Rule 7. The Presiding Officer shall preserve order and decorum, prevent involvement of personalities or the impugning of members' motives, confine members in debate to the question under discussion, shall decide all points of order subject to an appeal to the Council.
Rule 8. Roll call of Council: Every member shall be in his/her seat at the time of Roll Call, otherwise he/she shall not be recorded as present except upon special order of Council. Absence from five (5) consecutive regular meetings shall operate to vacate the seat of a member unless such absence is authorized by Council.
Rule 9. Duty to Vote: Every member present shall vote on all questions upon the call of the Yeas and Nays, unless excused by the unanimous consent of the Council; except that no member shall vote on any question in which he/she is financially interested or which in any way involves personal or private rights. Any member present, unless so excused, or excepted as above, who refuses to vote upon any question relating to the City government, upon which he/she may vote, when the Yeas and Nays are being taken shall be guilty of contempt of the Council and may, for such contempt be censured by a majority vote of the Council or may be expelled from the Council by a vote of two-thirds (2/3) of all members of the Council.
Council will vote by either responding YEA, NAY, PRESENT or ABSTAIN.
(i) A PRESENT vote indicates no vote at all, this only serves as notice that you are in attendance.
(ii) An ABSTAIN vote will be counted with the majority vote.
Rule 10. Yeas and Nays. On the passage of every ordinance or resolution and on the appointment of every officer the vote shall be taken by Yeas and Nays entered in full upon the records and published in the official journal. On any other question the Yeas and Nays shall be entered upon the records on the request of any member. Upon the call of the Yeas and Nays the Clerk shall call the names of members and record the vote. Roll Call shall be according to wards and voting shall start with the moving party and proceed clockwise numerically.
Rule 11. Change of Vote: Before the announcement of the vote on any question the Clerk shall read the vote of each member so taken upon the demand of any member, at which time any Councilperson on account of error or for any other reason may change his/her vote; but no Councilperson shall be permitted to change his/her vote as recorded after the Roll Call has been verified and the result declared.
Rule 12. Right of Floor: When any member is about to address the Council he/she respectfully addresses himself/herself to the Presiding Officer, and when recognized by the Chair shall confine himself/herself to the question under debate, avoid personalities and refrain from impugning the motives of any other members argument or vote. When two (2) or more members ask recognition at the same time, the Presiding Officer shall name the member who is first to speak and the exercise of such discretion by the Presiding Officer shall not be subject to appeal under Rule 15.
Rule 13. Time Limitation of Speaking. No member shall be allowed to speak for a longer time than ten (10) minutes at any one time without permission of the Council. No member shall speak more than once on the same motion until every other member desiring to speak on that motion shall have had an opportunity to do so, nor shall the Mayor nor any Director speak longer than ten (10) minutes upon the same motion, ordinance or question.
Rule 14. Members Called to Order. If any member in speaking or otherwise transgresses the rules of the Council, the President shall call the offending member to order. The member so called to order shall immediately take his/her seat unless permitted by the President to explain. Any member may, by raising the point of order, call the attention of the President to such transgression. The point of order shall be decided by the President without debate. Every such decision of the President shall be subject to appeal to the Council by any two members.
Rule 15. Right of Appeal. Any member may appeal to the Council from a ruling of the presiding officer, the member making the appeal may briefly state his/her reason for the same, and the presiding officer may briefly explain his/her ruling, but there shall be no debate on the appeal and no other member shall participate in the discussion. The presiding officer shall then put the question “Shall the decision of the chair be sustained?” If a majority of the members present vote Aye, the ruling of the chair is sustained, otherwise it is overturned.
Rule 16. Members may read from books, etc. Any member while discussing a question, may read from books, papers, or documents, any matter pertinent to the subject under consideration without asking leave, provided, however, that such reading shall be subject to and included within the time limitation prescribed in Rule 13.
Rule 17. Expulsion of Councilperson. Council shall be the judge of the election and qualification of its own members. It may expel any member for gross misconduct, malfeasance in or disqualification for office, conviction of a crime involving moral turpitude while in office, violation of the City Charter, or persistent failure to abide by the Rules of Council; provided however, that such expulsion shall not take place without the concurrence of two-thirds (2/3) of its members, nor until the accused member shall have been notified in writing of the charge against him/her not less than ten (10) days in advance of a public hearing.
Rule 18. Motions. All motions as contained in Robert's Rules of Order Revised shall be used. (Res. 41-2000. Passed 5-8-00.)