Unclear prayer policy raises concerns

MONTE VISTA—The Monte Vista City Council’s recent decision to implement prayer at council meetings following the Pledge of Allegiance has led to criticism from national organizations, concerns about discrimination and disagreement between council and city staff.
Having a prayer at the beginning of council meetings was first suggested by Calvary Baptist Church’s Pastor Bob Galey on March 15. Galey suggested using the pastors who are members of the local ministerial alliance on a rotation to lead council in prayer. On that date, Mayor Dale Becker noted they were taking all public comments “on advisement” following the resignation of former City Attorney Karen Lintott that morning. Mike Trujillo was selected as the interim city attorney at the end of the March 15 council meeting. The practice of including prayer was approved unanimously on April 5 by Mayor Pro-Tem Victor Sigala, and Councilors Gary Johnson and Kathy Ellithorpe. Former-councilor Schlabach had recently resigned and Becker was excused from that meeting. Ellithorpe noted the prayer should be non-denominational but council did not otherwise offer any guidelines for procedure that would be followed in selecting who leads the prayer. City council held their first prayer at the following meeting on April 19, led by Galey, with Becker inviting attendees to remain standing for the prayer following the pledge.

Timeline of events
On April 20, city council received a letter from Christopher Line at the Freedom From Religion Foundation (FFRF); the national nonprofit organization has 33,000 members including over 800 in Colorado. The FFRF was informed about the council’s decision to begin the meeting with prayer by a member. Line’s letter encouraged council to consider eliminating the practice of prayer at council meetings but cautioned council to remember by the Supreme Court precedent set in Town of Greece v. Galloway (2014) municipalities can conduct prayer if they allow anyone who wishes to give an invocation the opportunity to do so without discrimination. “In order to demonstrate the council’s respect for the diverse range of religious and nonreligious citizens living in Monte Vista, we urge you to concentrate on civil matters and leave religion to the private conscience of each individual by ending the practice of hosting prayers at your meetings. At the very least, the council must ensure that its invocation policy does not discriminate against atheists and freethinkers.”
In email correspondence with Valley Publishing on April 23, Line stated, “We don’t have any plans for further action at this time. The facts reported in your story certainly make it sound like the City plans on hosting only Christian prayers before meetings. We wrote to urge the City not to begin its meetings with prayer, but also to let the City know that if it does want to allow invocations at its meetings that it must allow minority religious groups and atheists, agnostics and other nontheists the opportunity to deliver invocations, as well.
If an atheist, agnostic, or other nontheist were denied an opportunity to deliver an invocation before the city council, we’d likely take action to protect the person who had been discriminated against.
We’ve been dealing with this issue pretty frequently lately, and FFRF was recently victorious in a lawsuit filed about this issue (Williamson v. Brevard Cty., 276 F. Supp. 3d 1260 (M.D. Fla. 2017), appeal docketed, No. 18-10109 (11th Cir. Jan. 11, 2018…))
Ideally, we’d like to see the city council cease including prayer at its meetings, it’s unnecessary and divisive. But, if they do continue including prayer at meetings then every religious and nonreligious group in the City should have an opportunity to offer an invocation.”
At the May 2 Coffee with a Cop meeting the topic of prayer at council meetings came up among attendees. First Christian Church’s Pastor Wayne Wittner stated he would be leading the prayer at the May 3 City Council meeting. Councilman Johnson, also a pastor of the San Luis Valley Christian Center and a Christian author, made it clear he disagreed with the FFRF interpretation of the Supreme Court ruling. He stated that his interpretation is Christian prayer was not a violation of the establishment clause and the city would not hear invocations from Satanists or other minority religions, stating “We don’t have to submit to the rule of a minority.” Mayor Becker’s wife, Jennifer, was present at the meeting and told attendees Becker would be clarifying his stance at the following council meeting and the interpretation of the city attorney was different from Johnson’s, stated Trujillo and Becker believed the correct policy was to allow anybody who wanted to give an invocation and equal opportunity. She encouraged Johnson to speak with Trujillo about his interpretation of the ruling, but noted her stance on the matter was “If the prayer is offensive to you, you’re more than welcome to get up and leave.”
At the May 3 council meeting, Wittner did not lead the prayer and Mayor Becker did not offer any clarification on the prayer policy or suggestions of sitting or standing, although council remained standing for the prayer. Becker requested Sigala lead the prayer, which he did.
Valley Publishing reached out to City Manager Forrest Neuerburg and council on May 10, asking for clarification of recent remarks, as well as comment on the policy. None of the councilors or Neuerburg responded or offered any policy in return.
On May 11, Sam Mamet, executive director of the Colorado Municipal League (CML), “a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization providing services and resources to assist municipal officials in managing their governments and serving the cities and towns of Colorado,” stated CML does not have a set suggested policy for prayer at council meetings. He stated policies throughout the state are “all over the map, ranging from not doing it all to very detailed and extensive policies.” Mamet said the prayer policy should ensure fairness and “be balanced toward an open process... not done on an ad hoc basis.” Mamet noted some jurisdictions opt for a moment of silence to be as fair and balanced as possible but noted the importance of having “a written or established policy” for invocations because of their complicated, sensitive nature. He stated invocations have the potential to be an instance where “The law of good intentions comes up against the law of unintended consequences, and when those two clash, you have a problem.”
At the most recent council meeting, held on May 17, Becker began the prayer by stating “We are getting ready to have a prayer now. You all may stand; if you choose not to stand, we understand that and we respect your beliefs and whatever you want to do and nobody here will feel any different, so we respect you for that.” The prayer was then led by Wittner, but no opportunity or time for other invocations was provided.
During the staff reports portion of the meeting, attorney Trujillo stated “We have done a lot of research on the prayer issue that has come before the council and the Supreme Court case that came down awhile back outlining what city council bodies could do in terms of prayer. I met with the Municipal League, I’ve been involved with them for many years and got information from them as well and I think we’ve got a pretty good response to the folks who have concerns about that. We’re going to put a notice in the paper, Nita [City Clerk Unita Vance] is going to do that and if folks want to get on the agenda and do an invocation then I guess we’ll get them scheduled but I think we are online with what the law requires, and I feel like we’ve got a pretty good policy there.” A
On Tuesday, May 22, the City sent the following policy for publication in the Monte Vista Journal, “City of Monte Vista City Council would like to invite anyone who would like to attend Council Meetings and open them with a prayer. Council meets on the first and third Thursday of each month at 6 p.m. and prayer time will be limited to 30 seconds and anyone is welcome. Please contact the city clerk at 719-852-2692 or [email protected] to get on the list.”
The policy does not address nontheist invocations or if the city will preview the content of the prayers beforehand.


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