In Person or Hybrid Public Comment at Board Meetings

[William Iannuzzi]

Hey All,

I am from a small city school district.

We are preparing to return to in person Board Meetings. 

Was wondering how other districts are doing public comment and if its just in person public comment or if any districts are offering "hybrid" public comment and letting members of the public speak virtually?

[Eileen Panico]

We have returned to public meetings (in person) and the public who wish to attend have the microphone during public participation. Virtual meetings (if any) - the public submitted email questions and our District Clerk would summarize them and dig out the actual question.

[Paul Haggett]

This is a really interesting discussion and not something we have addressed as a board. Fortunately few sticky issues have arisen since the pandemic, but it seems we should set up a protocol for increasing our public participation.

[Bob McCann]

We have stayed as close to our regular "in person" practice of how public comments are done. We have been back at in person for awhile now and have asked the public to send in the comments via email or come to the meeting. We are not currently putting our meetings on line. (luckily we rarely get 1-2 people at our meetings). If someone would like to speak /present to the BOE we arrange a google meet invite for them and generally it will only be audio, but they still are asked to submit name address etc. Remember, under State Ed law, Public comment is at the discretion of the BOE President and not a legal right, if there are abuses happening, we can just stop it all together.

[Suzie Lustig]

I have to figure out how to "undo" how we are handling it without inflaming. Allowing them to talk without their camera on now feels one step removed from being like a social media interaction. But perhaps I will have to wait until my December meeting to make this change. Knowing other districts are allowing in the public in small numbers lends credibility- although we are on Long Island so it's definitely more complicated.

[Rob Curtis]

We offer a hybrid on public comment. If someone attends the meeting they can speak and we check our BOE email at the beginning and end of the meeting for any comments. If any come in during the meeting we will read and respond before the end of the meeting.

[Colette Dow]

Prior to returning to in person board meetings we allowed the public to make comments during our remote meetings by elevating them to Participants in zoom calls and then returning them to Attendee after they made their comments. Since returning to in person (limit of 25 community members can attend in person) we are able to allow for comments at the microphone as well as comments from those observing the meeting remotely and we use the same process mentioned above to bring them into the live in-person meeting. We require anyone who is making a comment remotely to have their camera on.

[Suzie Lustig]

We are having a challenging situation to navigate ourselves. At end of August we brought in the the BOE and Admins in person and the community on zoom. They can register to view and then raise their hands to ask questions via live audio. Since we originally streamed on google meets when school was closed (where they could only email questions) they were used to not having their cameras on. Now we are on zoom they control their cameras and are basically refusing to turn on the cameras. So without eye contact, it is emboldening people in their tone and lack of filter. I wish I could dial it back.

[Dominick Vulpis]

We offer a "Hybrid" to our in-person public comments using a boe email address having a member monitor during meetings.

[Meredith Heuer]

We have been offering a hybrid version for public comment since we have a limit of around 35 people that can fit in the room where we hold our meetings. It's a little cumbersome but we didn't want the public to feel shut out.