Cheboygan mayor: New rules should help ensure orderly council meetings

CHEBOYGAN — Mayor Brett Mallory wants to ensure Cheboygan City Council meetings are conducted in an orderly manner, and to accomplish that council needed to endorse a set of rules and procedures.

The rules and procedures adopted by council earlier this month said meetings will be conducted in compliance with state statutes, including the Open Meetings Act and the city charter.

“There were some issues keeping decorum in the chamber, whether it was people speaking out of turn (or) people starting to insult others. They were not listening to me asking them to stop,” Mallory said.

He said the Michigan Municipal League has put out a document encouraging the adoption of council guidelines.

“Any city can run the meeting as they see fit as long as it is operating under the Open Meetings Act, and we are. We haven’t really changed anything except there are guidelines out there now,” said Mallory.

The rules and procedures adopted leave it up to the presiding officer — usually the mayor — to determine if a person is “… disrupting the proceedings, failing to be germane, speaking longer than the allotted time, speaking vulgarities or making inflammatory remarks.”

That leaves a lot of discretionary power with one person and raises the question about what can be done if that individual abuses that power.

“Before I was mayor and until about a year and a half ago there was no reason for any of these rules,” Mallory said. “But then some of these problems popped up. I want people to say what they want to. I have kept a loose meeting as long as I could allow free back-and-forth talking. As long as I am here I don’t see this as an issue, but council can always change the rules as needed.”

At the last council meeting, a public speaker questioned whether the three minute time limit on public comments could be more flexible.

“This gives the presiding officer the ability to change that as needed,” said Mallory. “I try to keep that fair — three minutes for everybody. The only times I can remember going outside of that is if there is something on the agenda where someone in the audience needs to give us information for something that is on the agenda.”

Are the rules and procedures designed to target councilwoman Mary Darling?

“No. I have talked to her about some of the things she has said outside of the meeting. Again the Michigan Municipal League encouraged these rules to be in place and this is a reminder for all of council,” Mallory said.

More: Cheboygan council tells Darling to reimburse city for payment to contractor

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Mallory has accused Darling of deliberately violating a provision in the city charter which prohibits council members from contacting firms that do work for the city without first notifying the city manager or the mayor. Council approved a motion requesting that Darling reimburse the city $1,125 for the work the contractor did in fulfilling her request. Darling said she only talked with the company one time “for about 20 minutes” and said if city manager Dan Sabolsky had done his job she wouldn’t have had to contact the firm.

Darling was the only council member to vote against the adoption of the guidelines.

— Contact Paul Welitzkin at pwelitzkin@gaylordheraldtimes.com.

This article originally appeared on Cheboygan Daily Tribune: Cheboygan City Council aims for orderly meetings with new rules

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