Council OKs ban on its cellphone use in meeting (original) (raw)

Elida S. Perez

The mayor and city representatives will no longer be able to use their cellphones and other electronic devices during all council meetings.

The City Council unanimously approved the first step toward implementing the new policy on Tuesday. However, before the vote, city representatives had a contentious discussion on the topic, at times accusing each other of being dishonest.

City Rep. Dr. Michiel Noe said city Rep. Claudia Ordaz was being untruthful about having voluntarily turned over text messages as part of a previous open records request.

“She is good at spinning things, but that’s not true … she did not turn in her texts voluntarily,” Noe said.

Ordaz said the accusation stemmed from a text message that had been deleted, but had been posted on a local blogger's website. Ordaz told council she consulted with the city attorney on what options she had for fulfilling the records request. She later purchased a program that retrieved the deleted text messages that fulfilled the open records request, Ordaz said.

“To call me a liar … and that I’m not transparent is not true,” Ordaz said in response to Noe.

Although the majority of council supported not using personal cellphones, some had hesitations about not being able to be notified of emergencies.

Noe hesitated because he also runs a medical practice and said he was concerned that using city email for private business related to a potential patient emergency could violate a patient’s privacy.

City Rep. Cortney Niland also said she has children who might need to reach her in case of an emergency.

City Rep. Lily Limón implied city representatives as elected officials should not be distracted by personal business while at City Council meetings.

“We should all be notified (if there are emergencies),” Noe said. “Limón is trying to set up a situation where it makes it impossible for me to sit on council. Any one of us up there that has children would expect to be notified if there is an emergency. I’m asking for the same respect.”

City Rep. Carl Robinson, who placed the item on the agenda along with Noe and city Rep. Emma Acosta, said he did not want the item placed on the agenda to single anyone out; rather it was intended to keep all city representatives from using cellphones during meetings.

“It’s one of the first items I introduced after being elected,” Robinson said. “It is known that council members have been using cellphones — people are being guided on what to do, how to vote.”

Robinson said his intent is that all members of council refrain from using cellphones in any manner during the meetings. He held up both his personal and city issued phones as examples during the meeting.

Under the ban, using any cellphones during meetings could be a violation of city policy, possibly subject to an ethics complaint.

City Attorney Sylvia Borunda Firth said she will need to draft the details of the new policy and changes to the ethics code before it officially goes into effect.

The mayor and city representatives would still be allowed to use email on city computers on their podiums in council chambers for research purposes or to email staffers about city business.

Being notified of family or medical emergencies will also be allowed, but it was not immediately clear how that will be drafted into the new policy.

“It’s us as elected officials banning ourselves from using private and public electronic devices,” Acosta said. “We want everyone to focus on the meeting at hand and we think keeping the devices away will help us do that.”

The revised code and policy is expected be brought back to the City Council for final approval during its next regular meeting March 8, officials said.

Elida S. Perez may be reached at 546-6137; eperez@elpasotimes.com; @ElidaSPerezEPT on Twitter.