HomeMy WebLinkAbout02/15/2011 07 City Council Meetings Invocation Policy and Agenda Disclaimer BUSINESS OF THE CITY COUNCIL
• • YAKIMA, WASHINGTON
AGENDA STATEMENT
Item No. 7
For Meeting Of February 15, 2011
ITEM TITLE: Resolution approving and adopting policy for opening invocations before meetings of
the City Council.
SUBMITTED BY: Mark Kunkler, Senior Assistant City Attorney
CONTACT PERSON/TELEPHONE: Mark Kunkler — 575 -6030
SUMMARY EXPLANATION: On February 1, 2011, the City Council directed preparation of a policy
regarding opening invocations before meetings of the City Council. The attached Resolution
incorporates the recommended policy. The policy establishes procedures for rotation of invocation
among Council members choosing to participate; states that participation of Council members and all
others is voluntary; provides for language to be placed on the agendas for Council meetings advising
the public of the invocation and voluntary participation; prescribes that the invocation will occur prior
to commencement of the meeting.
Resolution X Ordinance Contract •Other(Specify) Policy
• Contract Mail to (name and address):
Phone:
Funding Source
APPROVED FOR SUBMITTAL: ,/,)(4//'
Acting City Manager
STAFF RECOMMENDATION: Adopt Resolution
BOARD /COMMISSION /COMMITTEE RECOMMENDATION: Recommended for adoption by Council
Rules & Procedures Committee; preparation requested by City Council at February 1, 2011 regular
meeting.
COUNCIL ACTION:
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CITY OF YAKIMA
• LEGAL
DEPARTMENT
n South Third Street, Yakima, Washington 98901 (509)575-6030 Fax (509)575-6160
MEMORANDUM.
February 7, 2011
TO: Honorable Mayor and City Council
Michael A. Morales, Acting City Manager
FROM: Mark Kunkler, Senior Assistant City Attorney
SUBJECT: - Invocation Policy — Changes to Procedure
On February 1, 2011, City Council asked that a written policy be prepared and
presented for consideration at the next regular meeting. A Resolution incorporating the
provisions of a recommended policy has been prepared and submitted for your review
and adoption.
If the new policy is adopted, several new procedures will become effective. These are:
A. Invocation Not Listed as Agenda Item. The policy provides that "[t]he
prayer shall not be listed or recognized as an agenda item for the meeting or
as part of the public business." In checking this, I contacted the City of
Thomasville, North Carolina. The City of Thomasville adopted a similar policy
about two years ago. in that city, the invocation is not listed on the Agenda.
Instead, the Mayor introduces the invocation speaker about five minutes
before the gavel sounds to open the council meeting. The invocation
speaker leads the prayer and the Pledge of Allegiance. There is then about a
two or three minute break before the gavel sounds calling the meeting to
order.
The policy does not specify a time when the invocation occurs, only that it will
occur "shortly before" the opening gavel:
Shortly before the opening gavel that officially begins the meeting and the
agenda/business .of the public, the Chairperson of the Council shall
introduce the invocation speaker and the person selected to recite the
• Pledge of Allegiance following the invocation, and invite only those who
wish to do so to stand for those observances of and for the Council.
Memorandum to Honorable Mayor and Members of the City Council
February 9, 2011
Page 2
B. Placement of Disclosure Language on Agendas. Council Agendas
will include a written statement that reads:
"Any invocation that may be offered before the official start of the Council
meeting shall be the voluntary offering of a private citizen, to and for the
benefit of the Council. The views or beliefs expressed by the invocation
speaker have not been previously reviewed or approved by the Council,
and the Council does not endorse the religious beliefs or views of this, or
any other speaker."
The policy provides that this statement will be at the bottom of the Agenda in
not less than 10-point font.
C. Participation of Council Members. The policy calls for invocations to be
offered by Council members on a rotational basis. However, participation by
any Council member in the rotation is voluntary. A participating Council
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member may offer an invocation as his or her conscience dictates. A Council
member may offer to observe a moment of silence in lieu of a verbal
invocation.
D. Rotation,. The policy states that the invocation will be "rotated" among
the participating Council members, and that no Council member may offer
the invocation more than five (5) times per year, nor offer invocations at
consecutive Council meetings.
The "five (5) times per year" was chosen using the following rationale: The
Council meets twice per month, thus 24 regular meetings per year. There are
seven (7) Council members. Dividing 24 meetings by seven Council
members equals approximately 3.4. The number 3.4 was simply revised
upward to five (5) for ease of administration. The number may be altered, but
it is advisable to keep the number close to four, five or six to help assure a
sufficient rotation among all Council members.
