Jefferson County Planning and Zoning Commission members decided April 10 to remove the “citizens to be heard” section from all future meeting agendas.
That decision followed a discussion about the commission’s bylaws. Initially, the commission talked about amending the bylaws to move the public comments from the end of its meetings to the beginning, to limit comments to three minutes and to cap the comment portion at 20 minutes in total. By the end of the discussion, however, the commission decided to eliminate public comments entirely.
The commission voted 6-1 in favor of scrapping public comments, with Commissioner Michael Siebert voting against the motion. Commissioner Jeffrey Spraul was absent from the meeting.
“Why do we have public comment? Do we even need it?” Commissioner Johnathan Sparks asked the commission during its discussion of the matter. “As unpopular as it may be for the public and looking at the logical debate that we’ve had in this building, I’m going to be the bad guy and make a motion that we dissolve public comment from the planning and zoning meeting.”
The public still may voice their opinions on specific agenda items when they are brought forward in public hearings, according to the amended bylaws.
Residents who favor or oppose specific items, such as petitions, zoning requests or variances, may speak on the matter when they are brought forward by the petitioner. Those who wish to speak during a public hearing will be required to fill out an oath form with their name and address and state clearly what case they are speaking on.
Assistant County Counselor Jason Cordes told the commissioners that oftentimes people who comment at the planning and zoning meetings would be better served by speaking before the Jefferson County Council, the legislative body in the county.
“You’re here to hear specific applications to specific cases,” Cordes said to the commissioners. “You can hear these applications, rule on variations and make recommendations on zoning, but (the County Council) is the ultimate authority.”
County Services Director Mitch Bair said Planning and Zoning meetings are business meetings, saying it is “highly unorthodox” for a P and Z commission to have a public comment section, adding that when he previously worked for the county in 1997-99, there were no public comment portions on the Planning and Zoning agendas.
Siebert said he was unsure about getting rid of the opportunity for the public to comment on general issues at the P and Z meetings, even though it’s rare when someone speaks during the citizens to be heard section of the agenda.
“I know I’ve only been here since November, but I have yet to remember somebody actually coming up here and giving a public comment,” he said. “I don’t feel right about completely deleting it and leaving them out. If someone has major stormwater concerns, in general, and they want to bring it to our attention for future (meetings) that has no bearing on a particular case or hearing, I don’t feel right completely eliminating it. I’d prefer it stays where it’s at.”
Commission chair Jessie Scherrer initially said the public comment portion of the meeting should remain at the end of the meeting so commissioners aren’t swayed by people in the audience when making decisions on petitions, variances or zoning requests, before changing his mind and voting to eliminate the public comments.
“We’ve had members of the public show up who needed somebody to scream at, and we were the ones who got it,” Scherrer said. “There’s absolutely nothing we could do for them other than sit and listen to them. Most of the time, these people who want to crucify us and chastise us have no idea what we do; they have no understanding of the process or why we’re here. We’re just somebody else to throw darts at. We need to protect ourselves in that way and limit our negative exposure as much as we can.”
The next P and Z meeting will be held at 6:30 p.m., today, April 24 at the Assembly Room of the Jefferson County Administration Center, 729 Maple St., in Hillsboro.