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City attorney outlines public-comment rules; council to consider code amendments and phased implementation
Summary
The city attorney reviewed state and local rules governing public comment at open meetings, benchmarking peer cities and offering options including online sign-up, single public-comment periods and time limits; council directed staff to return with ordinance language and a phased public rollout.
City Attorney Melissa McGinnis reviewed the city’s options for handling public comment at council meetings, cited the Local Government Code and an Attorney General opinion and provided benchmarking from peer cities on time limits and sign-up procedures.
McGinnis said the Local Government Code requires governmental bodies to allow members of the public to address the body on agenda items and permits reasonable rules — including time limits and advance sign-up — so long as the rules do not prohibit criticism. She noted that the city code currently requires speakers to give name and address and limits speakers to five minutes, but the code does not specify how that five minutes is allocated across multiple agenda items.
The attorney presented options drawn from practices in other Texas cities: require speaker registration before the meeting (commonly one to two hours in advance), consolidate public comment into a single time period (beginning or end of meeting), limit total speaker time across multiple items (for example, five minutes total for all items), and set differing time limits for public hearings or zoning items. The Attorney General’s opinion allows reasonable limits (sign-up requirements, total-time limits and single comment periods) but also requires accommodations such as double time for speakers who require translators.
McGinnis recommended the council give staff direction and said any change would require a city code amendment and a public education campaign; she suggested a phased implementation period of two to three months after council action so residents could adapt. Council members asked that speaker decorum guidelines (matching council decorum expectations) be included in any package and that staff provide sample ordinance language and a public-notice plan.
Council did not adopt changes at the meeting. They asked staff to bring draft ordinance language, sample scripts for the mayor/city staff, and a public outreach timeline to a future briefing and to schedule the item for council consideration after the outreach period.
