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Trainer tells Centennial P&Z: follow written rules to keep meetings fair and defensible
Summary
Attorney and author Mr. Weiner gave a roughly 40-minute training on his book Bob's Rules of Order, urging the Planning & Zoning Commission to adopt clear, consistent procedures for fairness, efficiency and legal defensibility.
Mr. Weiner, a presenter and author, gave the commission a training session on parliamentary procedure and argued for written, local rules that reflect the commission’s needs.
Weiner said he wrote “a book I wrote actually, over the last 20 years called Bob's Rules of Order,” a simplified set of meeting procedures meant for Colorado municipalities, and walked commissioners through key differences between those rules and traditional Robert’s Rules of Order.
Weiner told the Commission that written rules produce three main benefits: fairness in who speaks and when, a stronger legal defense of decisions, and meeting efficiency. He emphasized that local bodies routinely rely on a small subset of parliamentary motions and that some commonly used practices—such as informal “abstentions”—are inconsistent with the rules he recommends. “Bob’s rules of order does not allow you to abstain,” he said, explaining that recusal is the correct procedure where a legal conflict exists and that an unexplained “abstain” should be recorded only as “did not vote.”
He reviewed points of order, points of information, the eight motions his appendix prioritizes (including principal motions, amend, continue/postpone, close debate, and reconsider), and the narrow legal requirements for executive sessions under Colorado law. He also urged commissioners to study the appendices and to use the clerk and city counsel as resources for clarifying language.
Commissioners asked procedural questions about speaker order, time limits, use of “so moved,” how to handle executive sessions and when the chair may recess for private counsel. Counsel and staff clarified that the commission has adopted Weiner’s rules as a bylaw addendum in the past and that council may change any bylaws that govern the commission.
Weiner closed by offering continued training through staff and counsel and by recommending commissioners read appendix B (detailed rules) and appendix C (motion cheat sheet).
