COUNCIL SHOULD SPEAK WITH RESIDENTS
Council Member Astor Calls For Repeal Of An Arbitrary Rule On Dialogue
The Reporter has covered residents who express frustration when their voices are ignored or the township fails to keep its promises to communicate. We have covered this issue five times. See
https://www.themounthollyreporter.org/p/what-did-we-just-witness
https://www.themounthollyreporter.org/p/editorial-will-you-please-stop
https://www.themounthollyreporter.org/p/council-member-astor-speaks-out
https://www.themounthollyreporter.org/p/jim-logan-speaks-out
This unfortunate trend reached a new low on November 10, 2025 when Mayor Banks repeatedly and aggressively interrupted multiple speakers. That meeting also featured Clerk Marnell threatening one resident with expulsion from the meeting. As we noted in our February 2024 article, resident “frustration and cynicism have set in and some lose their patience due to poor communication”.
This creates a negative feedback loop where the Mayor and Administrators demand “decorum” and short meetings while residents are demanding service, but neither get what they want.
Its true that some residents have an unfriendly tone. Some are uninformed and some are even misinformed. But when you run for office you sign up to solve problems and that demands respectful dialogue with the occasional upset resident. Its an opportunity to model the decorum you say you want and to de-escalate conflict by engaging in calm, polite dialogue.
Council member Astor believes that a rule [Resolution 2025-54] which the council faction of Brown, Banks and DiFolco passed this year is partially responsible for the dysfunctional state of communication between residents and government.
Astor said that “Kim and I voted against the rule last January and again last April when our two votes were unfortunately not enough to stop it.” Astor added that “Its enforcement has been completely arbitrary since Mayor Banks and Deputy Mayor DiFolco ignore it at every meeting. In effect, its enforcement only prevents Kim and I from speaking with residents.”
“I believe that polite dialogue is a good thing when residents have concerns and don’t want to wait until the end of meeting for an answer.” Council Member Tara Astor
Astor added “I get that the Open Public Meetings Act allows council to not answer questions at meetings, but that doesn’t mean we are prohibited from answering. Most people appreciate having a dialogue while they are at the podium with their concerns and find the policy [Resolution 2025-54] of not answering to be disrespectful.”
“If it’s not too time consuming, a polite answer or comment helps diffuse tense situations which can get out of control as we saw on November 10th. We are mindful of how busy everybody is so where an answer would take too long we could say ‘lets speak after the meeting’ or ‘If you need to leave, please leave your name, email and phone # with the clerk so the appropriate person can reach out to you later’.”
Astor acknowledged that “Its true the mayor gets to run the meeting, but the “no dialogue” rule should not be enforced on just Kim and me. The entire resolution 2025-54 should be repealed so that responding to a resident is no longer an arbitrary privilege. Once a speaker’s 4 minutes are up, they should not have to wait until the end of the meeting to get clarification or answers.”