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Rules committee considers removing oral prayer and rewording three‑reading suspension
Summary
The Village of Baltimore rules committee debated edits to its meeting rules, including removing oral or silent prayers from the order of business and clarifying whether motions to suspend the three‑reading rule may be questioned. Members agreed to hold the items for further review at the next rules meeting.
The rules committee opened with roll call and moved to consider several housekeeping items, including proposed edits to Chapter 220 of the codified rules. The chair said she wanted to remove “oral or silent prayer” from the order of business, explaining it can make visitors uncomfortable: “I would like to remove oral or silent prayer. It's not comfortable for a lot of people who walk in here and don't realize they're gonna have to say the Lord's Prayer,” she said.
Members also discussed language that currently bars debate on motions to suspend the three‑reading requirement for ordinances and resolutions. Several members said the wording could prevent even asking whether an item qualifies as an emergency. One committee member urged keeping the suspension motion as a narrow procedural item; another replied that questioning the emergency status is a normal and necessary part of council oversight. The chair summarized the group’s position: committee members will re‑review the rule language and return it to a future rules meeting for revision.
The committee flagged a separate drafting problem: a section labeled “duties of committee chairperson” includes items typically performed by the fiscal officer or administrator. As one member put it, “Everything on this list is something that fiscal officer does, not committee chairperson.” That discrepancy, plus inconsistent page numbering in the draft rulebook, led the committee to postpone substantive changes.
The committee chose not to act immediately on either the prayer item or the suspension language and left both items on the agenda for the next rules meeting so members could review proposed edits in more detail. No formal votes on changes were taken at the meeting.
