The last meeting of the 2023 calendar year of the Fremont City Council was one of the shortest meetings of the past 12 months, with only one actionable item on the regular agenda. The public comment portion of the meeting featured several residents urging the council to maintain the public comment sessions in the future.
Mayor Joey Spellerberg was joined by only five members of the council for the meeting, but all present donned festive holiday clothing with assorted Christmas messages and imagery. New Ward 2 council Member Blair Horner was the unofficial winner of the costumery, with an elaborate sweater adorned with ribbons and other holiday items.
Present for the meeting were Sally Ganem, Dev Sookram, Mark Jensen, Blair Horner and Lori Lathrop. Absent from the meeting were Paul Von Behren, Tad Dinkins and James Vaughan.
In his opening comments of the meeting, Spellerberg wished a Merry Christmas to all, and also thanked all the city staffers and elected officials for their hard work and diligence during 2023, noting that a lot had been accomplished by city leaders. He also lauded city residents for their role in making Fremont a great city to live in.
People are also reading…
The only actionable item on the meeting agenda aside from consent agenda items was the second reading of a proposed zoning change for a new, 147-home residential neighborhood called Hills Lake Farm, south of the Southeast Beltway on land now used as a gravel and sand pit. The second reading of the change was approved in a 5-0 vote.
During the public comment period of the meeting, which occurs for 30 minutes preceding the last meeting of each month, numerous local residents took the opportunity to criticize what they believe might be changes coming to the popular public comment sessions.
Their concerns stem from comments made by Ward 3 council Member James Vaughan, who has proposed altering the format of the end-of-month public comment sessions, calling them problematic and broken in part because the council is prohibited from responding to speakers.
Vaughan, as other council members have in the past, also claimed that some speakers spread misinformation or use the comment period to lob insults at the council, actions he believes are unacceptable. No action has been taken on Vaughan’s vague proposal to alter the public comment sessions.
Controversy surrounding the public comment sessions also increased after the public comment from the Nov. 28 city council meeting was not live-streamed as usual during the meeting and was initially posted online at the city’s YouTube page. After complaints from the public, city IT officials added the missing public comment video about a week later.
On Tuesday, numerous residents expressed their opinions on several topics, including the desire to not change the public comment period.
Former council member Brad Yerger touched on several subjects during his comments, including urging the council to ensure that the Keene Memorial Library’s internet filtering programs work as officials claim they do; demanding an update on the investigation into Council President Mark Jensen’s yelling at local resident Deb Brunmeier in September; and also how much money the city was spending on legal fees.
“Could one of you council members get an update about the (Brunmeier) noise and public comment violations (investigations)? This is a five-minute recap from documented video and the review of a couple of city code sections. It has been months, and no action has been afforded to the Brunmeiers,” Yerger said, noting that his public records requests for information on the case had been denied because of an exemption for cases being investigated by law enforcement.
The incident Yerger was referring to stems from an official complaint filed by Deb Brunmeier in October, seeking to have Jensen charged with a misdemeanor violation of the city’s municipal code after he screamed at her twice at the last council meeting of September.
Resident Glen Kay said the public comment sessions should be kept and also shown on the city’s YouTube feed in both a live-stream and archived video.
“I am here to say, I truly hope you continue the public comment to be allowed at the last city council meeting of the month. The public should have the right to speak about concerns of the city, and yes, the public comment time should be shown on the live stream of the council meetings also,” Kay said. “It is posted as being previous to the scheduled council meetings, just as other meetings you schedule, so it should be all available on the video. The understanding is the council cannot respond at that time to anything that has been brought to your attention. But, it has proven to be beneficial on some subjects.”
Steven Ray also said public comment was needed as a way for the city’s residents to tell council members about problems in a transparent manner in front of the public at a meeting.
“People do bring things to you in open comment, and you’re to look into it and give them feedback. To my, nobody ever gets any feedback,” Ray said.
Another resident, Gene Schultz, told the council that he has hearing issues and sometimes cannot hear what is being said during council meetings even though he is present in the room. He said the archived YouTube videos of the meetings allow him to replay meetings at home and hear what was said.
“When I got home on the night of Nov. 28, I wanted to listen to parts of the council meeting that I could not hear when I sit here in the room. I found the video was posted on YouTube as always, but the public comments were missing,” Schultz recalled. “Naturally, due to recent events, I thought the worst: that it was left out on purpose.”
Schultz said he contacted City Clerk Tyler about the missing video feed, and that it was later added to the online archived video the following week.
“Then on Dec. 16, my suspicions were confirmed in a letter to the editor (published in the Tribune) by Mark Jensen. Mark spilled the beans that the city of Fremont had made an administrative decision to not broadcast the public comment period,” Schultz said. “What was so offensive that the public comments had to be censored. Was it the delayed tribute to Glen Ellis or are there things just above criticism? I rely on the YouTube video to hear what was said in meetings.”
“I can go home and replay it where the sound quality is better. I believe the YouTube videos of the meetings is a public service for the handicapped, for those too busy to attend in person, for those who are working and can’t attend, for those that have to stay at home with the kids and for those who don’t have transportation,” Schultz added. “I guess in the days ahead, we’ll have to see if the city council is about service to the public or service to the whims of the council or others.”
