Bowmanstown borough council members who fail to attend regular meetings will be docked for missing them.

On a 4-1 vote, council this week agreed to advertise the council pay ordinance for adoption at next month’s meeting. Councilwoman Kara Scott was opposed.

Before the vote, borough solicitor Lisa Pereira said she prepared a draft amending an ordinance which set the new rate of compensation in 2017 to add a new section that spells out no compensation to council.

The ordinance states that no compensation should be paid in any month to a member of council who has failed to attend any regular meeting unless the member’s absence is due to an illness, an immediate family member’s illness, or the death of an immediate family member.

Scott asked if a council member’s absence due to illness could be taken out of the draft ordinance, since it would be difficult to track whether a council member is truly sick and for how long.

However, Councilman Rob Moyer said that each member took an oath to be true.

Mayor Zach Snyder said he agreed with Scott, and was not in favor of imposing such an ordinance.

“I think it should be done all or none,” Snyder said.

Moyer said it appeared as if the majority of council wanted to proceed with the ordinance.

Scott, though, reiterated that she had reservations.

“I would accept it without (the part that deals with) illness,” Scott said. “I feel it opens a can of worms.”

Councilman William Ravert said he didn’t necessarily believe it would prove difficult to know whether a council member was sick.

“This is a small town, and everybody knows what goes on,” Ravert said.

Afterward, council agreed to advertise the ordinance as is.

Councilwomen Donna Winter and Candace Rodrigues were absent.

Snyder said that in defense of one of the council members that has been absent was calling in to participate in the meetings, but once told that their vote would not count for a call in, that council member stopped.

But, resident Phyllis Kreiss said no matter how you look at it, there’s still two absences.

“There’s two absences every meeting,” Kreiss said. “They’re absent, but they’re still getting paid.

“We’re still dealing with the issue of two council members being absent month after month after month. They’re not here to represent their community.”

Last month, council said it planned to create a new ordinance that will spell out whether or not council members get paid for missing meetings.

On a 4-1 vote, borough council at that time agreed to move forward with having Pereira write a new ordinance.

Council members are paid $100 a month.

In 2022, Rodrigues missed eight meetings, Ravert missed seven (most of which were medical issues), Winter missed five, Scott missed two and council President Pam Leiby missed one.