Council Meeting on Oct. 1 Requires Public Comment Registration

San Angelo City Council has a full agenda for its first meeting requiring citizens to register in order to offer public comment.  The agenda has twenty items. seventeen on the Consent agenda, and three on the Regular agenda.  

The agenda makes no mention of the change or procedures someone interested in making public comment must follow.  The City Clerk informed Council at the end of their last meeting that citizens needed to register with her prior to the meeting in order to speak.  The minutes for that instruction state:

City Clerk Heather Stastny reviewed changes to the recently adopted changes to the Public Comment Policy that will go into effect on October 1, 2024.

So someone would needed to have watched the last City Council meeting to know that instruction (117 page views as of today).

To sum up, there is no information on the agenda about the change and no information on the City's website regarding procedures citizens must follow in order to speak on an item.  A search for the mentioned Public Comment Policy produced "no results."

Let's hope Council provides flexibility for citizens during this first meeting under the new rules.  Someone in the room may be struck by the Southern Drag Boat Association wanting the city to waive the $10,000 annual fee for use of Lake Nasworthy for events already conducted in June and September.  

A citizen may have questions about the City taking over Lee Pfluger's nonprofit Concho Christmas Celebration and operating the event through Downtown San Angelo.  An observer may wish to encourage Council not to reduce the Retiree Medical Benefit as implied in the background packet memo.

Citizens in attendance should have the right to offer public comment on the Mayor or City Council members' statements made during the meeting as those are not on the agenda and occur in real time. 

 The City's organizational chart has citizens at the very top.   Let's hope it stays that way.

Update:  The City's Facebook page posted yesterday at 5:00 pm:

People wishing to speak at the City Council meeting must sign in before 8:30 a.m.

The post included the three regular agenda items and has 14 likes.

Update 10-1-24:  Mayor Gunter started off public comment by saying those people in attendance who "filled out a card" will be given the opportunity for public comment but those that did not would not have the chance to share their thoughts with Council during the meeting.  A number of city retirees showed up to speak about proposed changes to retiree health insurance.  Former Police Chief Russell Smith reminded Council of promises made to retirees and the city's history of adjusting them.

Animal Shelter Open Houses Had Poor Attendance, Ended Early

Five months of public meetings produced data from an average of three citizens per meeting.  Shelter Chief Morgan Chegwidden's 7-15-24 report to City Council included

To give citizens an avenue to communicate their concerns, animal services held weekly open house hours for five months from February 2024 through June 2024. Visitors were invited to tour, ask the experts, share concerns and ideas for this come-and-go casual gathering of people motivated to solve San Angelo’s animal concerns. 

About two dozen people attended on 2/7/24 but no more than two individuals reported on any subsequent date.

The meetings were to run through August but stopped the end of June due to poor attendance.  

I would suggest veterinarians are included in the list of people motivated to solve the city's animal concerns.  They might be worthy of a special focus group meeting, since the open houses were held at a time that most veterinarians were working.  That is if someone really wants feedback/public input. 

 Morgan's report suggests that is the case:

To encourage greater participation, we moved the meetings to Thursday evenings and hosted events, such as a pet resource fair and microchip clinic. With no additional attendance, we held our last open house 6/27/24 and will research additional ways to stay in touch with citizens’ needs and requests

Data says the weekly series of open houses was for show.  Three months in it was obviously not fulfilling its stated aim, yet there was no course correction.  

Citizens have taken to contacting their City Council representative to get a response from Animal Services.  I hope they keep doing that.  Maybe elected officials will figure out that something is wrong.

Time will tell if Council's lack of response remains firmly in place.

Lighthouse Employee Mauled by Dog Pack

City of San Angelo records indicate the following occurred:

September 18, 2024:  This morning around 8:00 am , an employee of The Lighthouse for the Blind was attacked by three dogs on N. Malone behind the Lighthouse building. 

It was a brutal attack and the victim is currently at the Emergency Room, blood everywhere, tore up his arm and face. This was disturbing, but the police officer could not get animal control to respond to capture the animals. When asked when the animal control would show up the officer could not give a time of arrival and so he went to the ER to get a statement from the victim. In my opinion, an attack would warrant an immediate response to capture the animals. We are now keeping our employees in the building.

Those came records indicate the city's response:

Citation:  Date/Time: 09/18/2024 12:34PM

The owner of the dogs was given 2 spay or neuter citations and 1 dog at large along with a 24 hour quarantine notice for both dogs for the attack they were both involved in sending the victim to ER for his injuries.

Shelter Chief Morgan Chegwidden informed City Councilman Harry Thomas that same day:

ASO’s responded immediately and all three dogs were impounded – the two that bit and a third unrelated.

That's not in line with the report from the police officer responding to the dog pack attack.  "Responded immediately" is not the same as "could not get Animal Control to respond to capture the animals" or "could not give a time" Animal Control would show up.

The attack happened around 8:00 am, the Animal Control Officer report is at 12:34 pm and Morgan's e-mail to Councilman Thomas was around 5:15 pm.

City Council has Public Safety as a top priority.  It's hard to believe that in the dangerous loose pet arena.

City Council's New Public Comment Registration to Start 10-1-24

City Clerk Heather Stasny previewed the new public comment restrictions at City Council today.  She said:

I just want to remind the public that on October 1st is when the new changes to the public comment policy will go into effect....(Mayor Gunter could not hear) ... 

the public comment that Council approved months ago will go into effect October 1st.  Just to remind citizens they will need to sign in for public comment before the meeting.  Speakers will be called in the order that they signed up giving priority to citizens of San Angelo first.  The times to speak remain the same at three minutes.  Comments must be directed to Council.  Questioning of staff is not appropriate at that time, of course Council has no obligation to respond and comments must be relevant to the authority of the city.

