Voice of OC (https://voiceofoc.org/tag/oc-supervisor-meeting-public-comments/)
While some agencies have updated their options for remote commenters, many local boards have cut out live public comment and are only reading write-in comments.
Residents now can have their voice heard at public meetings of the Orange County Board of Supervisors if they can’t attend due to a disability.
Andrew Do and Michelle Steel are running this year for what are considered the toughest election races that any of the five supervisors are seeking.
Supervisor Andrew Do confirmed he asked Angie Cano to resign, but declined to say if it was because of her public comments.
Following a systematic attack on public comment, the Orange County Board of Supervisors triggers a First Amendment lawsuit from the ACLU. It’s the second time in recent years that county supervisors have fumbled taxpayers into court — landing in federal court last year over civil rights violations involving the homeless.
Orange County’s five elected supervisors preside over $6 billion in public spending and pressing issues like homelessness, mental health and drug treatment, and how to balance spending between those programs and county jails, the Sheriff’s Department, and District Attorney’s Office.
Mohammed Aly refused to stop speaking when his three minutes were up. A sheriff’s deputy threatened to arrest a Voice of OC reporter who was filming Aly and sheriff’s officers when everyone was ordered to leave the board room.
County Counsel Leon Page is defending a ban on public commenters addressing supervisors by name, among other the ACLU claims is illegal. In response, ACLU officials say county supervisors will be set straight by the courts if they don’t change their policies.
In recent months, Orange County supervisors put tighter and tighter restrictions on speakers who try to address them at public board meetings. The ACLU’s letter is prompting county officials to consider possible policy changes.
In her first meeting as the chairwoman of supervisors, Michelle Steel limited speakers to just one minute during the public comment period. This was the latest in a series of moves supervisors have made in recent years to curtail speakers at the board’s public meetings.