more people want to have a voice… (Public comment) is for the people who love your town to come and speak.”
“Remember – this is the people’s meeting,” said another resident.
“Public comment is not a decoration,” said a resident who objected to Pemberton bringing back the issue without public notice, such as having the item appear on the agenda, which is published on Fridays before the meetings. “(Public comment) is the one guaranteed time when residents can speak without filter, without scheduling a meeting and without an appointment. It’s the public’s only direct line to this room… Treat public participation as a strength, not a disruption.”
Pemberton explained his request.
“I wanted to bring this back because I wanted to vote on it,” said Pemberton. “No one’s voice is being taken away… This is a plain and simple straight-forward resolution that’s to the benefit of our residents, the people who elected us… What I want to prioritize with this resolution is simply that residents and business owners should have the right to speak first in the beginning of the meeting.”
Business owners who live outside Port Huron cannot vote in city elections.
“Cities all across the state of Michigan are doing this,” said Freed.
None of the cities in St. Clair County have two public comment periods, one for residents and business owners, and one for nonresidents. Marysville has a single citizens-to-be-heard period. St. Clair has a single time for Public Questions and Comments. Marine City, Algonac and Yale each have a single public comment period. The village of Capac has one public comment period.
“A lot of people who are not residents of our community come here to put on a show, to a gain a social media thing, to put skits, to make a spectacle of our meetings,” said Freed. “That drowns out local voices. A lot of residents have stopped coming because they don’t want to wait an hour and a half or two hours to know what’s going on in our city. Boy Scouts and Girl Scout troops no longer come to our meetings because of the inappropriate behavior that’s happening here. It’s no longer safe for kids to come here because of the explicit language and people yelling and storming out.”
Freed himself walked out of a council meeting earlier this year.
“They don’t want to subject their children to that,” Freed said. “These changes are meant to put decorum in and highlight the voices of city residents.”
Many of the most disruptive and expletive-filled comments have come from Port Huron residents over the past half-decade, including those of an urban farmer and a self-proclaimed government watchdog.
The council voted 4-3 to approve the first reading of the ordinance. Archibald, Lamb, Mozurak and Pemberton voted for the rule changes. Ashford, Haremza and Payton voted against them.
On Dec. 8, the council will vote on officially adopting the changes.
Jim Bloch is a freelance writer based in St. Clair, Michigan. Contact him at bloch.jim@gmail.com.
