RIVER FALLS — The River Falls City Council heard the first reading of an ordinance that would ban residential targeted picketing during the Sept. 10 meeting.

“This ordinance prohibits targeted residential picketing within city limits. This creates a municipal civil forfeiture offense for activity that includes, but is not limited to marching, standing, or patrolling, that is focused on a single residential dwelling without the consent of the dwelling’s occupant(s),” city documents state.

The memorandum states Brookfield, Shorewood, Lisbon, Appleton and Oshkosh are all municipalities in Wisconsin with similar ordinances. Residents can still walk through residential areas while picketing, but the ordinance prevents picketing at a specific, targeted home.

“Less than a year ago, [we] had an ordinance brought in front of us that was very narrow regarding picketing in front of council members’ and law enforcement officers’ homes, and we, as a council, chose to vote that down,” Alderperson Alyssa Mueller said. “Now we have an ordinance coming forward that is much broader than that ordinance. So, I’m just confused as to why this is coming before us because I’ve heard nothing about this.”

Mayor Dan Toland said there has been interest from council members in an ordinance and that it is not in response to residential targeted picketing happening, but for protection in case it does. Toland said this does not only protect council members, but also school board members, police, firefighters and anyone else living in River Falls.

City Administrator Scot Simpson said the previous ordinance presented protected city officials, but this ordinance would protect all in the city.

“To me, it feels like we’re taking away a fundamental right of our citizens to express their frustration through free speech public demonstration on public property, including the sidewalks, for something that’s never happened,” Mueller said.

Other members of the council stated the change would not be a violation of constitutional rights, and instead serve as a protection of other rights.

“When you’re dealing with constitutional rights, here the constitutional right for free speech, you can put reasonable restrictions on it,” Alderperson Diane Odeen said. “It also needs to be balanced against other rights including the right to be safe in your own home, the right of privacy in your neighborhood.”

Odeen said there are other ways for the public to exercise their freedom of speech rights and the ordinance brings safety to people in their homes.

“The idea is you can communicate with elected officials, you can protest, but you can’t just stop in front of someone’s house and target that person,” City Attorney Chris Gierhart said.

Mueller said the ordinance is not specific enough on what residential picketing is, including not giving a time for how long picketing can occur outside a home before it is considered targeted and what is considered residential. Odeen disagreed, saying residential targeted picketing is well defined and there are other outlets for protest.

“It doesn’t happen in most communities,” Mueller said. “I think this is a bad decision.”

With no specified threshold for the ordinance, law enforcement would be responsible for determining residential targeted picketing and enforcing it.

“I think they’ve already gone too far if they’re standing in front of somebody’s house on the street and picketing that individual person,” Toland said. “What we’re doing is making sure that person in that house feels safe.”

Gierhart said this ordinance will result in a fine if violated, and if no ordinance is in place, it would take harassment or disorderly conduct to result in police action.

Alderperson Nick Carow shared his thoughts and said he would like more information from city staff prior to the next council meeting.

“We have all sorts of other things that could have ordinances that don’t… As a council, I think a default action has been if we don’t see an issue, we’re not going to go ahead and put something on the books quite yet,” Carow said. “Simultaneously, what this ordinance I think does is it helps protect our election officials, and that is a really important element in an era of contested elections.”

Bacon Bash

After some discussion with River Falls Chamber of Commerce CEO Russ Korpela, council amended and approved an updated open container exemption request for Bacon Bash. While one exemption was already approved for the Bacon Bash in May, it covered Sept. 27 and 28 at Heritage Park, while the update includes 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Sept. 29 on a section of Main Street for people to view the classic cars.

The updated proposal was for the section of Main Street from Pine Street to Cascade Avenue to be changed to the section of Main Street from Maple Street to Locust Street.

The reason the original section was in the proposal was because the proposal was modeled after the proposal for River Dazzle, but the section was changed because only the amended section was necessary.