Aurora City Council will hold its next meeting virtually and consider options for changing public comment rules after Monday night’s virtual meeting was interrupted by protesters who attempted to skirt the rules to speak.

Monday night’s meeting went virtual because of “safety concerns,” according to councilmembers, who also decided to eliminate the option for public invited to be heard during the meeting as well.

Protesters have been attending council meetings and speaking for months in support of Kilyn Lewis, who was shot and killed by an Aurora police officer who was trying to arrest him on a warrant for attempted murder. He was unarmed.

Councilmember Danielle Jurinsky told The Denver Gazette that councilmembers were told to stay home Monday by Aurora police, who voiced concerns about their safety. Jurinsky didn’t have many details about the security concerns beyond what police told her, she said.

In addition to going virtual, the council also got rid of the option for public invited to be heard on non-agenda items during Monday’s virtual meeting.

Instead, protesters attempted to make their voices heard via public hearing on agenda items, calling in to speak on various zoning questions and using the time to talk about Lewis and request action from the council.

Each time, the mayor cut them off when they strayed from the listed agenda item. 

The meeting lasted over three hours as protesters called in, the mayor tried to silence them and councilmembers interrupted to try to end public comment for the remainder of the meeting. The council took multiple recesses. 

Following the agenda items, councilmembers decided to make the next meeting, on Feb. 10, virtual as well, while they figure out what their next steps are in addressing protester interruptions.

While the majority of councilmembers voted to make the next meeting virtual, some disagreed. Councilmember Stephanie Hancock said meeting virtually doesn’t change anything “as seen by tonight’s actions,” she said.

Councilmember Angela Lawson agreed, saying she would agree to having the next meeting virtual, but “we can’t keep hiding behind a screen,” she said. 

“We’re going to have to get up on the dias eventually,” Lawson said. “We can’t just stay behind the screen … at the end of the day we’ve got to try to figure this out.”

Mayor Mike Coffman, however, said that if the council meets in-person, they will end up going virtual anyway, since it is “the only mechanism I have to control the meeting and the outlandish behavior,” he said.

Councilmember Francoise Bergan thinks the council needs to meet virtually until they come up with a solution. The council respectfully listened to protesters initially, but the protests have become “disruptive,” she said, keeping city officials from doing their business.

“We do have the option to do away with public invited altogether,” Bergan said. “We offer it as a courtesy to our residents, but our residents that have an issue with real concerns can’t even be heard … I’m sorry to say, but it has come to that point.”

Councilmember Crystal Murillo said that while she doesn’t necessarily agree with the “tactics everyone is using,” she also doesn’t think the council is helping when it comes to protesters.

“I don’t want to paint the wrong picture that there’s this scary mob of residents,” Murillo said. “Residents are angry and their forum for speaking on issues and feeling not heard keeps bubbling up, and we’ve done it to ourselves too … I don’t necessarily support all the tactics everyone is using but I also have seen this council contribute to that response by dwindling these opportunities for public comment.”