Photo: Castanet

Kamloops city council will decide next week whether to continue its practice of allowing public inquiries during regular meetings, or if the agenda item will be paused for a six-month trial period.

At its Tuesday meeting, council is set to hear public submissions about a bylaw amendment which, if adopted, will provide more flexibility to make changes to meeting agendas.

Council unanimously voted to approve the first three readings of the bylaw in December.

Proposed bylaw changes include removing the approval of the agenda from regular meetings, limiting the number of delegations to two per council meeting, and adding a provision for council to allow people who are out of the country to participate electronically in closed meetings.

If the bylaw amendment is adopted, council will then vote on a separate recommendation regarding public inquiries. Council’s governance committee has recommended that councillors authorize removing public inquiries from regular council meetings for six months, then putting the matter to a review.

If council approves the six-month pause, there will be no public inquiries during Tuesday’s meeting.

The public inquiries section — which is different from public hearings or public submissions on city business — allows anyone to address council for five minutes with a specific question about matters on the meeting agenda.

Many municipalities do not allow for public inquiries at all, and several others have instituted strict guidelines for such submissions.

The recommendation to remove public inquiries from the agenda came forward to council in the fall following a meeting where a Zoom user broadcast pornography to people watching in city hall and online.

But council members have said they are concerned about continuous disruptive behaviour displayed during this part of the meeting.