Three hours into last Monday’s city council meeting, Mayor Sumbul Siddiqui faced a tricky task when presiding over Cambridge councillors: reining in debate.
“I don’t want to hear from anyone anymore,” she said dryly.
The sense of irony was strong in the room. Councillors were discussing new rules proposed by Councillor Jivan Sobrinho-Wheeler, chair of the government operations committee, including one controversial provision to end Monday council meetings at 10 p.m. and restart them if necessary at noon the next day. There were still other agenda items to discuss, the longer they failed to reach agreement, the longer this meeting would run.
Sobrinho-Wheeler put forth these rules because “the way we do business is extremely disrespectful to city staff,” he said. “I want to make that really clear as a moral imperative.”…