Palmdale City Council Debates Problem of the Endless Meeting : Government: The panel’s monthly public forums often run into the wee hours. Members are divided over what to do about it.

It was 1:30 in the morning at a City Council meeting earlier this month, many residents had already departed in despair after waiting hours to speak, and there was no end in sight to the session that had begun, as always, at 7 p.m.

Then the unexpected happened. In a city where the once-a-month council meetings routinely drag into the early morning hours, testing the endurance and patience of residents and city officials alike, Palmdale Mayor Jim Ledford, himself tired and hungry, finally told his colleagues he’d had enough.

“One-thirty is not the time to be doing public business,” Ledford declared. “I’m ready to move we don’t hold our meetings past 11:30 p.m. There’s got to be a better way.”

Now, after long accepting their early morning marathons as a given, Palmdale officials are finally talking about finding a better way to conduct the public’s business.

As a result of the May 13 flare-up, Palmdale City Administrator Bob Toone told council members he will present them with options for improving the situation at their June 10 meeting. A second regular council meeting each month and a council curfew--halting the meetings at a set time such as 11:30 p.m.--are possibilities.

But council members appear divided on their preferences, and no clear consensus has emerged. Councilman David Myers, for instance, favors a second regular meeting each month, but Councilwoman Teri Jones said she opposes it, and Councilman Jim Root is skeptical. Ledford, meanwhile, has been pushing his council curfew plan.

The reasons for the marathon sessions vary. Sometimes a bevy of controversial topics draws a heavy turnout of residents eager to talk. Other times council members get caught in drawn-out debates. And oftentimes, part of the reason is that the council’s regular agendas, because they have only one a month, include dozens of items.

Although Palmdale officials are reluctant to shift to twice-a-month meetings, complaining of the extra staff work to prepare for the extra sessions, a Times survey of 10 other similarly sized cities in Los Angeles County showed them all holding two or more regular council meetings monthly, and almost all saying they finish at earlier hours.

In the past 17 months, 13 of the 17 regular monthly meetings ended past 11 p.m., seven of those between 1 a.m. and 3 a.m. and another--the longest, in July 1992--went to 3:18 a.m., city records show. Even after excluding the council’s closed-door sessions, which often come last, 12 of the public sessions ended after 11 p.m., according to records.

Among the cities surveyed by the Times, only Santa Monica, with its tradition of controversy, reported council meetings that regularly go beyond midnight, as they have for years.

Palmdale officials acknowledge they become bleary-eyed and tired as the nights drag on.

“I can’t defend that as being in the best interest of decision-making,” Ledford said.

The timing of night council meetings is particularly important in Palmdale, where many residents commute to the Los Angeles and San Fernando Valley areas and thus must leave home as early as 4:30 a.m. Palmdale’s regular council meetings now are held the second Thursday of each month, meaning the following morning is a workday for most.

At the May 13 Palmdale council meeting, several hundred residents turned out at 7 p.m. to testify on a trio of hot items: an increase in trash collection fees, an increase in landscape maintenance fees and a rent-control measure for the city’s large number of mobile-home residents.

Not only were many residents left standing for hours because there is limited seating in the council chambers, but many ultimately ended up leaving before the council got to their items because the session went so late.

“There were a lot of people who wanted to speak but left,” Councilman Root said.

Ledford acknowledged that how the council handles its scheduling problem probably also will impact residents’ ability to address their elected officials. While the early morning sessions certainly make it tough on residents, so would a plan under discussion by council members to more tightly limit residents’ speaking time to help end the meetings earlier.

Frequency of City Council Meetings (for comparable cities in L.A. County)

Population Meetings Jan. 1993 Ranking City Per Month Population 10 Lancaster 2 107,675 11 West Covina 2 98,157 12 Burbank Weekly 97,219 13 Norwalk 2 96,281 14 Downey 2 93,454 15 Compton 4 91,413 16 PALMDALE 1 89,717 17 Santa Monica 2 88,588 18 South Gate 2 88,490 19 Carson 2 84,991 20 Alhambra 2 84,919

Sources: State Department of Finance, city clerks