Monday,  February 10 , 2025

Linkedin Pinterest
News / Politics / Clark County Politics

Vancouver City Council weighs new policies to curtail disruptions at meetings

Rules would address audience members who create interruptions with clapping, shouting, gestures

By Alexis Weisend, Columbian staff reporter
Published: January 14, 2025, 1:23pm

If you’ve been to a Vancouver City Council meeting, you’ve most likely witnessed interruptions from audience members in the form of clapping, talking, gestures or shouting.

On Monday, the city council took the first step toward updating its policies to prohibit that kind of behavior.

“Ultimately, what we’re seeking to do is really provide a mechanism where there’s some predictability that if people willfully violate these rules that there are consequences that they’ll be held to,” then-City Attorney Jonathan Young said.

The new rules would designate council meetings as limited public forums where the time, place and manner of speech can be regulated.

Anyone making comments or noises out of order would be subject to removal from the city’s public meetings and potentially lose the right to speak.

The proposed policy language states if speakers continue talking after their three minutes are up, they’ll have three strikes until the mayor gavels a five-minute recess and the speaker is issued a written notice of a 90-day suspension of the right to provide verbal comment at any public city meeting.

After the recess, the mayor will warn the audience if any other speaker refuses to stop talking after the three minutes or is disruptive, public comment will be terminated for the night.

If a speaker who received a 90-day suspension disrupts a meeting for a second time within a year, they’ll be issued a 180-day suspension.

The proposed language limits clapping to after proclamations and presentations “at the discretion of the presiding officer,” which usually means the mayor.

It’s not uncommon for Mayor Anne McEnerny-Ogle to limit clapping at meetings or ask disruptive audience members to leave.

Recently, a woman who frequently disrupts council meetings was escorted out by police, and the council chambers were cleared. She initially refused to leave but eventually agreed to go. Soon after, she entered the council meeting remotely, disrupting three times before city staff muted her.

Although the city council can limit people’s ability to give public comment, people can still attend city council meetings unless they are violent or dangerous, Young said.

“I appreciate that clarification because I know that we have had some members that have joined us in the chambers where they’ve made a lot of noise in the audience so that we can’t hear other people talking or conversing that are at the dais or trying to speak to us,” Councilor Sarah Fox said.

She said the intent of the proposed changes are not to limit the topic of public comment but to minimize disruptions.

“I know we were hoping that you would bring forward something that could help us better control those folks that are intentionally trying to be disruptive and rude and insulting,” Fox said to Young.

Young said Spokane Valley and La Center have similar policies for public meetings.

The council will vote on the policy change when it appears on a future consent agenda.

Stay informed on what is happening in Clark County, WA and beyond for only
$99/year

Councilors also debated whether, with public forums on the agenda every month, they should stop hosting special public forums four times a year outside City Hall. Those forums used to be the only opportunity to speak to a city councilor in person about any topic during a meeting before the council adding monthly forums to its agenda.

The council will decide other policy changes — including those affecting public forums, attendance and all-council emails — this summer or sooner.

Loading...