By NICOLE CARTRETTE
Staff Writer

If it is not on the agenda, they don’t want to discuss it.

That is what a few of the commissioners were saying Monday night.

“When I first came on this board we had guidelines or procedures,” Commissioner Amon McKenzie said. “We had to put it on the agenda before a vote or discussion.

“No motion could be made unless it was on the agenda.

“A lot of times we are throwing things out there,” McKenzie complained. “We need to be able to make a good, sound decision.”

“We used to do it,” Chairman Sammie Jacobs added.

McKenzie said the board needed to go back to the old policy.

Commissioner Prevatte disagreed.

“I believe just a few months ago you said nobody was going to tell you when you could or could not talk,” Prevatte declared.

“I’m talking about all of us,” McKenzie interrupted. “I know I’m guilty; we all are.”

“Allow me to finish,” Prevatte insisted.

“We need to have some guidelines,” Jacobs said.

“Let me finish – I didn’t get through,” Prevatte declared again, and pointed out that Commissioner Bill Memory had brought up topics not on the agenda eight times recently and McKenzie five times.

Memory looked surprised that anyone had been counting.

“I’ve read the law; there is nothing that will prevent me from making a motion,” Prevatte said, adding that a commissioner has the right to bring up anything at any time.

“I’m not going to stop talking,” Prevatte declared.

“You brought this up because of what happened at the last meeting,” Prevatte accused McKenzie.

At the last meeting, McKenzie was the sole commissioner opposed to redistricting. In a second motion at that meeting, Prevatte made a motion for a referendum to be on the ballot in 2008 that would ask voters if commissioners should be elected countywide. That motion failed.

Commissioner Ricky Bullard said he felt the board needed to have an open meeting structure and not limit what could be discussed. He said issues brought up have “not been looked into” but “slid under the table”.

“I don’t know what’s been slid under the table,” Memory fired back.

“We haven’t brought up anything that’s wrong,” Bullard insisted, pointing out he worked with an agenda for 12 years on the Columbus County School Board and never had these issues.

Discussion with the clerk to the board followed, as the board tried to pinpoint the deadline for agenda items. Clerk June Hall suggested the items be added at least by noon on Thursdays before the Monday meetings.

Sheriff’s deputies deliver the packets to commissioners’ homes on the Friday before the Monday meeting.

A few of the commissioners questioned if a request to be added to the agenda would make it on the agenda.

“I’m in charge of the agenda,” Jacobs said.

Bullard said if topics of discussion should be on the agenda so should closed sessions and the purpose for the closed session.

“I don’t want one (a closed session),” Jacobs said.

“Let me finish talking, Mr. Jacobs,” Bullard replied.

Memory suggested the phrase “closed session if needed” be permanently added to the agenda.

Bullard said he wanted specifics about a closed session to determine if he wanted to go into one, legal or illegal.

“We’ve never gone into closed session illegally,” Memory insisted.

“The last closed session we went into we discussed selling the department of aging,” Bullard declared.

Bullard said he had contacted David Lawrence at the Institute of Government about the legality of the closed session and was told it was illegal.
“You can hand me something from David Lawrence or your friend Bob High, I don’t care,” Jacobs insisted the meeting was not illegal.

McKenzie tried to calm the chairman and commissioner down and called for a “point of order.”

“I’d like to know what’s coming up (on the agenda),” Commissioner Lynwood Norris said.
Prevatte, still opposed to limiting what can be brought up at a meeting, pointed out it was McKenzie who had told former chairman Kip Godwin “You ain’t my daddy and you ain’t going to tell me when I can talk.”

McKenzie’s motion to require that only topics on the agenda may be discussed or acted on passed with a 4-3 vote of the board. Only Commissioners Prevatte, Gore and Bullard were opposed.

Later in the meeting Memory said the board was violating a new policy adopted in January that requires two readings before taking a vote. Jacobs said it would serve as the first reading but the vote was not rescinded nor was it clear if the vote would count.

At the end of the meeting Columbus County resident Robert Adams criticized the board and questioned if citizens would be allowed to bring up topics during public discussion not on the agenda.

“You’re shutting down public input into the meeting,” Adams declared.

State law requires public comment sessions to be held during regularly scheduled meetings at least once per month.

Under General Statute 153A-52.1 “the board of commissioners shall provide at least one period for public comment per month at a regular meeting of the board.”