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Committee debates council meeting start times, asks staff to return with policy options
Summary
Committee members and staff debated regular meeting start times, closed-session scheduling and special-meeting polling procedures; staff will return with policy options, including possible limits on how many date polls will be used before scheduling.
The Governance and Ethics Committee discussed whether the City should adopt a formal policy on the scheduled start times for City Council meetings and how staff should poll members and schedule special meetings and closed sessions.
Staff noted that the charter requires two regular council meetings per month but does not fix dates or start times. Historically the council has started regular meetings at 7 p.m. and scheduled study sessions and closed sessions earlier — often at 5:00 or 5:30 p.m. — but that practice has sometimes forced scheduling challenges when members have outside employment or travel. The staff presentation said the city often needs special meetings because of public hearing noticing requirements and an especially busy closed-session calendar in the coming months: staff identified negotiations with seven labor groups as an upcoming reason for additional closed sessions.
Council members emphasized competing priorities. Member Park said a standing charter review commission risks producing frequent changes and urged required disclosures for commission members; Chair Jane argued that 7 p.m. start times historically helped working residents attend meetings and warned that moving start times earlier could reduce representation for people with work commitments. Several members suggested limiting the number of successive poll requests staff makes before scheduling a meeting, and staff said it would explore policy options such as reserving off-Tuesday slots on members’ calendars, rotating meeting times when a member is repeatedly unavailable and defining how many poll cycles staff will run before scheduling with a majority present.
Chief Operating Officer Nady Nader and assistant staff said they would return to the committee with written policy options for committee review and potential recommendation to the City Council. The options will include: prescribed regular start times (e.g., maintain 7 p.m. vs. move to 6 p.m.), rules for closed-session timing, limits on the number of poll attempts before scheduling, and procedures for communicating deviations from policy when staff must schedule a meeting on short notice.
No formal action was taken; the committee directed staff to prepare options and bring them back for a future meeting.
