Merriam council narrows public-comment rules, removes blanket profanity ban

The Merriam City Council on Jan. 14 approved amendments to its governing-body rules that clarify public comments are limited to matters related to city programs and services and set a three-minute limit for speakers.

Staff attorney Jason Ingle told the council the redline edits would “rename business from the floor to public comments” and explicitly confine comments to city matters. Council members focused discussion on two elements: whether to change the 7:00 p.m. meeting start time and whether to keep a standalone prohibition on “profanity.” After debate, the council voted to leave the meeting start time at 7:00 p.m. and to remove the word “profanity” from the list of prohibited topics. Ingle summarized the agreed change: “We would just remove profanity from the red line that you have in there in your packet.”

Council members also discussed how to collect names and addresses for the record. Staff clarified the blue sign-in sheet records a speaker’s name, address and topic for the minutes; the council retained the requirement that speakers provide address information for follow-up while allowing written submission if a speaker prefers not to verbalize a private address.

The motion to adopt the amendments as amended passed on a unanimous voice roll call. Supporters said the edits would bring clarity to procedures; dissenting comments raised concerns about whether limiting topics to city programs could constrain First Amendment protections in some circumstances. The adopted language preserves a mechanism for the mayor or chair to control disruptive conduct while removing a categorical ban on profanity.