Last night, a school board committee made it clear that the purpose of its proposed public comment policy is “to encourage the community to engage and feel they have the ability to do so without being attacked or criticized.” (See pages 3-4 here.) Yes, they want to regulate some people’s speech to ensure that other people don’t feel criticized.
This strikes me as reflecting a very peculiar understanding of what the First Amendment permits a governmental body to do. I guess I shouldn’t be surprised when I read reports like the one described here.
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1 comment:
Civic literacy fail.
I admire people who participate in public comment at school board meetings. I found it a bit unnerving to engage in public speaking (on camera no less) to a largely non-responsive--and potentially unfriendly--audience of school board members. It takes guts, as we used to say.
Potential speakers who can't stand the heat should call or write to school board members, rather than seek to restrict the speech of those who can.
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