They will sign up with City Clerk or the deputy, which will be right here (the staff desk next to the raised City Council seating) before the meeting starts.

The new rules mean citizens will not be able to respond to any comments by the Mayor or Councilmembers during an agenda item.  Their positions on any item are not included in the background packet.  

Council practice is for the Mayor to interject her thoughts first on agenda items.  It takes a brave Councilmember to challenge her position, thus most members avoid comment during the meeting.

Today's City Council had few members of the public in attendance.  One person referenced the permission to speak change and wondered how to do that.  That opened the door for staff to preview the new rules.

Listening to someone (who took the time out of their day to attend) for three minutes is a small gift for an elected official/public servant to grant.  I imagine Council watchers got the hint that citizen feedback is generally unwanted.  

Government should be responsive to the people.  It will be interesting to see what happens when an item compels many people to attend.  Will the rules cause complications, extending the meeting length to deal with the new bureaucracy?

We shall find out how these "reasonable rules" work when many citizens wish to have their voice heard on an agenda item.

ASAC Meets & Welcomes New Members

San Angelo's Animal Shelter Advisory Committee welcomed three new members.  The meeting kicked off with public comment.  Director of Neighborhood and Family Service Bob Salas stated the temporary shelter is being permitted and he expects construction to begin in a month or so.

New board member Penny Roberts asked about the location of the temporary facility.  Shelter Chief Morgan Chegwidden said she would get Roberts a presentation as "they want us to be careful and not dialogue in this section."  Sharing a fact with a new board member relative to earlier public comment by a city leader hardly seems like dialogue.

I took the liberty of including information on the temporary shelter's location in the above image.  New board members asked questions during the meeting which the agenda did not accommodate.  So future agenda items include:

1. Shelter capacity
2. Enforcement of ordinances
3. Budget 
4. Barriers for the public to access shelter services

Morgan admitted the ASAC failed to comply with city ordinance by only meeting twice in 2023.  She did not say city leaders had over two months to schedule and hold a committee meeting but chose not to do so.  Bob Salas instructed Morgan not to reschedule, according to an 11-14-23 internal e-mail.

Bob, missed you at 4pm – wanted to clarify this messaging. Brian’s referencing a reschedule of ASAC but you’d previously discussed proceeding with the 2024 calendar with no additions. Will there be a meeting in the near future?

Nope, as Bob instructed there were "no additions."  Salas gave an update on the temporary Animal Shelter but provided no information on renovating the existing facility (City Council approved financing for the project in early 2023).  The last official word was the project would go out for bids in May.  That is yet to happen.

New board members have much to learn.  I hope staff answers as many questions in public as possible.  That is the open and transparent thing to do.

Gov. Abbott Issues New Hospital Regulation

The Hill reported:

Beginning Nov. 1, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott is directing hospitals in Texas to gather data on “patients who are not lawfully present in the United States,” as well as the number of inpatient discharges and emergency visits and the costs of care.

The Texas Hospital Association responded with:

Texas Governor Greg Abbott“This would be a new requirement, and we are reviewing it as quickly as possible. Right now, hospitals don’t ask about patient immigration status as a condition of treatment. Hospitals are required by law to provide life-saving treatment to anyone, regardless of ability to pay or status.”

That's less than three months for hospital electronic medical record systems to add this field.  Surely, the Texas Health and Human Service Commission has ways of estimating the financial cost of treating undocumented persons in Texas hospitals.  

Texas has not participated in Medicaid expansion and as a result:

there are about 5 million uninsured Texans

The Governor left federal money to pay for hospital care on the table since he was sworn into office.  He passed over a bonus for recalcitrant states, those yet to participate. 

Hospitals have a difficult job to begin with.  Gov. Abbott just made it harder for those providing and those seeking care. It's a shame.

Update 8-12-24:  Gov. Abbott and the political Red Team have turned hospitals into no treatment zones for women with ectopic pregnancies.  New Mexico is recruiting Texas OB/GYN physicians as a result.

Council Subsidizes Businesses, Cracks Down on People

San Angelo City Council approved the sale of 17 acres in the Industrial Park to LTG Real Estate Group LLC in Grapevine, Texas.  The property was appraised in January at $48,000 per acre.  Council approved selling the property for $25,000 per acre due to site issues.  

The Development Corporation approved the item in their July meeting.

The City approved a tax rate as part of the budget process.  Council stressed that fees should reflect the cost of providing the service during a previous budget meeting.  That seems to conflict with today's discounted land sale.

A citizen spoke during public comment about an upcoming Tom Green County Appraisal District board meeting.  She encouraged people to attend and shared her concerns about the board appointment process as well as the move to appraise properties annually instead of once every three years.  

Tax abatement for significant capital projects that provide some measure of employment also passed 7-0 in today's meeting.  In order to receive tax breaks up to 85% applicants must provide at least one full time job.  

Corporations as a whole did much better than financially stressed citizens as Council restricted the ability for homeless people to be in certain areas from 10 pm to 6 am with a camping ordinance change.  The head of San Angelo's Homeless Coalition thought he had five minutes to offer public comment as an affected party but was cut off at three.

Citizens should take advantage of free and open public comment while it lasts.  Today's meeting, had it occurred in October would've had far fewer public comments.  

Update:  City Council raised the tax rate from 70.42 cents per hundred valuation to 75.57 cents,  That nickel increase is a 7.3 percent increase in the tax rate.  Inflation is not going away for San Angelo homeowners.  Neither the prior rate nor the increase were included in the City Council background packet.  Truth in Taxation and transparency should ensure that information is shared as a bare minimum.

Old rate:  70.42 cents per $100 valuation

New rate: 75.57 cents per $100 valuation 

Increase:  5.15 cents or 7.3%