Bloomington council imposes time limits on final speeches, leaves question time unaltered for now
After reducing public commentary time from five minutes to three minutes per speaker two weeks ago, Bloomington’s city council has now imposed for the first time a limit on how long councilmembers can talk on a given topic.
Each of a councilmember’s two chances to speak comes with a time limit—5 minutes for the first chance and 2 minutes for the second chance.
Under the old rule, there was no explicit limit on the number of times that a councilmember could talk. There was just a prohibition against someone talking twice before everyone had a chance to talk at least once.
Under the new rule adopted by the city council on Wednesday night, there’s a limit of twice.
The vote on the ordinance, which was put forward by council president Isabel Piedmont-Smith, was 5–4. Voting for it were: Piedmont-Smith, Matt Flaherty, Kate Rosenbarger, Hopi Stosberg, and Isak Asare. Opposing it were: Dave Rollo, Andy Ruff, Sydney Zulich, and Courtney Daily.
The vote was taken after 1 hour and 40 minutes of deliberations on the topic.
The ordinance passed by the council does not affect the time that councilmembers use to ask questions and get answers from the presenter of the ordinance, which is most often a city staff member, not a council colleague as it was on Wednesday. Piedmont-Smith presented the ordinance, as its sponsor. [Listen to this report.]
Just before the vote, the tally was expected to be 4–5. In fact, Piedmont-Smith said it looked like it did not have enough support to pass.
From the start, Dave Rollo and Andy Ruff had been clear in their opposition to imposing speaking time limits. But Daily and Zulich both indicated they had been persuaded by commentary from the public and their council colleagues to oppose the ordinance, after starting the meeting thinking they would vote yes.
Asare had also indicated opposition to the ordinance, based on the idea that enacting a small change like the one the council was considering that night would actually delay any significant progress towards making “some of the more radical changes that we really should be making.”
But when the roll call came, Asare voted yes.
The original ordinance put forward by Piedmont-Smith had shorter time limits—3 minutes for the first speaking turn and 1 minute for the second one. But Stosberg put forward an amendment that made the limits 5 minutes and 2 minutes, respectively.
Here are the old and and new versions of the section of city code affected by the council’s Wednesday night action:
Old: 2.04.120 – Limits on debate.
No member shall speak more than once upon a question until every other member has had the opportunity to speak. The council may, before debate begins, decide by a two-thirds vote of all members to set time limits on debate upon a particular pending question, but time spent in answering questions shall not be counted against the speaker.
New: 2.04.120 – Limits on debate.
No member shall speak more than twice upon a question without leave of the council, and no more than once until every other member has had the opportunity to speak. No member shall speak longer than five (5) minutes for the first speech on a question and no more than one two (2) minutes for a second speech on the same question, unless further time is granted by the council. The council may, before debate begins, decide by a two-thirds vote of all members to set time limits on debate upon a particular pending question, but time spent in answering questions shall not be counted against the speaker.
The amendment to the ordinance, to make the time limits a bit longer, came after a table was displayed on the screen in council chambers showing speaking time limits for city councilmembers in some other cities in Indiana and other Big Ten cities. The table was compiled by council staff at the request of Ruff.
In the table, the most common time limit for councilmember speaking turns—for those cities that put such limits in city code—is 5 minutes. Gary is the only city with a limit as short as 3 minutes. From the public mic, The B Square noted that the time limits for council speaking turns in some cities are not included in city code, but rather in a separate document for the council’s rules. The rule for the city council of Ann Arbor, for example, has a two-turn limit with a 3-minute time limit for the first turn and a 2-minute time limit for the second turn.
Also from the public mic, The B Square noted that the default time limit for speeches in Robert’s Rules, which many councils adopt to cover anything not in their own explicit rules, is 10 minutes.
The 10 minutes in Robert’s Rules is longer than the 7 minutes that Ruff took in his final comment turn during the deliberations on the Summit District PUD in mid-May, which appears to have been a sore point with some other councilmembers.
When Ruff gave his speech, the hour was approaching midnight. That’s something that Flaherty drew out during Wednesday’s deliberations, when he said that “context matters” when it comes to evaluating whether a 7-minute speech is long or short.
On the occasion of Ruff’s 7-minute speech, some councilmembers believed that Ruff was trying to give Rollo a chance to push the meeting past midnight when Rollo later took his final speaking turn. After midnight, any two councilmembers can end a meeting on the spot with a motion and a second to adjourn the meeting.
Asare called the question after Ruff’s speech, and Zulich seconded the motion. The vote on calling the question passed 7–2, with dissent from Ruff and Rollo. That ended the deliberations, and the vote was taken before Rollo had a chance to give his final comment.
One Wednesday night, Stosberg called 7 minutes for a speech “exceedingly long.”
Ruff responded to the idea that 7-minutes is too long for a speech by comparing that span to the sum of the limits the council was considering imposing: “Based on some of my colleagues’ reactions tonight, it was sort of an egregious example of not respecting time. I have to say: 5 plus 2 equals 7.”
Ruff also rejected the idea that council meetings are too long. Ruff put it like this: “People say taxes are always in need of relief. And council meetings are always in need of being shorter. I don’t really think our meetings are too long. The public’s business takes a lot of time.”
Asare said that night’s discussion—which included a lot of time for councilmembers to ask questions of Piedmont-Smith about the ordinance—illustrated that the cause of long meetings is rarely the result of the final comment period. Instead it’s due to question time and other factors, he said.
Piedmont-Smith indicated she is willing to consider putting time limits on other parts of the meeting, like council question time. Limiting other parts of the meeting as well is something for which former councilmember Steve Volan advocated from the public mic.
Rosenbarger indicated that she would be supporting the ordinance, because for the previous four years of her service on the council, she felt that her colleagues were not willing to try new things. Rosenbarger said, “I’m really happy that this term, folks are up for trying new things. So I want to try to be supportive of that.”
Among the “radical changes” that Asare has called for is the streamlining of the council’s formal legislative business meetings to focus just on legislative items. Asare’s idea is to address the need for more general discussion, but focused on specific topics, at consensus building activities (CBAs). A first CBA for the council is set for Aug. 14.
Flaherty responded to Asare’s worry that approving the ordinance that night would actually wind up delaying any significant progress on more substantive changes.
Flaherty echoed Rosenbarger’s sentiment that it is important to try out things. He lamented the “inertia” of the status quo that had been typical of the previous edition of the council.
Flaherty felt that enacting the ordinance, as “inconsequential as this might seem” would actually be “a meaningful step to try and see how it goes.” Flaherty allowed that “it’s a little silly, maybe, that is codified,” but added that on balance he still supported it, because it would help, even just to have a timer on display because it would allow councilmembers to self-regulate the length of their comments.
