OPINION: Killeen council would benefit from shorter meeting agendas

The Killeen City Council has a problem with its meeting agendas.

Simply put, they’re too full.

On Tuesday, the council’s regular meeting started at 5 p.m. and adjourned after 9:30. But then the council launched into a special meeting that didn’t wrap up until a few minutes after 11 p.m.

More concerning is the fact that the late meeting was for the presentation of the municipal budget for the coming fiscal year, followed by a discussion of the city’s upcoming capital improvement projects.

Certainly, that’s a lot of information for council members to absorb and process under any circumstances. Dropping it on the council more than 4½ hours into the evening’s workload undoubtedly made the task even more difficult.

No doubt, the budget presentation was necessary, and with the budget calendar calling for several public hearings and workshops on the subject, there was little wiggle room on scheduling it.

However, putting the special meeting on the calendar for a night that also featured a scheduled agenda item on economic development options was not a sound decision.

As a result, the lengthy discussion on economic development — which also included a presentation by the Killeen Economic Development Corp. — pushed back consideration of all the subsequent agenda items, resulting in another late night for the council.

A similar situation developed three weeks ago, when a scheduled discussion of governing standards went sideways, drawing out the meeting by nearly 45 minutes. That should have been anticipated as well, since the preliminary discussion of the item the week before had been rather contentious.

To be fair, it’s not always easy to predict which agenda items will generate a lot of discussion and which ones won’t, but complex, sometimes controversial issues like how the city structures its economic development efforts should get extra consideration.

That said, however, some items are guaranteed to require a large block of time, such as the city human resources director’s presentation on the proposed employee health plan. Council members sat through a detailed discussion of the plan’s coverage options, fees and copays, complete with a multi-slide PowerPoint presentation.

Granted, this was something that had to be discussed, as the council is required to sign off on the health plan before it can go into effect.

However, scheduling the presentation in the midst of a 33-item agenda was a huge mistake. Partly because the item required such a large block of time, several items were pushed back to the following week — which served to make for yet another long night for the council and mayor.

The City Council last year approved a stipulation that discussion could not begin on any agenda item after 11 p.m., except by consent of the council members.

Unfortunately, the council has run up against its self-imposed deadline more than once in the last few weeks.

And given the number of items on the meeting agendas, it’s hardly a surprise.

A little research shows that the council had a 25-item agenda on June 7, a 20-item agenda followed by a Public Facilities Corp. meeting on June 14; the aforementioned 33-item agenda on June 21 and a 23-item agenda for a regular meeting on June 28, followed by a workshop to discuss the seven items that got pushed back the week before. Last week’s meeting featured 23 discussion items, followed by a three-item workshop — with the big workshop item being an hour-long budget presentation.

No doubt, Killeen is a fast-growing city, and as such, the amount of business that comes before the City Council is substantial.

However, packing an agenda with 25-30 items is counterproductive, both for the city’s elected officials and the residents they serve.

Expecting council members to tackle often-complex issues toward the tail end of a five- or six-hour meeting is unreasonable — and it is an invitation to poorly deliberated issues and rushed decisions.

Long, drawn-out meetings can also contribute to sharp exchanges and frayed tempers, which have been on display a few times in recent weeks.

Additionally, long meetings are not in the public’s interest. Though the council meetings and workshops are televised live on the city’s cable channel, lengthy meetings discourage in-person public input and penalize those who have items under consideration far down the agenda.

Now, with the city’s annual budget process underway, the council will be under increased pressure to analyze, scrutinize and prioritize the information the proposed document contains, as well as suggest changes as warranted.

Between now and Sept. 13, when the council is scheduled to approve the budget and adopt the tax rate, the city will have four council workshops and two public hearings on the subject.

It would be wise of the mayor and city manager, who are in charge of setting the meeting agendas, to restrict the number of other items scheduled for discussion on those meeting dates.

Also, it is crucial that council members be up to speed regarding the main areas of the budget document before engaging in discussion.

To that end, Councilman Riakos Adams successfully proposed a budget workshop for July 18 — to be capped at three hours. He correctly advised his fellow council members to get familiar with the proposed budget before that workshop, rather than tie up discussion with questions that are addressed in the document.

Working smart is the key to working better. But that concept can only take the council so far, as long as members are tasked with confronting upwards of 20 discussion items in an evening.

Just because an item is listed on the agenda doesn’t mean it must be discussed that night. It should only be addressed if it can be addressed adequately.

Moving forward, the mayor and city manager should agree to limit agendas to 15 discussion items or fewer. Consent items would be exempted, since they are generally voted on as a group.

A second improvement would be to reduce the amount of time each council member is authorized to speak on each item. Currently, the limit is five minutes, and each member is allowed to comment up to three times.

That can really add up when the council and mayor get into a drawn-out discussion. The council should consider changing the rule to five minutes for the first comment, then two minutes each for subsequent comments.

Another positive step would be to move complex items like the budget presentation, city employee health plan or changes to the governing standards to special stand-alone meetings that would not be held in conjunction with regularly scheduled meetings.

The change might add more meeting dates to the council’s schedule, but it’s better than dragging out already-lengthy meetings, when council members are getting tired.

It could also be argued that since voters recently authorized a $150 monthly bump in pay for the council and mayor, it’s not unreasonable to ask them to convene a few more times to get the job done more efficiently.

If more frequent meetings, with smaller agendas, help the council get more done — without being stuck on the dais late into the night — it would be beneficial for everyone.

Posting fewer agenda items doesn’t guarantee more thorough deliberations or better decision-making, but it can put the council and mayor in a better position to get there.

And that’s a positive step that all the city’s residents should support.