E. No Prior Review of Invocation or Limitations. No guidelines or limitations
shall be issued regarding an invocation's content, "except that the Council
shall request by the language of this policy that no prayer should proselytize
or advance any faith, or disparage the religious faith or non-religious views of
others."
Memorandum to Honorable Mayor and Members of the City Council
410 February 9, 2011
Page 3
F. Pledge of Allegiance. The policy provides that the Mayor will "introduce the
invocation speaker and the person selected to recite the Pledge of Allegiance
following the invocation." The invocation and the Pledge of Allegiance may
be given by the same person.
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RESOLUTION NO. R-2011-
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A RESOLUTION adopting policy regarding opening invocations before meetings of the City
Council; stating procedures; and reciting principles of supporting law.
WHEREAS, the City Council of the City of Yakima ("the Council") is an elected
legislative and deliberative public body, serving the citizens of Yakima, Washington; and
WHEREAS, the Council has long maintained a tradition of solemnizing its proceedings
by allowing for an opening prayer before each meeting, for the benefit and blessing of the
Council; and
WHEREAS, the Council wishes to maintain a tradition of solemnizing its proceedings by
allowing for an opening prayer before each meeting, for the benefit and blessing of the Council;
and
WHEREAS, the Council now desires to adopt this formal, written policy to clarify and
codify its invocation practices; and
WHEREAS, our country's Founders recognized that we possess certain rights that
cannot be awarded, surrendered, nor corrupted by human power, and the Founders explicitly
attributed the origin of these, our inalienable rights, to a Creator.. These rights ultimately ensure
the self-government manifest in our Legislature, upon which we desire to invoke divine
guidance and blessing; and
WHEREAS, such prayer before deliberative public bodies has been consistently upheld
• as constitutional by American courts, including the United States Supreme Court; and
WHEREAS, in Marsh v. Chambers, 463 U.S. 783 (1983), the United States Supreme
Court rejected a challenge to the Nebraska Legislature's practice of opening each day of its
sessions with a prayer by a chaplain paid with taxpayer dollars, and specifically concluded, The
opening of sessions of legislative and other deliberative public bodies with prayer is deeply
embedded in the history and tradition of this country. From colonial times through the founding
of the Republic and ever since, the practice of legislative prayer has coexisted with the
principles of disestablishment and religious freedom." Id., at 786; and
WHEREAS, the Council desires to avail itself of the Supreme Court's recognition that it
is constitutionally permissible for a public body to "invoke divine guidance" on its work. Id., at
792. Such invocation "is not, in these circumstances, an `establishment' of religion or a step
toward establishment; it is simply a tolerable acknowledgment of beliefs widely held among the
people of this country." Id.; and
WHEREAS, the Supreme Court affirmed in Lynch v. Donnelly, 465 U.S. 668 (1984),
"Our history is.replete with official references to the value and invocation of Divine guidance in
deliberations and pronouncements of the Founding Fathers and contemporary leaders." Id., at
675; and
WHEREAS, the Supreme Court further stated, that "government acknowledgments of
religion serve, in the only ways reasonably possible in our culture, the legitimate secular
purposes of solemnizing public occasions, expressing confidence in the future, and
encouraging the recognition of what is worthy of appreciation in society. For that reason, and
because of their history and ubiquity, those practices are not understood as conveying
• government approval of particular religious beliefs." Id., at 693 (O'Connor, J., concurring); and
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WHEREAS, the Supreme Court also famously observed in Zorach v. Clauson, 343 U.S.
306, (1952), "We are a religious people whose institutions presuppose a Supreme Being." Id.,
at 313-14; and •
WHEREAS, the Supreme Court acknowledged in Holy Trinity Church v. United States,
143 U.S. 457 (1892), that the American people have long followed a. "custom of opening
sessions of all deliberative bodies and most conventions with prayer...," Id., at 471; and
WHEREAS, the Supreme Court has determined, "The content of [such] prayer is not of
concern to judges where . . . there is no indication that the prayer opportunity has been
exploited to proselytize or advance any one, or to disparage any other, faith or belief." Marsh,
463 U.S. at 794-795; and
WHEREAS, the Supreme Court also proclaimed that it should not be the job of the
courts or deliberative public bodies "to embark on a sensitive evaluation or to parse the content
of a particular prayer" offered before a deliberative public body. Id.; and
WHEREAS, the Supreme Court has counseled against the efforts of government
officials to affirmatively screen, censor, prescribe and/or proscribe the specific content of public
prayers offered by private speakers, as such government efforts would violate the First
Amendment rights of those speakers. See, e.g., Lee v. Weisman, 505 U.S. 577, 588- 589
(1992); and
WHEREAS, in Bacus v. Palo Verde Unified School Dist. Bd. of Educ., 52 Fed. Appx.
