City Council Enters 2023

San Angelo's City Council met for the first time in 2023 with one item on the regular agenda.  Council got an earful from citizens during public comment.  One gentleman offered predictions that some form of justice awaited those seated in their high chairs.  

A number of citizens asked for the city to do more for the community's homeless population.  One request was for city leaders and elected officials to simply show up one day later this month.

Another resident asked City Council once again to prioritize the Animal Shelter and do more to serve the countless stray animals in city limits.  During public comment she said:

"My friends are sick of getting up here to ask for help. They feel anything they say falls on deaf ears.  On Tuesday mornings... many of them are at a spay/neuter clinic on Council meeting days.  They have at least one clinic a week where they spay/neuter with pain meds and vaccinate at least 35 animals.  They are volunteers and they seem to be doing more to solve our pet overpopulation problem than our city.  Why is our city not hearing any feedback?  We are not hearing from anybody."

She asked Council to steer more funding to spay/neuter services and ordinance enforcement.  Council did not respond.  

The City used the same "no response" strategy after receiving urgent letters from PETA and two local animal rescues regarding the Animal Shelter's shutting off dog intake for the month of November.  Refusing lost dogs stretched into December due to high shelter occupancy.  The current state of shelter availability was not shared with Council or the public in today's meeting.

Council decided last month not to serve citizens requests for public information once staff time reaches 36 hours in any fiscal year.  They passed the restriction two and a half months into the fiscal year, making it retroactive.

Council's public information vote included an exemption for elected officials, i.e, they retained a privilege they took away from interested citizens.  Generally, that goes over poorly with the public.

The public likes rule changes to be forecast, well communicated and citizens be given time to change behavior.  That's not the City of San Angelo in the areas of public information or pet spay/neuter ordinance enforcement.  The "go back" period for the city to issue citations went from two months to two years with no explanation.  

2023 is off to an expensive start, thanks to the one item Council approved.  Sewage upgrades at Lake Nasworthy will have big economic development impacts.   If only stray animals and homeless people fit into an economic development framework.  I imagine employers don't want to relocate to a community with third world treatment of pets and people.