From:
To: City Council
Cc:
Subject: Zoom Bombing
Date: Monday, April 1, 2024 10:10:05 AM
Thanks upfront to all Sebastopol City Council members who are facing challenging times! I admire your service! I support Zoom attendance with a “view only” option, with the option to remove the offender from the Zoom meeting if they post aggressive items. Communication could continue via email.
I’m not sure if the “cooling off” period would be successful; hateful people don’t usually cool off...
As leader of our Burbank Resident Forum (RF), we have has an individual that twice has interrupted our monthly meetings with personal issues and tirades. We are considering changing our bylaws to be able to emphasize that we don’t deal with personal issues in the meeting (altho it has been an unwritten policy). We also are attempting to meet with them (with a social advocate) to try and ascertain what the core issues are. Listening to them directly might or might not stop the tirades, however it’s something we want to try for our community’s well-being.
Our person is saying that they have “freedom of speech” so they feel it’s OK to insult the RF officers; tricky issue— similar to what you are dealing with.
We too are concerned that their rant scared attendees; we normally have low attendance for our monthly meeting, so now we’re wondering if they have created a hostile environment where our regulars won’t even want to attend.
I’m so sorry that this is happening to the Council; I can definitely relate! Lauralee Aho
Burbank Resident Forum Coordinator