Public meetings scheduled this week at Lake Worth City Hall.

The Finance Advisory Board (FAB) meets tonight in the City Hall conference room. Tomorrow (Tuesday, June 5th) is a regularly scheduled meeting of the City Commission and the Planning & Zoning Board meets on Wednesday. All meetings begin at 6:00.


Please note: The meeting of the City’s Electric Utility Advisory Board (EUAB) scheduled for next Wednesday has been rescheduled for June 18th.


The big surprise is not what is on the agenda at the City Commission tomorrow but what is not on the agenda. This is very good news. Check back tomorrow for more about that. And I think it’s time to increase the time limit for public comment to three minutes across the board. For all agenda items.

The experiment last year increasing the time limit from two to three minutes on just “Non-Agendaed Items and Consent Agenda” has worked. One could say the normal people have firmly taken control. Again. It was back during the administration of Mayor Jeff Clemens and a commissioner named Cara Jennings that the time limit was reduced from three minutes to two. The trepidation returning to three minutes again is understandable. It’s been that way for a long time.

True. Some will take advantage of that extra minute to the extreme. However, that extra minute will also be extremely beneficial for the majority of the public, most of whom are reasonable, deliberate and respectful and they shouldn’t feel like they are being rushed or brushed off. Most everywhere else in Palm Beach County the time limit for public comment is three minutes. All the City’s volunteer advisory boards, including the FAB and EUAB, have a three minute time limit.

We are the outlier. And that needs to end. It’s time.

So with a caveat or two like keeping public comment to forty-five minutes on any one item or a warning of some sort when people just get up to the podium and parrot what somebody already said, then it’s time for three minutes. Maybe this topic will come up at public comment tomorrow. Maybe somebody will get up and make the case for keeping the limit at two minutes? Stay tuned as they say.

Meet your elected leaders in this City of Lake Worth:

Not a long agenda at the City Commission this week. To look it over for yourself use this link and scroll down for “June 5, Regular Meeting”, then look for “Agenda & Backup” to download the full version.