City Council rules stem from rowdy meetings in past years

City Council President Dan Lewis says he simply was enforcing the rules this week when he ordered an audience member to take down a flag and — after the person refused — told him to leave the chambers.

The dispute ended up bringing the whole meeting to a halt, as security escorted everyone out of the room. The man with the flag, Silvio Dell’Angela, left on his own eventually.

The meeting picked up again later, but police wouldn’t let Dell’Angela back into the chambers.

Lewis said after the meeting that enforcing the rule is simply a way to ensure “we’re treating everyone fairly.”

Council rules prohibit large signs, props, posters and banners. The goal is to avoid the rowdy atmosphere of council meetings two years ago, when activists brought in a fake coffin, congregated in groups around the speaker’s podium and jeered city officials. Protesters even took over the meeting one night.

Lewis said he took care this week to be polite, but firm, in asking Dell’Angela to comply with the rules.

“We give the public a lot of leeway,” Lewis said.

Not the first time

Dell’Angela, for his part, said he did nothing wrong. His flag wasn’t obstructing anyone’s view, he said, and once security officers took it down, he simply sat in his seat quietly and refused to move.

It’s certainly not the first time Dell’Angela has clashed with the city.

The flag display is a longtime source of attention, flaring up periodically over the last couple of years, though not as intensely as it did this week. There have been other disputes, too.

In 2013, the city agreed to a $14,000 settlement after the American Civil Liberties Union of New Mexico accused a police oversight board of violating the free-speech rights of Dell’Angela and four others when it refused to let them speak on certain topics at a meeting.

A spokesman for the ACLU said Tuesday that the group hadn’t reviewed the recent dispute.

Reasonable limits

City Attorney Jessica Hernandez said the law allows for reasonable limits on “how members of the public address the council, and the council rules are a reasonable way to allow the public to speak during council meetings while maintaining order and fairness.”

People can display flags and other material, she said, as long the material is small enough to be displayed on the council’s overhead projector during the person’s speaking time.

“The council wants to allow members of the public an equal opportunity to be heard and for each speaker to have the council members’ full attention while speaking,” Hernandez said. “Larger displays or displays that go beyond the speaker’s time at the podium create a distraction for the council members and members of the audience.”