A common issue frequently arises concerning public meetings of County Commissioners, City Council and Township Trustees: can government officials/bodies limit public comment/discussion during these meetings?
Courts have held public meetings are considered a limited public forum. As a limited public forum, the government entity can impose reasonable, content-neutral speech restrictions during public meetings. Thus, government entities can impose time restrictions, limit discussion to certain parts of the meetings, or any other reasonable, content-neutral restrictions. Public officials should also keep in mind that they cannot necessarily automatically eject someone from a meeting based on a single violation of meeting rules. For example, in order to eject someone under rules prohibiting disruptions of the meeting, the individual must actually engage in conduct that would reasonably be deemed disruptive conduct. As a result, a government actor must be careful that the disruption defense is not used as pretext for ejecting an individual based on the content of the speech.
Overall, when considering and enforcing rules regarding public comment and discussion at public meetings, public officials must be sure to fairly enforce whatever rules are currently in place. For instance, if members of the public are allowed 5 minutes to speak on an issue, make sure every person actually receives that time, if needed, regardless of viewpoint, assuming he or she is not disruptive. Or, if the meeting allows 15 minutes for all public comment, be sure the time is divided as close to evenly as possible between everyone who wishes to speak. While it may be easier in the short-term to make exceptions to individual members of the public, keep in mind that doing so may create issues down the road if an aggrieved individual challenges a policy or decision limiting his or her speech. But, as long as public officials focus on remaining consistent in their decisions regarding public speech, they can limit First Amendment complaints.
If you have a specific scenario or complaint in regard to this issue, and would like assistance, contact one of the attorneys at Fishel Downey Albrecht & Riepenhoff LLP.