Monday, July 30, 2007

A Busy Night for the City Fathers/Mothers

‘Hot fun in the Summertime’ was never like this.

The City Council is in for a long and interesting work-session this evening. On top of their regularly scheduled meeting, they’ll be hosting a public forum session at the Pueblo Convention center. The purpose of this special session is to explain their position on the proposed agreement with the YMCA and to collect information from the general public relating to that matter. The public forum session starts at 6 pm tonight.

There are some concerns about the forum’s format.

There are reports that the public forum will last ONLY one hour. That a good portion of this time, even up to half or more, will be taken up as the city and the representative of the YMCA explain their position and why they think it is a great idea for Pueblo. Then, it is reported, that there will be a 10 minute recess, while questions are collected from the citizens attending. After this the representatives from the city and the YMCA will answer as many of those questions as time permits.

That leaves only about 10-15 minutes for the questions to be answered. Say, 2-3 minutes to have the question asked and an answer provided. That’s only about 5-7 questions, if the reports on the format for this meeting are correct.

That doesn’t seem like much time to assuage concerns of the citizens over $2 million in public revenues that the city is talking about spending. Especially in light of the fact that the city can’t maintain recreational facilities it already has.

UPDATE The 6 PM Meeting Can Go Longer [301605 Jul 07]: Good news. According to a comment from a staff member at the Pueblo Chieftain, there will be no meeting of the City Council at 7 pm. This allows for more time to do Question and Answer during the 6 PM meeting at the Pueblo Convention Center.