The Bainbridge Island City Council decided Dec. 12 to limit public comments after some “hate speech” comments via Zoom the previous meeting.

In-person comments will be limited to agenda items only. Remote calls are being suspended, except as required by state law, until the council can discuss the issue at a future study session.

Deputy mayor Kirsten Hytopoulos said the council is limited in controlling comments, and that’s why the hate speech regarding the Middle East wasn’t cut off previously. “It was unfortunate,” she said.

The agenda summary on public comments says during and post COVID council meetings have been interrupted with verbal communication that expresses hatred, prejudice or hostility toward people or groups based upon race, ethnicity, nationality and other characteristics. All of the communications have occurred remotely over Zoom.

Remote communications are limited in their ability to verify a speaker’s identity. Research has shown that anonymity is a factor in uncivil behavior. Other than an accommodation for people with disabilities, there is no legal obligation to accept remote public comment.

City councils are allowed to provide rules on time, place, and manner of speech during public comment.

In an email to this newspaper, at least one former councilmember objected to the stance on public input. Ron Peltier said limiting public comments to agenda items is a disservice as that is the only time people can address city leaders in a public setting. Talking about things not on the agenda can make the council aware of important issues it may not know about.

He said when he was on the council from 2016-19 there were public comments on any issue at every meeting. Now they are only taken at business meetings and now comments will be limited even more. He added the council even dug deeper into the community at that time, attending six Ward meetings per year. Those were suspended during COVID, but they are supposed to start up again, he said.

Also at the meeting, the council decided to clear the former police station property at 625 Winslow Way in the hopes of building affordable housing there.

Hytopoulos asked if any of the materials could be recycled. Public Works director Chris Wierzbicki said the city can look into that but the materials are old. City manager Blair King said there is a clock they want to save.

King said there was research into whether it should be a historical building, but added it lacked integrity because of so many changes to it over the years.

Councilmember Jon Quitslund disagreed. “There is quite a bit of history this building is part of,” he said. He added little research went into the historical review, which was “scurrilously done.”

Meanwhile, the council asked staff to come up with a plan to return “hotels” to a land use in Winslow. Hotels have not been allowed in Winslow for three years. That decision was only supposed to be temporary as long-term plans for downtown encourage such usage. The information is important for the Winslow Subarea and Comprehensive plans underway now.

The Planning Commission would review the recommendations. Quitslund asked to make sure it has standards such as how many rooms and for noise.

Finally, the council accepted the low bid of $16 million for the Winslow water tank project. King said they have a low-interest loan, but there’s still up to a $4 million gap to be funded.

During public comments, a representative of another company said the bid being accepted has much higher maintenance costs than the one from her company. She said her company’s product would save the city $4.38 million in maintenance costs, which would easily make up for the higher initial cost.

King said there was no official bid protest.