On the same afternoon Prescott swore in a new mayor and three new council members, a resident publicly accused the outgoing council of quietly gutting the city’s citizen-initiative process.
Ralph Hess used his four minutes of public comment to charge that a new “Rule 11” allows council to bury legally submitted petitions on the consent agenda and kill them without a vote.
Hess then handed the city clerk a new petition to repeal the rule.