Public comment/testimony

[Guest Richard Knee]

In what section does Robert's Rules address the question of whether a body must respond to a question from an audience member? Pls email response ASAP to rak0408[at]earthlink.net

[Gary Novosielski]

In what section does Robert's Rules address the question of whether a body must respond to a question from an audience member?

In no section, because the obligation does not exist in RONR. In fact, a body need not permit an audience in the first place. Your rules may supersede this, however.

[Guest Richard Knee]

In no section, because the obligation does not exist in RONR. In fact, a body need not permit an audience in the first place. Your rules may supersede this, however.

Gary, thanks for your prompt and helpful response. In this case, audience admittance is indeed required, because the body in question is part of city government.

[Gary c Tesser]

Gary, thanks for your prompt and helpful response. In this case, audience admittance is indeed required, because the body in question is part of city government.

Robert's Rules still doesn't say anything. So (speaking as a sentient being, and not for Robert's Rules, and certainly not as a lawyer) whatever the city government requires, is what is required. Ask the city government whether the "audience" (no offense meant with the quotation marks, but the word gives me the jitters) has the right to speak. Or any other right. For that matter (still speaking as a sentient being, not a lawyer), I point out that, logically, it does not necessarily follow that being part of city government requires a body to admit an audience. (As perhaps the premiere example, the phrase "executive session ... originally referred to the consideration of executive business ... behind closed doors in the United States Senate [RONR, 10th Ed, p. 92]," which, you might recall from High School Biology, is a government body. Flaccid, orotund and mostly somnolescent, unlike, say, me and Megan Fox, but a body nonetheless.

(I used to say me and Nicole Kidman, but she's gettin old.)

[George Mervosh]

Talk about wading into it, GcT (I know what the lil "c" stands for by the way)

[Gary Novosielski]

Gary, thanks for your prompt and helpful response. In this case, audience admittance is indeed required, because the body in question is part of city government.

Things get more complicated with public bodies. Typically there will be state Sunshine Laws that require admitting the public during non-executive sessions, restrict the reasons why executive session may be used, and depending on the jurisdiction, may require hearing from the public on agenda items, or on any subject. None of these requirements will be found in RONR.

I am not a lawyer, so ignore me when I say that I've never seen a regulation anywhere that would REQUIRE an answer to a question posed by a member of the public. I mean, they may not even have the answer; or if they have it, nobody present may know it offhand. The only thing Sunshine Laws usually guarantee is the right to observe and sometimes the right to be heard. But after you say your piece, don't be surprised if they just say "Thank you--next."

It would be an unusual rule indeed that would require them to give you an answer, and they'd be some sad excuse for politicians if they gave you a straight one.