Council forms subcommittee to review rules of procedure after members flag inconsistencies
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Summary
Council members agreed to create a small subcommittee to reconcile practice and written council rules of procedure, clarify language about quorum/attendance notices, and resolve legal points raised by staff and council counsel.
Speaker 5 told the council that the existing council rules of procedure contain language that does not match current practice and asked members to review the rules page by page. The presenter said the council should either follow the written rules or change them to reflect current practice and identified items needing clarification, including how attendees are named when a quorum is not present and the meaning of language allowing adjournment 'from day to day to compel the attendance' of absent members.
Council members discussed whether attendees present when a quorum lacked should be named in a website notice and whether the language about ‘‘compel[ing] attendance’’ is practicable. Several members suggested a small subcommittee could re-draft the affected sections and return recommended changes to the full council. Multiple members volunteered for the subcommittee during the meeting; staff and legal counsel will supply legal points and suggested edits to the group for its review.
The council did not adopt formal amendments to the rules at this meeting but agreed the subcommittee would prepare proposed revisions for future council consideration.