The Berkeley City Council will discuss an item tonight that will require the council to read items from the Peace and Justice Commission twice, an effort to allow for more public input.

But some officials say this requirement, introduced by Councilmember Gordon Wozniak, unfairly places a burden on only one of the city's 45 commissions, not all of them.

Wozniak said he created the item because more public input and adequate time is needed to consider items coming from that commission, especially in light of the recent controversy surrounding the Marine Corps recruiting center in Downtown Berkeley.

Last month, the Peace and Justice Commission recommended an item to the City Council that included sending a controversial letter to the Marines, calling them "uninvited and unwelcome intruders."

"The reason why you want to do that is because these statements are being done in the name of all the public," Wozniak said. "We should be requesting broad input so we can hear some counter-arguments without rushing it through."

But some council members say the item is unfair.

"I think Councilmember Wozniak was on the short end of two votes regarding the Marine recruiting station and sought to achieve something that he couldn't achieve through the democratic process of considering items that come from our commissions," Councilmember Max Anderson said.

Currently, items from all commissions are passed after only one reading. But under Wozniak's proposal, items from the Peace and Justice Commission would follow a path similar to that of ordinances and go through two readings before passing.

"It's a check and balance to something," Wozniak said.

Some say his item should be applicable to all commissions in the city.

"This kind of process issue is bad policy for a city government to set procedures from one group compared to any other group," said Steve Freedkin, former chair of the commission. "There is no substantive group. It should be applied to all other commissions."

Councilmember Betty Olds said she agreed with the idea of looking more closely at the commission's items.

"They could put forth whatever they want to put forth and they should," Olds said. "I'm just saying the articles tend to be more controversial from them than others."

Freedkin said he met with Wozniak Thursday to discuss alternatives to the original item. One compromise included requiring background information to be posted with the commission meeting agenda and posting minutes in the days following a meeting, rather than sometimes waiting as much as a month for them to be posted.

"The basic idea is to give people more access to policy proposals, and I think that most commissioners should get behind it because it increases the value of their work," Freedkin said.

Wozniak said he would draft the substitute motion for discussion tonight.

"I don't have a problem with treating (all commissions) the same, but it's particularly something you want to do with the Peace and Justice Commission, with the nature of resolutions they've produced," he said.

Some of the commission's members say the alternatives are better than the original item, as they will improve public participation in commissions.

"These would be improving the communications with the citizens, getting the word out, having more public input before votes are taken on the item," commissioner Michael Sherman said. "If all commissions get involved in this, something very positive came out of this thing."

Tags: CITY COUNCIL, PEACE AND JUSTICE COMMISSION, MILITARY RECRUITMENT CENTER