Last night Mayor Musser inflamed the packed city council meeting audience that filled the seats and had people standing in the back. It started when he made a decision at the beginning of the public comment period to limit each speaker to just three minutes instead of the normal four minutes stated in the agenda. He justified this by saying 18 people had signed up to speak and the meeting would take too long if every person got four minutes. His decision frustrated many of the speakers who had carefully prepared their remarks to stay within the expected minute allotment.
One of the early speakers expressed her outrage for the imposed time limitation saying the City Council needed to hear all the issues and concerns from citizens about the General Plan. Several other speakers were cut off before finishing their comments. Later another speaker told Mayor Musser he was going to take the full four minutes of time because the City Council needed to be held accountable to listen and that his partner was videoing this meeting to put it on YouTube. When the timer at the podium alarm went off he continued speaking and Mayor Musser then had the podium microphone turned off. By this time several members in the audience had had enough and called out to let him finishing speaking. This caused the crowed to start shouting at the Mayor. He shouted back and some in the audience rose to their feet and yelled and gestured at him.
Mayor Musser then announced they were taking a five minute break and got up end exited behind the curtain while the crowd repeatedly exclaimed "No five minute break". All the other City Council members just sat in their chairs and stared at each other. When the Mayor returned, there were now four additional police officers present, two of which were wearing tactical vests. The Mayor told the audience they better settle down or he would let Police Chief Johnson handle the situation.