City Council to Test Tuesday Meetings Amid Concerns Over Late Starts

The Pasadena City Council will experiment with moving its meetings from Monday to Tuesday next month, a change that could eventually become permanent as the City Council grapples with chronic late starts, canceled committee meetings and a schedule complicated by Monday holidays.

“Moving it to Tuesday creates the opportunity for us to take back on meetings the weeks when there are national holidays,” said Councilmember Jason Lyon. “And clearly one of the issues we’re having is a lot of conversation in closed session. For the record, some of the public comments said people have to show up and it’s not that Councilmembers aren’t showing up. It’s that the conversation with legal counsel is going longer. That said, I think it’s unacceptable and rude and we have to fix it. But moving it to Tuesday gives us the option of taking back in some weeks that we currently take off with national holidays. But also, as the city manager said, it might be that some weeks we just have a closed session on a Tuesday so that we can spend some time on the legal issues and not have to rush out to a meeting. So I do think it’s worth trying.”

The City Council voted to draft an ordinance to move its meetings to Tuesday.

Councilmembers Tyron Hampton and Steve Madison were not at the meeting.

The council will hold special meetings on Tuesday, Sept. 15, and Tuesday, Sept. 29, replacing its regularly scheduled meetings on Monday, Sept. 14, and Monday, Sept. 28.

The September meetings will serve as a trial run while city officials consider permanently shifting council meetings to Tuesdays.

“I think there are two significant pluses to Tuesday versus Monday,” said Councilmember Rick Cole. “We’ve talked about one, which is that we don’t collide with national holidays. And we’ve alluded to the other, which is the opportunity for a work day besides Friday when often every other Friday the staff is in theory not working. Although I think our department heads are remarkably responsive to concerns over that weekend. But I think that having a regular workday, of course that’s not true in a national holiday, but then at least half of the time there’ll be a Friday. So I think this will give more time for better preparation for the staff and for the council and for the community to have one extra day if we continue to put the agenda out on Thursday.”

Cole made the motion to prepare an ordinance to move permanently to Tuesday. Hampton and Madison will have a chance to weigh in on the matter at before it receives two readings.

“We have a lot of professionals they don’t work in Pasadena,” said Justin Jones. “It’s hard. I mean, I just think about my mom who worked retail and she couldn’t go home until her go-backs were finished. And so what happens to that person who has to do their go-backs or something comes up at work where maybe it prevents them from getting there at five, but they can get there at 5:30 and they can finish out the rest of the meeting afterwards.”

Changing the council’s meeting night could also force changes to several committee schedules. The Finance Committee, which currently meets before the council on Mondays, would likely move with the council, while committees already meeting Tuesdays could shift to Mondays, Wednesdays or Thursdays. Staff said it would work with committee chairs before bringing back a proposed schedule.