In an effort to explore why they are involved in repeated friction at the table, Saginaw City Council members Monday debated about how to stop debating so often.
Councilman Michael Balls walked out after he asserted that his peers were “wasting their time” on studying procedure rules because the mayor in Saginaw’s form of government holds the gavel to conduct meetings and is free to wield its power. He did not mention specific scenarios where he felt Mayor Brenda Moore should show more authority, other than banging that gavel. Instead, Balls said the mayor should feel offended that her council peers are questioning her leadership, cloaked in a sudden rules review.
Mayor Pro-tem Annie Boensch called for a comb-through of rules-of-order that are similar to any governing board, public or private. She responded that she is not questioning the mayor, but rather the meeting conduct of the body as a whole.
For the review chore, Moore named a three-member panel of members who most often support her votes — Boensch, Reggie Williams II and newcomer Priscilla Garcia. Neither of the two members who often clash with her and with Boensch, Michael Flores and Monique Lamar Silvia, questioned this point about her choice of favorable appointees. However, they raised concerns regarding the Open Meetings Act.
Governing bodies often use small committees as steps to avoid allowing the public to attend meetings by ensuring that a majority “quorum” is not in attendance. When Silvia learned that she also would be banned, even with her status as an elected council member, she indicated she will object when the first Boensch/Williams/Garcia meeting is scheduled.
Moore and Councilman Bill Ostash attempted to reassure Silvia that a three-member panel and staff may conduct closed meetings, but any council action would have to be public. Ostash said a review of council rules would be similar to regular financial audits, as something that should occur on a schedule.
Conduct at council meetings, in general, is entering a fourth phase:
1) From the City Charter’s adoption in the mid-1930s until the mid-’60s, most policy was decided in private, with the Saginaw Club as a primary location, and then ratified at City Hall with scant public discussion. Council election slates were for the Committee of 50 and for United Saginaw Citizens, usually with Chamber of Commerce endorsements.
2) From the mid-’60 into the late ’70s, citizen participation grew on issues that ranged from urban renewal and block grants to police conduct and minority hiring. The city’s remaining finance and professional class gradually lost interest in local public politics and moved to the suburbs.
3) Public differences in opinion, with the new openness during the non-slate years that have followed, have been mostly relegated to traditional liberal versus conservative, with moderate libs now in the majority.
4) A new factor with the current tension is that clashes stem not so much from choosing priorities, as from how to proceed.
To start, Monday’s session began with Flores making regular motions to extend public speakers beyond three minutes, a practice that began soon after his election three years ago and placed him on maverick status. Most members gradually have resisted time extensions, some feeling Flores is trying to self-promote, to the point where only Silvia and Balls supported him on extra time for some among Monday’s parade of public appearances, losing on 3-5 votes while the speakers watched from the podium. Councilman George Copeland was not present.
Later, instead of continuing the dispute, Flores remarked that a time clock placed at the side desk of Clerk Janet Santos showed potential for resolving the time-limit concerns.
Past councils made little use of closed meetings for purposes other than the obvious, such as labor negotiations, employee discipline and property price bargaining, even though privacy tactics for general purposes are encouraged at “elected officials training” by such groups as the Michigan Municipal League and the Michigan Association of School Administrators.
As an alternative, until about 15 years ago, “committee of the whole” sessions that began in late afternoon were slated for single-issue special reviews that allowed all members to take part. During the break time before the regular evening business meeting, members would share an hourlong dinner (part of their compensation, which is about 10 percent that of County Board members) at nearby local restaurants, informal with a mix of business and social banter. Later after budget cuts began, takeouts consumed in the manager’s office. These were open to the public, which hardly ever attended. This get-to-know-one-another practice has ceased.
Also, there will not be a city-only council and school board election this fall. These have been moved to even-numbered years for presidential or governor elections, in an attempt to boost voter participation that declined to near 15 percent and council elections that nearly lacked enough candidates to fill all the seats.
Current terms for Boensch, Williams, Copeland, Flores, Silvia and Ostash expire in 2024. Moore, Balls and Garcia are elected through 2026.
The council next meets at 6:30 p.m. on June 19.
