Council
fails to maintain 'order'
Roadway funding issue
falls by wayside
The Daily Advertiser /
The
City-Parish Council took two hours Tuesday to decide not to adopt Robert's
Rules of Order, then voted to try out the parliamentary procedure for the
remainder of the meeting.
The
experiment lasted for only two agenda items before the council voted to go
back to its traditional manner of conducting meetings. That was at 9 p.m. on
agenda item 10. The meeting began at 5:30 p.m.
The first
victim of Robert's Rules was Councilman Chris Williams, who was silenced on
the very next agenda item after speaking only 10 minutes, the limit allowed by
Robert's Rules.
It
was Williams who unsuccessfully lobbied the council Tuesday to implement
Robert's Rules permanently to "take favoritism out of how we operate as a
council and how we treat citizens when they come before this body."
The council
usually is governed by the chairman.
Williams
and Councilman Louis Benjamin have complained that letting the chairman rule
gives him too much power to stifle minority opinions. Other rules also
restrict their ability to place items on the agenda and buck the consistent
7-2 vote.
Council
Chairman Rob Stevenson advised that Robert's Rules of Order is very
restrictive.
"I
don't think anyone will be pleased with it," he said "The
restrictions would make Mr. Williams' head pop off."
Councilman
Randy Menard offered a substitute motion, which was adopted by a 6-3 vote,
that makes minor adjustments to the rules by which the council operates.
"It's
amazing to me you would take an instrument designed to be more restrictive ...
only to solidify what the good old boys" have been doing, Williams said.
Stevenson
turned off Williams' microphone because of the comments.
"Don't
ever turn my microphone off again while you are chair. Don't ever. Don't ever
do it again," Williams said. "You did it at the last meeting. ...
The ignorance you displayed took away from the ability of the public to
understand what was going on at the meeting. While my mic is on, don't you
ever censure me."
Under
existing rules, certain council members are treated unfairly and their
constituents are treated with less respect than others, Williams said. Also,
it can take 25 days to place an item on a council agenda. Some items must be
addressed quicker, so he brings them up under council announcements, he said.
"This
particular instrument is censorship, a way of tweaking the process and putting
the squeeze on those things you guys don't want to hear," Williams said.
Benjamin
said the consistent 7-2 vote pitting black councilmen against white will
continue "because of the hostility and mean-spiritedness" on the
council.
"It's
mean-spirited, and it's only going to get worse," he said of the
council's refusal to rename Willow Street after Martin Luther King Jr.
"If you want to take it personally, that's your business as long as you
keep your distance.
"Lafayette
needs to understand the civil rights movement has passed. Maybe it's going to
resurrect. I'm not coming around shuffling like an old shuffling Negro. I got
enough shuffling Negroes. I'm not shuffling," Benjamin said. "We're
going to get people shuffling around tomorrow saying 'You starting some
trouble again.' Somebody needs to give them guys some gumbo."
Williams
added, "You guys have been overt and covert. You've utilized the media,
you've called the media, you've done things above the table and below the
table. It's underhanded ..."
Councilman
Bobby Badeaux said Robert's Rules might stop councilmen from calling others
good old boys and other names and questioning their ancestry. Under Robert's
Rules, they would be ejected from the meeting, he said.
"I
don't think it matters what rules we put in here, those individuals ... will
be schoolyard bullies, will continue to threaten people, will continue to
threaten people's integrity," Badeaux said. "As is evident on this
council, when things don't go a councilman's way, they yell, cry and scream.
... Those people who don't think they need to follow the rules will continue
to shout other people down, threaten them and do whatever."
Councilman
Marc Mouton asked Williams and Benjamin to "put an end to this rhetoric
that you seem to embrace for no reason."
Using the
transfer of money from frontage roads in north Lafayette to a south Lafayette
project "was intellectually a very lazy issue in which to cast light on
fact that we are approaching election time which ... is what this is all
about," Mouton said. "I suggest your politicking and grandstanding
should be done in your district and not at council meetings."
The issue
of funding for road construction was introduced at Tuesday's meeting, but no
action was taken.
Originally published February 8, 2006