Agenda Highlights 11/10/22

Because of Tuesday being Election Night, the Fort Smith Board of Directors will hold their study session meeting on Thursday November 10,2022.

The Board will be presented paper copies of the proposed 2023 City Operating Budget. The budget hearing will be held November 18,2022.

The Board will discuss the calendar for scheduled meetings for 2023.

The Board will discuss potential changes to the Town Hall meetings. The issue was originally discussed at a recent meeting but tabled so that it could be moved to a study session for further discussion. Options to be discussed are keeping the Town Hall meetings as they are currently (immediately following the adjournment of the first regular meeting of the month), or moving them to 6PM before the first regular meeting of the month, or returning to the format used prior to instituting the separate Town Hall meetings where citizens could speak on non-agenda items in a Citizens Forum section of the regular meeting instead of a separate Town Hall meeting, or moving the Town Hall meetings to immediately following the first study session meeting of the month, or moving Town Hall meetings to the quarterly Ward Meetings, or eliminating the Town Hall meetings or Citizens Forum opportunities for the citizens to address the Board on non-agenda items in a public Board of Directors meeting all together.

The Board will discuss issues pertaining to animals. They will discuss options for the Animal Ordinance that would require pet licensing that was adopted previously but due to issues with the private company that was going to handle the licensing was never actually implemented. There will be discussion of ways to implement the existing ordinance and start enforcing it, or if the ordinance needs to be changed, or if the ordinance should be repealed entirely and rethought and replaced from scratch. The Board will also discuss other issues pertaining to stray pets, animal services, and animal shelter space availability issues.