At another special meeting called by the Eagle Mountain City Council on Monday night, council members changed how their agendas are written, as a response to a dispute with the mayor.

They also discussed a resolution that would allow them to use tax money to pay for their own attorney, separate from the mayor's counsel.

The Monday meeting was the second in a series planned after a special meeting Friday, in which more than 100 people attended. Only about 20 attended the Monday meeting, and two others are planned for Saturday, at 12:30 p.m. and 1 p.m. The mayor and some council members have been arguing over a budget amendment. The council didn't pass it when Mayor Brian Olsen put it on an agenda earlier this month, and he has refused to put it back on an agenda so the council can discuss it.

There has also been a dispute between some members of the council and the mayor over whether council members are required to give the mayor their city-owned laptops to be scanned for pornography. Councilman Vincent Liddiard said his laptop has been scanned by a third party and he produced a piece of paper as evidence before the council and audience. After the meeting Councilman David Blackburn said that his laptop had also been scanned by a third party.

According to the agenda circulated at the meeting, the changes to the agenda process include requiring that the mayor put an item on the next City Council agenda if it's requested by at least two council members. Also included was a rearranging of the comment order, placing public comment and council comment at the beginning of the meeting, and any items selected by the mayor at the end of the meeting. They also changed the time limit for council and mayor comments to three minutes, except at the end of the meeting.

The agenda proposal passed with Blackburn and Liddiard and Councilwoman Linn Strouse voting for it, and Councilman David Lifferth voting against. Councilwoman Heather Jackson abstained from the vote.

When the need for the proposed law was called into question, Strouse said, "I have spent the last nine months trying to get things on the agenda to represent my constituents, and I cannot spend another day with the kind of roadblocks that I have had to deal with. I really believe that in order for this city to move forward we do need to make our government more efficient. I do not want to continue to have special meetings."

Jackson had a different view. "I have an opposing view in that it seems to me that we are taking away some checks and balances. In UT code 10-3-1213 it says that the mayor's power lies in setting the agenda. The mayor is the chairperson of our council. We are allowing comment from all council members and not the mayor. Are you intending that the mayor should not speak at all during the meetingfi"

Blackburn addressed the comment saying, "I don't think there is a desire here to censor the mayor."

After voting on the agenda process, council members talked about getting their own attorney to advise and protect their interests.

The first opposition to this motion was that there was no resolution drafted for the council to review or for the mayor to sign, should that resolution be passed.

The council managed to debate for an hour their right to have an attorney paid for by the taxpayers with no documentation and no background.

Finally Jerry Kinghorn, Eagle Mountain city attorney, said, "I didn't prepare a resolution for you (speaking to Blackburn and Strouse) because I didn't know what you had in mind. I am not sure what it means tonight. It should just be a budget item, a line item on the budget."

It was decided that if the any members of the City Council want legal counsel at the city's expense, then they need to amend the budget. Kinghorn said council members could hire their own attorney, and pay for it themselves.

"Hopefully, it would never be used, but it sets the groundwork should it ever be needed," Blackburn said about the attorney issue. Strouse said, "Anything that furthers the City Council's ability to represents the needs and concerns of citizens on fiscal and other issues is a good thing."

This story appeared in The Daily Herald on page A12.