By Roger Jimenez, Interning Correspondent for The Apopka Voice
The Apopka City Council voted 4-1 in favor of a resolution reinstating public comment at the beginning of meetings. Resolution 2025-19 reversed the divisive changes made by Mayor Bryan Nelson in August 2024, which moved public comments to the end of meetings and removed them entirely from the live stream feed.
Related: A Legacy in Peril: Why Mayor Nelson should return public comments to their normal position in City Council meetings.
But at the May 7th meeting, public comment took center stage, accounting for more than an hour of dialogue.
The discussion immediately grew tense when Commissioner Nick Nesta made a motion to open the floor to citizens immediately, ahead of the resolution's formal introduction. The motion passed.
Throughout the conversation, Nesta challenged Nelson, accusing him of failing to uphold transparency and selectively enforcing decorum rules with the public.
"We have made residents wait for hours to speak to us, to address us properly," Nesta said. "They have been disenfranchised, marginalized. We have attacked them in many ways—and by we, I mean the Mayor. You have attacked them by doing this."
Nelson had little to say in response, though he did express his support for the new resolution.
"I think this is a good policy that we could all feel like we've done a good job for our constituents," Nelson said. "I think it's a great policy."
Commissioner Nadia Anderson also expressed her support.
"I think it's always important to look at old policies or outdated policies and see how we could redline and improve them," Anderson said.
However, the "old" policy, Resolution 2016-16, gave speakers 4 minutes to speak, and did not limit the total time of public comments to 30 minutes, as Resolution 2025-19 does.
Early debate on the resolution centered around its language. Commissioner Diane Velazquez spoke of how crucial it is to state the decorum before every meeting, while Nesta objected to time limits on speakers and urged the council to include live streaming in the wording of the policy.
"He [the Mayor] should read the decorum announcement at every meeting to order, rather than at his discretion," Velazquez said. "The reason I felt it was important is so we are consistent."
Resolution 2025-19 passed 4–1, with Nesta voting against it due to his opposition to the time limits placed on public speakers, which he considered unnecessary. The decision comes as a surprise, as a similar motion by Nesta was rejected last year on September 4th, just a month after the original change.
Some residents expressed gratitude for the resolution, while others were concerned about transparency.
Michael Duran, whose son Austin died in 2022 after a workplace accident at Apopka Fire Station 1, advocated fiercely for safety improvements at the Apopka Fire Department. He attributed his public comments as the platform to bring those changes about.
"Commissioners, thank you so much," Duran said. "This is long overdue. Public comment is super important, and its timing is super important. Two years ago, I had to come to every meeting and fight for something that I thought was important for one of your departments and our firefighters. I used public comment to hold the city accountable and for transparency. Had public comment been, then, the same environment that it has been for the last eighteen meetings, maybe those changes would not have happened… I don't know why we are so afraid of transparency."
Others, however, were not as pleased.
"You are failing to act in the best interest of the citizens who elected you. This is my comment," Apopka resident Rod Olsen said as he held up a pair of shoestrings. "These are shoelaces. Because that's what I feel, and most people here feel like they have been talking to you for the last couple of years."
Key parts of the motion include:
- A 30-minute Public Comment period will open at the start of City Council meetings.
- Public comment on agenda items will be limited to three minutes per speaker.
- If numerous citizens wish to speak, time may be reduced to a minimum of two minutes per person.
- Groups may elect a spokesperson, who may receive up to six minutes depending on group size.
- Citizens wishing to speak publicly must submit the proper Intent to Speak form beforehand.
Although the resolution restored public comments to the front of the meeting, some on local social media were skeptical of the timing. The Apopka Critic, a local Facebook page with over 15,000 followers, believed the timing was politically based.
"After almost a year of suppressing public comments, the Mayor has a change of heart ten months before an election. But don’t be fooled, the time the public has to speak has been reduced from four to three minutes. The public comment portion of the meetings has moved back to the beginning of each meeting. We believe Nelson knew this was, and will be, a major topic during the upcoming Mayoral election."
The post received 29 likes and 41 comments at the time of publication.
Although Nelson has not announced, he is expected to run for a third term as Apopka Mayor.
