Today's News-Herald

Who knew? Citizens wearing baseball caps hinder the Mohave County government’s ability to deal with important business.

This is no joke, but it should be. A new county rule establishes a dress code for people attending county meetings.

At Monday’s Board of Supervisors meeting, two members of the public wearing baseball caps were told to leave the meeting and the meeting was briefly adjourned to allow security people to deal with the dress-code violators.

One of those ejected complained that her rights to address the board on tax matters was violated.

Despite the hat distraction, the supervisors approved a budget. Supervisor Buster Johnson’s quote is memorable: “We were meeting to approve a $280 million budget; we are trying to look into three escaped murderers in the county and we have other important business. People wearing baseball caps will not be tolerated.”

Let’s see, of the following four items, which one is different: 1.)the county’s annual budget 2.)escaped murderers 3.)important business 4.)baseball caps.

Put another way, taxpayers most likely want their elected officials to focus on which of the above-named items?

Either way, baseball caps are the odd items out.

The dress code is a silly bit of business in a political battle between a handful of people protesting county policies and practices and the county government. Its adoption was an ill-advised part of an effort to keep those few people out of meetings.

By the way, there should be an expectation of appropriate dress in all public meetings.

In this case, though, the dress code is part of an effort to silence dissent. In our view, the public has every right to attend a government meeting. Unless dress is so shocking, so clearly out of touch with community standards that it truly interferes with the conduct of public business, it should be tolerated.

Ball caps? If we had to put a number to it, we’d guess they’re worn by about a quarter of the male population in Mohave County. They’re a bit casual. But overall, Mohave County is more than a bit casual.

The county should remove people from meetings only if there are disruptions.

Ball caps interfering with decisions? C’mon, supervisors, we hope you have stronger focus than that.

— Today’s News-Herald