NORTH BRUNSWICK – Although there was one dissenting vote, the members of the North Brunswick Township Council have approved limiting the time members of the public may speak during regular council meetings.
Currently, a 15-minute window is allotted at the end of a workshop meeting for residents to speak. For example, if there are 15 people seeking to provide comment, each would have one minute to address the council. That will remain in place.
During regular council meetings, a resident was allowed five minutes at a time to speak, for an unlimited number of times. The clock applied to when the resident was speaking; when a council person or a department director responded, the clock stopped.
On Jan. 14, council members Amanda Guadagnino, Carlo Socio, Bob Davis, Bob Corbin and Dr. Will Lopez voted “yes” to change the policy to limit an individual to three turns at the microphone for a total of 15 minutes. The rule of stopping the clock when a response is being given to the speaker still applies.
Councilman Ralph Andrews voted “no” on the proposed change and said he wanted the opposite to happen: he said he would like the council to take a two-thirds vote in the event a person was speaking too long to decide if the conversation should continue.
“This governing body has never limited conversation,” Andrews said. “We don’t really have a problem where we need to limit comment, that’s just my personal opinion.”
He said council members are not in a position to tell a resident how to get his or her point across.
“If someone is making a point, for whatever reason we may or may not like, at that point to not continue the conversation, to me, is shutting down the debate,” Andrews said.
Davis reiterated his statement from a Jan. 7 workshop meeting that someone who is seeking a resolution to a specific problem should go through a department director first and then come to the mayor and council for discussion.
