Editorial: City Council, School Board board virtual meetings on April 13

Virtual meetings take a lot longer because every motion has to be voted on in a roll-call vote to make sure everyone is participating.
On Monday, April 13, we had two, back-to-back, virtual meetings, with most of those involved participating from their homes.
The Belleville City Council had a special meeting at 5 p.m. on a COVID-19 related business matter. Everyone on the city council was present on the screen except for Councilman Tom Fielder, who was participating by phone.
Before the meeting, Councilman Ken Voigt showed everyone how to change their backgrounds and he changed his to have the seal of the City of Belleville behind him, which brought lots of compliments. That meeting had everyone able to talk freely.
In the Van Buren Public Schools Board of Education virtual meeting at 7:30 p.m., Trustee Kelly Owen was frozen in place in her position on the screen a few times. But, former board president Keith Johnston was frozen in place a good deal of the time and was unable to voice a vote on one motion. Board members agreed Johnston would have agreed with the motion and went on with the meeting.
Not a good idea. Trustee Johnston was a good sport about it and didn’t complain. But, he was there and he should have been given a chance to cast his ballot, no matter the subject. Got to fix that before the next virtual meeting.