COWLEY COMMISSION RESUMES IN-PERSON MEETINGS

The world is slowly peeking out, and beginning to crawl out of its bunker after all the coronavirus precautions, and things are beginning to return to some semblance of normalcy locally too. The Cowley County Commission met Tuesday morning in person for the first time since March 19th. Since then, and until yesterday, Zoom virtual meetings have been the way meetings have been held. Tuesday’s meeting was still available on Zoom by audio, and at least through the summer, the meetings will be held both live and on Zoom. The reasoning behind that is, according to county officials, is since they paid for it for a year, they might as well use it. Additionally, it will make the meetings available to those who want to participate but are still afraid to do it in person. According to the Kansas Open Meetings Act, if a meeting is covered through audio, those attending the meeting have to identify themselves each time they speak or vote, and that requirement causes some issues that county commissioners don’t like. They want to see if there is any way around that requirement.