Chattanooga City Council recently voted down an ordinance to rezone Bassam Issa’s Gunbarrel Road property where he hopes to build an IHOP restaurant, but a procedural oversight by the council may undermine that vote.
In the meeting when the vote was taken, the council did not give Issa an opportunity to offer a two-minute rebuttal after the opposition spoke. The council then voted to allow Mike Baker, a representative from Erlanger, to speak in opposition to Issa’s request. Baker’s comments were in addition to the three allotted opposition speakers who had already spoken.
“In effect, council replaced my two minutes’ rebuttal in favor of my case with two minutes of more opposition to my case by unlawful procedures that broke the whole rezoning process,” Issa wrote in an email to the council.
According to Chattanooga City Council District 8 representative Andrae McGary, skipping the rebuttal was an oversight by Council Chairwoman Pam Ladd, who is working with the city attorney to find a solution. The allowance of a fourth person to speak in opposition to a request is rare but not a violation of procedure since a majority of the council voted to allow it, he said.
“The oversight that was made has been recognized, and at this point every effort is being made to rectify the situation,” said McGary.