Submitted by Mark Harmon on Sat, 10/27/2007 - 10:17.
News Sentinel editor Jack McElroy has a good blog entry requesting letters to legislators, writing to oppose the proposed weakening of the state Open Meetings law.
I am a Knox County Commissioner, and have served in that role since shortly after my election in August 2006. Let me state as firmly as I can that the Open Meetings Act DOES NOT need to be weakened by adding a provision that only a quorum can violate it. In the aftermath of the abuses that took place this year in Knox County we should be looking to strengthen the Open Meetings Act, not weaken it.
One of the great temptations in this job is reflected in the phrase “my district.” The district seat is, of course, not yours. It is on loan from the public, and the public has the right to know what you are doing in its name, and for the sake of the broader community. That ethical right of the public to know what its legislators are doing becomes a sad joke if public meetings only rubber stamp the collective result of deliberations done outside of public view.
I spent more than three hours on the witness stand in the recent Knox County lawsuit, specifying in great detail what followed when the commission majority opted for a closed, insider system. The public does not object to commissioners arguing with one another, attempting to persuade one another, and compromising with one another. The public only rightly insists these acts be done in public sessions and meetings.
Your committee has heard vast overstatements that commissioners no longer can talk to one another or cannot attend the same events as district mates. Nonsense. The current act’s prohibition is on deliberation. If commissioners need to deliberate, they can do so in regular or special meetings or properly announced workshops. District mates can announce a gathering in their district and talk to one another and the public as much as they want.
Please resist the current effort and all efforts to weaken the Open Meetings Act.
Cordially yours, Mark D. Harmon, Knox County Commission, District 2, Seat A
Can someone kindly explain to me why at the state and federal levels legislators have the right to caucus with like minded folks but there is not that option on the local level?
Granted, I don't support any kind of closed door meetings and certainly not the backdoor bargins that happened in Knox County. There does need to be some way when party affiliation can be dropped and like minded folks can freely examine the issues in caucus fashion. Then after careful consideration of the facts they are free to vote up or down on any issue.
I live in a county where there is a solid voting block on behalf of the mayor. ( Blunt Kounty is all about the three B's- builders, bankers and the good old Boys ) Where even trying to talk about the impact an issue, one way or the other and how it will effect the residents- it is simply not done. Oh yeah, a few try but they are so out numbered they get no where.
On the flip side, the County Chair allowing the voting block to add issues to the agenda which were not scheduled is done with care free abandon. Screw the printed agenda, we wanna talk about this or that and rush the vote and most certainly not give the other commissioners or the public time to talk about or research the issue. Let's get this sucker voted on before Joe Public knows what we just did.
Submitted by Carole Borges on Sun, 10/28/2007 - 09:04.
Mello wrote," On the flip side, the County Chair allowing the voting block to add issues to the agenda which were not scheduled is done with care free abandon. Screw the printed agenda, we wanna talk about this or that and rush the vote and most certainly not give the other commissioners or the public time to talk about or research the issue. Let's get this sucker voted on before Joe Public knows what we just did."
Too many committees or commissions lack a knowledgeable Chairperson. Sticking to the agenda should be a given. Many Chairs aren't even familiar with the Rules of Order. Sloppy adherence to rules is usually the fault of the Chairperson. They have the ability to control the movement of the meeting to a large extent, to cut off those who are not following the agenda, to stop the verbal types who would go on forever and ever relating self-serving anecdotes instead of getting on with business. The Chairperson sets the tone of compliance with the rules. It's not easy to bring a group of people together to discuss anything. Many times the group will want to do something that is not in compliance with law, or with the Rules of Order, or the bylaws under which they are operating. To allow a lot of slack to be given causes a snowball effect of non-compliance. In this case it sounds like the Chairperson simply wasn't competent or didn't care.
Submitted by Carole Borges on Sun, 10/28/2007 - 08:52.
Mark Harmon wrote, "The public does not object to commissioners arguing with one another, attempting to persuade one another, and compromising with one another. The public only rightly insists these acts be done in public sessions and meetings."
Submitted by talidapali on Sun, 10/28/2007 - 14:15.
Please do not gut the Sunshine Law by adopting the committee's recommendation to change the language to "quorum" instead of "two or more". The mess here in Knox County was caused by County Commissioners trying to interpret the unambiguous language "two or more" into "quorum" already. We voters are not stupid, when we voted for the Sunshine Law, we knew what "two or more" meant... that's WHY we voted for it. We also voted for term limits here in Knox County, but the commissioners were more interested in protecting their status quo than in following the will of the voters; which is why this whole mess wound up in court in the first place. We are tired to death of politicians that ignore what we, the voters, actually TELL them with our votes about how we want our government to work for us! After all, this is SUPPOSED to be a government of the people, by the people, and FOR the people... not of the politicians, by the politicians, and FOR the politicians. It is long past time that all politicians stop triangulating on issues and just start listening. This is NOT a partisan issue, although some seem to be trying mightily to make it so. There is more than enough hot air floating around these days, please LISTEN, instead of trying to come up with clever sound bites to explain why once again politicians are trying to TELL us what we want rather than listening to what we are telling them we do, in fact, want and need.
Thank you,
I can only hope that they actually listen to the voters. Local politicians, more so than state or national politicians, tend to operate on the level of the good old boy network. Corruption in government starts from the ground up. As the locals go, so goes the wider world.
