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NEWTON: Commissioners, it’s time to shorten these meetings, please.
Evan Newton headshot

In my six-plus months of covering the news cycle in Newton County, I have not seen a more divided front than the Newton County Board of Commissioners.

Almost immediately after I wrote my column on seeing more unity in 2024, the very next meeting things went south again with fighting across the board on several topics.

But if it’s one thing that all citizens – and hopefully commissioners – can agree on is that these meetings have gotten way too long.

One of the expectations I’ve now gathered from covering BOC meetings, is that you know they’re going to be at least three-hour ordeals, if not longer. This has rang true for the most part, with three of the more recent meetings going longer than three hours within the last two months.

The most recent meeting on May 7 lasted four hours and one minute – not even including the work session that occurred beforehand.

One gentleman, who said it was his first time attending a BOC meeting, had this to say about what transpired.

“I’ve never been in a meeting that took so many hours to address basically nothing.”

So what did the BOC address last Tuesday night?

Well for starters, it took 20 minutes just to approve the agenda. The chairman’s report took around 30 minutes. Ditto that of the county manager’s report.

And then the big ticket item on the agenda for that meeting was the discussion of a new ordinance regarding citizens’ comments, which took just under an hour.

That’s right. A whole hour.

I guess while we’re at it, I’ll give my opinion on the matter. A removal of any portion of citizens’ comments should have never been on any agenda. Point blank period.

I get that certain commissioners have been under a lot of heat lately – it is election season after all. But that should never stop citizens from talking about any county-related matters that they please to the commissioners, and the fact that was even in jeopardy at one point is quite frankly embarrassing.

Speaking to that, I think that the citizens who wish to speak should do so in a respectful, honorable manner.

No, cursing at a commissioner isn’t OK. No, accusing a commissioner of pocketing their own money isn’t OK.

So what happens when someone goes out of line? Throw them out.

It is an extremely simple concept that could easily be enforced with the current rules that are already in place here in Newton County. 

If an ordinance needs to be created to help enforce those rules, then so be it. But don’t take up an hour of your citizens’ time to discuss something that really shouldn’t take more than 15 minutes to discuss, or even any time at all. 

One part of that aforementioned proposed ordinance was a time limit suggested by the county attorney Patrick Jaugstetter of 30 minutes total for citizens to speak. According to Jaugsettter, this suggestion was made in the interest “of moving meetings along.”

That’s ridiculous.

If each citizen were to come up and take the entire three minutes, then that would mean only 10 citizens could speak each meeting. I get it’s a proposal and that the board has not officially voted on that as of yet, but to make that suggestion is really upsetting.

Instead of limiting the citizens time, maybe implement a time limit on items of discussion for the agenda. Maybe it’s 15 minutes per agenda item. Maybe it’s 20. I don’t know. 

What I do know is that these meetings are taking way too long and should be shortened, but not at the citizen’s expense.

Evan Newton is the news editor of The Covington News. He can be reached at enewton@covnews.com.