On Council’s communications policy

Progressive Pensacola is pleased that the Pensacola City Council opted last week to not adopt a formal communications policy. Several Council members had suggested that the Council adopt a policy similar to the one recently adopted by the Escambia County Commission, which we feel is overly restrictive.

Instead, Council members agreed on an informal “gentleman’s agreement” to keep communications devices “out of sight” during meetings. That’s fair. There’s nothing in Florida Sunshine laws, or any other statute, that requires elected officials to leave their cellphones at home. Nor should there be. If you were a Council member with young children, for instance, would you want to cut their lifeline to you for the six or more hours some Council meetings have taken? There are legitimate reasons, such as children or elderly parents, that a Council member might need to have his or her cellphone on hand, albeit out of sight.

So we don’t understand the tone of the Pensacola News Journal‘s Sunday editorial condemning the decision. The editorial seemed to insinuate that the lack of a formal policy left unclear what Council members can and cannot do, which isn’t the case. Perhaps the News Journal is unfamiliar with Florida Sunshine laws. Council members cannot:

• Speak to, email, text-message, instant message, hand-signal, or in any other way communicate with one another about pending business, or any business which could conceivably come before the Council
• Use a third party, whether it is a person, or an outlet such as a blog, to communicate with another Council member about pending business

The County Commission adopted its policy in an abundance of caution, and in our opinion, they took it too far. The County’s policy widens the gap between County Commissioners and their constituents by banning valuable communications tools such as blogging and other social media.

We commend the City Council for rejecting a restrictive policy. This City Council has made tremendous strides in both citizen access to information and Council members’ communication with constituents. A year ago we had a Council full of people who didn’t return emails or phone calls, who could care less what people thought. Now we have a Council with several members who maintain blogs or websites as tools to push information out to constituents and foster debate. If there are any grey areas, or questions about what is acceptable, that’s why we have a City Attorney.

Furthermore, despite the News Journal‘s distortions, we feel it’s important to note that Councilman Larry B. Johnson at no point indicated any problem with the gentleman’s agreement. He said simply that he would leave his phone turned on, and set to vibrate, which is perfectly acceptable under the agreement.

We’re not sure of the News Journal‘s motives. We aren’t sure why they decided to skew the facts and paint City Council members as self-important, fussy, and immature. Maybe they didn’t watch the same meeting we did. Maybe they heard about it second-hand. Or maybe they’re just trying to generate some newspaper sales. We know how much they need them — but this yellow journalism stinks.

Links

• Pensacola News Journal: “Editorial: Rules are for sissies”