If the people have any hope to retain control of their government so that it works FOR them and not the politicians and corporations, then local government MUST be held accountable for open and honest debate, IN PUBLIC, where actual citizens can speak about issues that matter to them. We can't all travel to Washington or Nashville to advocate for our positions on things, but we can and should be able to advocate on the local level without having to fight against secret deals and foregone conclusions.
If we want more people to participate in the political life of this country, if we want more informed citizens to CARE enough to go to the voting booths, then we MUST make it possible for ordinary citizens to affect change, simply by being able to speak in open meetings and listening to debate on issues. The more welcoming we make the participation process, the more people will feel like they are not just spitting into the wind when they do get involved. The more disenfranchised the voters feel, the more they are unlikely to even do so much as go vote. Our founding fathers envisioned a country where every person had the RIGHT to participate in the decisions that affect all of us, but you can hardly blame people for not taking advantage of their rights when it feels like an exercise in futility. I think that sometimes this is EXACTLY what political parties count on to remain in power, and that is a vicious spiral that we are caught in these days. If we are to change it, it must start at the local level, and it has to start in plain sight.
Let the sun shine in.
_________________________________________________ "You can't fix stupid..." ~ Ron White" "I never said I wasn't a brat..." ~ Talidapali
Submitted by Betty Bean on Tue, 10/30/2007 - 09:17.
Writing to state reps or senators who represent districts on the other end of the state is farting in a windstorm. Legislators pay attention to constituents/donors, and hardly anyone else. Efforts to contact your own representatives would be far more useful.
Can someone kindly explain to me why at the state and federal levels legislators have the right to caucus with like minded folks but there is not that option on the local level?
Granted, I don't support any kind of closed door meetings and certainly not the backdoor bargins that happened in Knox County. There does need to be some way when party affiliation can be dropped and like minded folks can freely examine the issues in caucus fashion. Then after careful consideration of the facts they are free to vote up or down on any issue.
I live in a county where there is a solid voting block on behalf of the mayor. ( Blunt Kounty is all about the three B's- builders, bankers and the good old Boys ) Where even trying to talk about the impact an issue, one way or the other and how it will effect the residents- it is simply not done. Oh yeah, a few try but they are so out numbered they get no where.
On the flip side, the County Chair allowing the voting block to add issues to the agenda which were not scheduled is done with care free abandon. Screw the printed agenda, we wanna talk about this or that and rush the vote and most certainly not give the other commissioners or the public time to talk about or research the issue. Let's get this sucker voted on before Joe Public knows what we just did.
How can there be a happy middle in all this?
Mello wrote," On the flip side, the County Chair allowing the voting block to add issues to the agenda which were not scheduled is done with care free abandon. Screw the printed agenda, we wanna talk about this or that and rush the vote and most certainly not give the other commissioners or the public time to talk about or research the issue. Let's get this sucker voted on before Joe Public knows what we just did."
Too many committees or commissions lack a knowledgeable Chairperson. Sticking to the agenda should be a given. Many Chairs aren't even familiar with the Rules of Order. Sloppy adherence to rules is usually the fault of the Chairperson. They have the ability to control the movement of the meeting to a large extent, to cut off those who are not following the agenda, to stop the verbal types who would go on forever and ever relating self-serving anecdotes instead of getting on with business. The Chairperson sets the tone of compliance with the rules. It's not easy to bring a group of people together to discuss anything. Many times the group will want to do something that is not in compliance with law, or with the Rules of Order, or the bylaws under which they are operating. To allow a lot of slack to be given causes a snowball effect of non-compliance. In this case it sounds like the Chairperson simply wasn't competent or didn't care.
or the chair was simply following the pre-approved party script.
Mark Harmon wrote, "The public does not object to commissioners arguing with one another, attempting to persuade one another, and compromising with one another. The public only rightly insists these acts be done in public sessions and meetings."
I think this is a very important point.
I can only hope that they actually listen to the voters. Local politicians, more so than state or national politicians, tend to operate on the level of the good old boy network. Corruption in government starts from the ground up. As the locals go, so goes the wider world.
If the people have any hope to retain control of their government so that it works FOR them and not the politicians and corporations, then local government MUST be held accountable for open and honest debate, IN PUBLIC, where actual citizens can speak about issues that matter to them. We can't all travel to Washington or Nashville to advocate for our positions on things, but we can and should be able to advocate on the local level without having to fight against secret deals and foregone conclusions.
If we want more people to participate in the political life of this country, if we want more informed citizens to CARE enough to go to the voting booths, then we MUST make it possible for ordinary citizens to affect change, simply by being able to speak in open meetings and listening to debate on issues. The more welcoming we make the participation process, the more people will feel like they are not just spitting into the wind when they do get involved. The more disenfranchised the voters feel, the more they are unlikely to even do so much as go vote. Our founding fathers envisioned a country where every person had the RIGHT to participate in the decisions that affect all of us, but you can hardly blame people for not taking advantage of their rights when it feels like an exercise in futility. I think that sometimes this is EXACTLY what political parties count on to remain in power, and that is a vicious spiral that we are caught in these days. If we are to change it, it must start at the local level, and it has to start in plain sight.
Let the sun shine in.
_________________________________________________
"You can't fix stupid..." ~ Ron White"
"I never said I wasn't a brat..." ~ Talidapali
Writing to state reps or senators who represent districts on the other end of the state is farting in a windstorm. Legislators pay attention to constituents/donors, and hardly anyone else. Efforts to contact your own representatives would be far more useful.
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