By Meg Hibbert
Contributing Writer
Salem City Council is pondering adding additional opportunities for citizen comments. The discussion was during a work session before Monday night’s regular Council meeting.
Right now, citizen comment periods are held at the beginning of the first meeting each month. Citizens must sign up in advance, and are limited to speaking for five minutes.
Three Council members – Mayor Renee Turk, Vice Mayer Jim Chandler and Councilman John Saunders – were in favor. Councilmen Randy Foley and Bill Jones were against the idea, saying they believe citizens already have time to speak and few are taking advantage of it.
“I am open to having comments at every meeting,” said Saunders.
“What are we afraid of?” asked the mayor. “Why not let people comment?”
Foley added, “If we’re going to allow this, we need to have tight rules.” He referred to a December 2019 meeting when almost 100 people turned out to press Council on gun in the city, something over which Council has no power to enact. Few, if any, of those people were Salem residents.
When asked what other jurisdictions are doing for citizen comments, City Counsel Jim Guynn said Alleghany County allows it every meeting, Franklin County has a time for public comments at the end of its meetings, which have to be about an issue which the board of supervisors can do something about.
Guynn added that a decision on having public comments more than once a quarter – required by state law – is at the discretion of Council.
Salem Council took no action Aug. 23 on the question on citizen comments more than one meeting per month. City Manager Jay Taliaferro said the staff would create a menu of possible choices and bring it back to a future meeting.
During the regular meeting, Council approved, on first reading:
- A request to rezone to light manufacturing a former business college building on Apperson Drive. Ben Crew of Balzer & Associates represented Layman Candy Co., currently located off West Main Street, that wants to move its warehouse and distribution center to the Apperson Drive location now owned by LewisGale Medical Center.
Salem Community Development Director Chuck VanAllman explained Layman wants to grow and possibly add 40 additional jobs. Layman’s Glenn Bowe said outside the meeting that Layman “is a distributor for all the things you see in a convenience store.”
Councilman Jones thanked Layman for staying in Salem. “We appreciate it,” he said. He also thanked members of the Salem Planning Commission for the time they spent on the request.
- A request by Roanoke College to rezone to single family a residence on Broad Street, that the college says is surplus.
- Council also set a public hearing for Sept. 13 on filling School Board seats currently held by Nancy Bradley and Teresa Sizemore-Hernandez. Mayor Turk pointed out any others who are interested in applying should go to the city’s website and fill out an application before Sept. 13. The term starts Jan. 1. Both Bradley and Sizemore-Hernandez are eligible to ask to be reappointed.
The meeting adjourned at 6:58.
