Ogden council members defend internal leadership process amid social-media backlash

A Feb. 3 Ogden City Council work session opened with an extended discussion about the council's internal process for choosing leadership after council members and staff said city residents raised questions on social media and by email.

One council member (Speaker 5) said she had received "a lot of emails and comments on social media" asking whether the public should be able to comment before chair and vice-chair nominations. Multiple council members responded that the council follows established rules and norms for electing its leadership and that those rules give members the authority to elect leadership without prior public comment.

"Council rules and norms spell out the process by which leadership is elected, and that's been followed," said a council member (Speaker 4), adding that "there was a lot of misinformation and a lot of hyperbole" about the process.

Another member (Speaker 2) described being the target of much of the social-media commentary and said, "misinformation, very little truth involved in any of that stuff." Several council members said the public can influence leadership indirectly by electing council members who then choose leaders, and that the council could amend its rules if four members favored a change.

Questions included whether the council could solicit public comment before a leadership vote; members noted the council had previously used an anonymous straw poll in a work session that was later replaced by a public roll-call vote so members would "own" their votes on the record. Speakers emphasized they were open to reviewing the process in the future but said the current rules had been followed for this nomination cycle.

The council did not take a formal vote on changing the procedure during the work session. The discussion concluded with members agreeing to move on to other agenda items.