City Councilmember Justin Outling was conspicuously absent from the second half of the Greensboro City Council town hall meeting on Monday, April 1.
Outling left the dais about 7 p.m. after the whole meeting had devolved into chaos. At that point Councilmember Goldie Wells was ordering that people standing up and shouting at the City Council be removed from the Council Chamber. Mayor Nancy Vaughan was shouting that if people didn’t sit down they would be removed. Lots of people in the audience were shouting at the City Council and in the midst of that Outling collected his iPad and walked out.
As Outling was leaving Councilmember Nancy Hoffmann made a motion to adjourn which failed for lack of a second. Outling later said if he had heard the motion he would have seconded it, but he doubted if the motion would have passed.
Getting up and leaving and making a motion to adjourn are different ways to send the message that the meeting had gotten out of control.
Outling said, “The poor management of the meeting was a great embarrassment and detriment to the city.”
Outling said in his opinion one of the main responsibilities of the City Council is to promote economic development, to increase the number of jobs in Greensboro and increase what those jobs pay. He said that an employer considering bringing jobs to Greensboro could have been watching that council meeting and gotten the impression that Greensboro is a chaotic and disorganized city and not a good place to invest.
Outling said that he is always willing to listen to people’s opinions, but that at the City Council meeting he couldn’t hear what people were saying because of all the shouting back and forth and he didn’t want his presence to imply that he condoned that type of activity or holding a chaotic meeting.
Outling said that because the City Council has agreed not to voice their own opinions during the town hall portion of the meeting that he would comply with that, but that he would no longer sit in a meeting that was chaotic and out of control. He said, “Ultimately it comes to the point that I don’t want my presence on the dais to send the incorrect message that I am in support of the poor management of those meetings. I will continue to quietly and respectfully remove myself from those meetings.”
Outling said that there were rules for the meetings and he believed the rules should be enforced for everyone. He said that when a speaker’s time was up the microphone should be cut off and if someone shouted out from the audience they should receive one warning and for the second offense be removed from the Council Chamber.
Outling said that at the next City Council business meeting if the issue of the chaotic meetings was not addressed he would bring it up
Outling said that if the meetings continue to be chaotic and in his opinion detrimental to the city, he would continue to leave watch the meetings on television in the back in case he needs to come back to the dais to vote but that he did not intend to participate in meetings like the one on Monday, April 1.
Wow!!! An adult on a council of children.
Bravo, sir.
Oh, please. He’s concerned about “appearances?” How shallow.
This tumult is the result of Outling excusing city misconduct and his response is blame others? How about tackling the hard work of addressing it head on instead of literally running away from tough issues? What a chicken.
Trying to sweep tough situations under the rug for the sake of appearances is becoming this guy’s trademark.
Finally, a lone voice of reason in a sea of cacophony!
Good for him!
You get what you elect people of Greensboro! The mayor and most other council members other than Justin Outling
have no guts. We need to elect a new city council who will not be cowards and throw out anyone in a council meeting
who does not act with respect and decorum. It looks like now that most of our council members are afraid of their constituents and are scared they will lose votes in the next election. STEP UP AND TAKE CONTROL!!
Who are you guys kidding? Greensboro City Council has been an embarrassing spectacle
for the last 14 years I have lived here. All you have to do is think back to the moronic Diane Bellamy-Small,
the Yow/Alston feuding, the financial corruption involving the Civil Rights Museum, the tenure of
City Manager Mitchell Johnson, the firing of David Wray, the promotion of corrupt
cop James Hinson. Etc., etc. etc.
This city is a laughing stock cesspool of racist idiots and corruption. Congratulations!
You have earned one star out of five…
Unfortunately we are stuck with these adolescents for another two years. Thank you, Mr. Outling, for being an adult.
Mayor, if you have the gavel, use it. If the crowd of loons is out of control, have them removed. If you cannot control a simple meeting, how will you respond to a true crisis?
The City Council meeting in the council chamber is not the place to talk about or solve individual police cases and should never be aloud at any time. Our city business does NOT include these discussions. We should always conduct business in a proper adult level that makes us all proud to be a citizen of Greensboro!!!