Petaluma City Council meeting bombarded with hateful comments

A wave of bigotry hitting several North Bay communities and government bodies in recent weeks has come to Petaluma, with homophobic and other materials distributed downtown last week, followed by a coordinated attempt on Monday night to flood the City Council meeting with hateful comments.

The actions by a few anonymous people prompted city leaders to shut down the public comment period entirely, and to not include remote comments in future meetings.

Incidents similar to that disruption have been occurring at other public meetings in Sonoma County, with certain speakers – who rely on video conferencing to remain anonymous while making their comments – attempting to hijack the proceedings to express anti-Jewish, homophobic and other bigoted sentiments.

On Monday, city leaders and staff seemed to guess they might be targeted next, with City Attorney Eric Danly noting before the public comment period that “The Brown Act does not require permitting members of the public to comment from a remote location, except when a legislative body member is also participating remotely, and tonight that is not the case.”

Mayor Kevin McDonnell followed up by saying, “It’s not good to see those disruptions that have come down at other boards and things, and we certainly don’t want to have that here.”

Minutes later – and moments after in-person public speakers denounced the materials distributed downtown – the city meeting was subjected to the same sort of disruption.

After half a dozen people, some with fake names and all of them commenting remotely, began sidetracking the meeting with hateful comments, McDonnell fell back on Danly’s suggestion to shut down remote comments if need be.

“I think we have determined the pattern tonight,” he said. “We will close public comment for the evening.”

Monday night’s disruption came amid an uptick of similar incidents at public meetings around the region, including at city of Santa Rosa, county Board of Supervisors and Santa Rosa City Schools board of trustees meetings.

Antisemitic and other hateful flyers have been distributed around the region as well, with residents in Sonoma Valley recently targeted. Authorities in that incident said they had few or no leads on who is doing it, and that it wasn’t certain what crime they could charge the perpetrators with if they did, given that the fliers were carefully worded to avoid making direct threats.

Petaluma officials said they first learned about the downtown flyers last Thursday afternoon. An early statement by the city did not specify the content of the flyers, nor did it describe them as hate speech, instead characterizing the incident as “vandalism.”

On Monday, Petaluma City Schools board president Joanna Paun came forward as an in-person public speaker to state that “Last week there were white supremacist stickers found placed around our downtown area.” She wondered why, in a recent Facebook post, the city had only referred to that incident as “vandalism.”

On Friday, Oct. 6, the city released a stronger statement, declaring that “Recently, our city has been the target of antisemitic hate speech, both in the form of flyers in our downtown and during the virtual public comment portion of our Council meeting this past Monday.”

The city now plans to suspend online public comment going forward, and will introduce a resolution at its Oct. 16 meeting “condemning hate speech, racism, and acts of extremism,” according to the statement.

“Petaluma will continue to stand strong against hate in all its forms,” the statement read.

Another speaker during the public comment period on Monday, Petaluma school board member Ellen Webster, identified herself as Jewish and said she was “nervous and worried about the attention I’d bring to myself,” by speaking publicly.

“I want to bring a face, mine, to the recent spate of antisemitism. Unfortunately, antisemitism is not new to Petaluma,” she said.

After McDonnell closed public comments during the meeting and turned it over to council comments, nearly every elected official expressed outrage over what they had just heard. Several also signaled their support to end online public comments, and to pass anti-hate resolutions on the city’s behalf.

“This is very disturbing,” said Vice Mayor Janice Cader Thompson. “I am Jewish, and I’m extremely stressed out over this. I know antisemitism, you can smell it a mile away, and what’s happening in this county is not surprising for me, nor in this city.”

Cader Thompson also made a nod toward Paun’s comments about the city not calling the hateful materials what they are. “We need to do better. You don’t call this vandalism,” she said.

“They’re cowards, and that’s who they are,” she said of the perpetrators, and then issued a challenge to them: “If you want to make your comments, then come on down and make your comments” in person.

The city will still cut you off, she said, but “At least your faces will be shown.”

Two local rabbis, in responding to recent incidents of antisemitism, encouraged residents to lean into kindness, compassion and love.

Despite the disheartening behavior, “We feel embraced by the local community,” said Rabbi Dovid Bush of Chabad Jewish Center of Petaluma.

“We do have to take notice. The best reaction that we could have to this kind of situation is to respond how? To respond by increasing in acts of kindness,” he said.

A kind word or act outside one’s circle of influence is one way to “add more light” to the community, he said.

For Rabbi Shalom Bochner of B’nai Israel Jewish Center, “It’s a moment to celebrate the diversity of this place.”

Those responsible for the flyers and commentary “are attempting to create division, fear and potentially promote violence. I recommend giving them as little attention as possible,” he said.

This “strengthens my resolve to get people to get to know their neighbors to build strong alliances“ with faith groups, LGBTQ+ groups, Latino residents, Black residents and other members of the community, he said.

You can reach Staff Writer Jennifer Sawhney at 707-521-5346 or jennifer.sawhney@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter @sawhney_media.