HomeMy WebLinkAbout20 CC MTGS DATE CHNG 03-16-98AGENDA
DATE: MARCH 16,
1998
NO. 20
3-16-98
TO'
FROM'
SUBJECT:
WILLIAM A. HUSTON, CITY MANAGER
OFFICE OF THE CITY CLERK
CHANGING DATE OF CITY COUNCIL MEETINGS FROM MONDAYS TO
TUESDAYS
RECOMMENDATION:
Pleasure of the City Council.
FISCAL IMPACT:
There is no fiscal impact anticipated with changing the dates of City Council meetings.
BACKGROUND:
At the February 17, 1998 City Council meeting, Mayor Thomas requested the City
Council agendize discussion of changing City Council meeting dates from Mondays to
Tuesdays due to holiday conflicts. In 1998, the holidays necessitating a change from
Monday to Tuesday for City Council meetings are February 16 (Presidents Day) and
September 7 (Labor Day).
The City Council may want to consider the following areas when discussing the changing
of meeting dates: cable broadcast coverage, newspaper coverage, legal noticing and the
agenda preparation cycle.
Cable Broadcast Coverage:
Both Media One and Cox Communication have indicated if meetings were changed to
Tuesdays, there would be no change in their schedule to broadcast City Council
meetings. Live broadcasts could be done on Tuesdays by both companies. There
would not be 'a scheduling conflict with the Tustin Unified School District because
their meetings are held on the 2nd and 4th Monday. The Irvine Unified School District
meetings are held the 1st and 3rd Tuesday, however, Cox Communication would
broadcast Tustin City Council meetings to Tustin residents only, and school board
meetings to Irvine residents only.
Changing Council Meet
Page 2, 3-16-98
)ate
NewspaPer Coverage.:
The Tustin Weekly reporter said there would be no impact on his coverage of City
Council action if the meetings were moved to Tuesdays.
The TUstin News reporter stated moving the meeting dates to Tuesdays would be
"disastrous" for reporting City Council action. Due to his publication deadlines, action
from City Council meetings would not be published until seven days following the City ·
Council meeting.
Legal Noticinq of Ordinances:
The law provides that in lieu of publishing an entire ordinance, which can be costly,
the City can publish a summary of the ordinance. This summary must be published
once five days prior to adoption and again within 15 days after adoption.
Upon completion of the agenda and prior to the City Council meeting, staff sends the
ordinance summary to the newspaper. This summary is then published in the
newspaper on the Friday following the City Council meeting where first reading and'
introduction was approved. This publication meets the requirement for publishing the
summary five days prior to second reading and adoption: However, staff has the
capability of canceling that summary on Tuesday morning should the City Council
decide not to introduce the ordinance.
If meetings were held on Tuesday, staff would no longer have the capability of
canceling an ordinance summary on Wednesday morning due to publication deadline
set by the newspaper. This could potentially result in the publication of an ordinance
summary that did not receive first reading as proposed. It is anticipated that this
would not be a frequent occurrence but wanted to make the Council aware of the
potential for erroneous publications.
Agenda Preparation Cycle:
If the meeting dates were moved to Tuesdays, staff would recommend that the
finalization of the agenda and delivery of the material to Council and newspapers be
moved from Wednesday to Thursday allowing staff an additional day of preparation to
coincide with Tuesday meetings.
The date and time of City Council meetings is established by Ordinance No. 883. This
ordinance states that City Council meetings will be held the first and third Monday of
every month with the provision that if the meeting date falls on a legal holiday, the
meeting will be held the following day. Should the City Council desire to change their
meeting dates from Mondays to Tuesdays, staff will agendize introduction of an
ordinance at the April 6 City Council meeting.
Valerie Crabill
Chief Deputy City Clerk