Every council meeting to start with forum


Monday’s first-of-its-kind forum on the city audit won’t be the last chance for the public to speak before a regular City Council meeting.

Starting March 21, the floor will be open for anyone to bring questions or concerns to Mayor Clem Seifert and any council members who choose to join him, the mayor revealed in an interview Friday afternoon.

Seifert intends to announce his plans at Monday night’s council meeting. He said he was inspired by the Feb. 28 forum, at which a dozen people raised questions and made comments about the city’s finances over the course of about 75 minutes. Roughly 100 people attended the forum.

“We’re renewing Speak Up Henderson,” the mayor said, referring to the series of forums held in each of Henderson’s four wards last year.

Seifert often speaks about the value of participatory democracy and of building city policies from the bottom up. He said the Speak Up Henderson forums succeeded but had some problems:

* They were difficult to arrange at a time and place people could agree on.

* They required extensive publicity.

* They provided no clear way to provide answers that required research, because the person wasn’t likely to attend the next forum in another ward.

This renewal of Speak Up Henderson will solve those problems, Seifert said. People will know they can show up in the council chambers at the Municipal Building at 6 on the evening of any council meeting, and there will be a public forum. The place and time are set, so there shouldn’t be a need for additional publicity. And Seifert promises that if anyone asks a question he can’t immediately answer, he will bring the answer to the next forum.

If people want to read a letter that’s public record or want to examine a line item in the budget and see supporting documents such as receipts, for example, the mayor will get the information and bring it to the next forum, he said. “I’ll get the details and tell you what happened.”

The City Council usually meets on the second and fourth Mondays of the month, so people will have two chances per month to seek information.

Seifert said that the airing of public concerns before the meeting should allow the council to conduct its business more efficiently. Several times last year, the public-comment section of the meeting ran out of control. To solve the problem, the council in September created a policy limiting speakers to three minutes, but it has not been strictly enforced.

The forums will be 60 minutes, ending half an hour before the regular council meeting begins.

“Anybody who shows up can have the floor,” Seifert said. He hopes for specific questions from people who want to hear the answers.

“People claim they ask questions that don’t get answered,” Seifert said. “Now they’ll get answers.”