355 (9th Cir. 2002), the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit recognized the
continued vitality of Marsh and its applicability to analyzing the constitutionality of legislative
prayer; and
WHEREAS, the Ninth Circuit held that prayer before deliberative bodies must not •
"disparage other religious faiths," "proselytize," nor "'advance any one. .faith or belief." Id. at
357 (quoting Marsh, 463 U.S. at 794-95.); and
WHEREAS, the Council intends to avoid all of the unique circumstances that rendered
the practices at issue in Bacus unconstitutional, including the facts that:
a) The prayer before meetings was "almost always" offered "in the Name of Jesus,"
despite objection from the community. Id. at 356; and
b) The persistent invocations "in the Name of Jesus," "necessarily ha[d] the effect of
'making adherence to a religion relevant' to...'standing in the political community." Id. at 357;
and
c) Such continued and "regular" Christian invocations, to the exclusion of all others,
provided Christianity "with a special endorsed and privileged status..." Id.; and
d) The same individual almost always offered the invocation, and no individuals of other
religions ever gave the invocation." Id. at 356-57; and
e) The prayer practice was thus not conducted "as is traditional in Congress," where
invocations are "rotated among leaders of different faiths, sects, and denominations." Id. at 356
(citing Marsh, 463 U.S. 783 n.13.); and
WHEREAS, the Council intends, and has intended in past practice, to adopt a policy
that does not proselytize or advance any faith, or show any purposeful preference of one
religious view to the exclusion of others; and
• WHEREAS, the Council recognizes its constitutional duty to interpret; construe, and
amend its policies and ordinances to comply with constitutional requirements as they are
announced; and
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WHEREAS, the Council accepts as binding the applicability of general principles of law
• and all the rights and obligations afforded under the United States and Washington State
Constitutions and statutes; therefore,
BE IT RESOLVED BY THE CITY COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF YAKIMA:
1. In order to solemnize proceedings of the City Council, it is the policy of the Council to
allow for an invocation or prayer to be offered before its meetings for the benefit of the Council.
2. The prayer shall not be listed or recognized as an agenda item for the meeting or as
part of the public business.
3. No member or employee of the Council or any other person in attendance at the
meeting shall be required to participate in any prayer that is offered.
4. The prayer shall be voluntarily delivered by a single Council member, scheduled on a
rotating basis among all Council members who voluntarily choose to participate in the, rotational
list.
5. The designated Council member shall deliver the prayer or invocation in his or her
capacity as a private citizen, and according to the dictates of his or her own conscience.
6. No guidelines or limitations shall be issued regarding an invocation's content, except
that the Council shall request by the language of this policy that no prayer should proselytize or
advance any faith, or disparage the religious faith or non-religious views of others.
7. No Council member shall receive supplemental compensation of any kind for
providing the prayer or invocation.
8. No Council member shall be scheduled to offer a prayer at consecutive meetings of
the Council, or at more than five (5) Council meetings in any calendar year.
9. No other member(s) of the Council shall engage in any prior inquiry, review of, or
involvement in, the content of any prayer to be offered by the scheduled Council member.
10. Shortly before the opening gavel that officially begins the meeting and the
• agenda/business of the public, the Chairperson of the Council shall introduce the invocation
speaker and the person selected to recite the Pledge of Allegiance following the invocation, and
invite only those who wish to do so to stand for those observances of and for the Council.
11. This policy in not intended, and shall not be implemented or construed in any way, to
affiliate the Council with, nor express the Council's preference for or against, any faith or
religious denomination. Rather, this policy is intended to acknowledge and express the
Council's respect for the diversity of religious denominations and faiths represented and
practiced among the citizens of the City of Yakima.
12. To clarify the Council's intentions, as stated herein above, the following disclaimer
shall be included in at least 10 point font at the bottom of any printed Council meeting agenda:
"Any invocation that may be offered before the official start of the Council meeting shall be the
voluntary offering of a private citizen, to and for the benefit of the Council. The views or beliefs
expressed by the invocation speaker have not been previously reviewed or approved by the
Council, and the Council does not endorse the religious beliefs or views of this, or any other
speaker."
ADOPTED BY THE CITY COUNCIL this 15 day of February, 2011.
Micah Cawley, Mayor
ATTEST:
City Clerk
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