In a year when the City Council has repeatedly debated its own rules, the body held a hearing Thursday to review the clarity and consistency of Rule 15’s application.

Rule 15 prevents duplicative items from appearing on the same agenda. If two councilors file substantively similar items, the City Clerk will add only the first-filed item to the Council’s agenda. It also prevents items already in committee or already acted upon in that municipal year from recirculating in the Council Chambers.

All agenda items must be published 48 hours before the Council meets, in accordance with the Massachusetts Open Meeting Law.

In February, Councilors Erin Murphy and Gabriella Coletta Zapata filed separate resolutions recognizing March as Women’s History Month. Murphy said that City Clerk Alex Georntas had called her to issue Rule 15 and requested that its wording be tweaked to distinguish it from Coletta Zapata’s filing.

Murphy argued that the outcomes of the filings were markedly different. Coletta Zapata’s resolution focused more on federal actions and judicial decisions affecting women, whereas Murphy’s highlighted women’s contributions to the City of Boston and tied them to a local celebration.

“I think we could have voted and supported both easily,” she said.

Geourntas said that due to the volume of last minute filings, he and his staff have to move quickly, and it is possible the intention of resolutions can be missed.

“It’s a race for 12 noon,” he said. “My hope is that councilors could submit items sooner than 10 minutes before 10 o’clock.”

Georntas said that the number of dockets filed has increased greatly over the past few years. In 2025, the Council saw 2114 items filed, more than 500 more than in 2019. Of the 1588 items in 2026, there have been 16 instances of a Rule 15 so far. The majority of these, he said, were able to be amended by their sponsors, but a few were outright withdrawn.

He added that last year the council saw multiple resolutions on White Stadium. Because of how contentious the issue has been, Georntas said there were sometimes difficulties deciding when items had too much overlap.

“If the intent is different than what the original one is, I give the councilor the benefit of the doubt. In other instances it rings the same to me, and I have to converse with Central Staff and review it again, and we make our determination from there,” he said.

Councilor Sharron Durkan said she has not been completely satisfied with the application of the rules, but that Councilors should be better able to collaborate on issues.

“I think it creates for a more robust hearing when all the people who care about a specific subject matter are working on the docket and working on the same issue. And I think that if colleagues were willing to talk to each other, these issues would not exist,” she said.

She added that it does make it harder to collaborate when the Council frequently name-calls in the media. “We wouldn’t need to have an entire hearing on rules if we just talked to each other and had more collaboration.”

Councilor Ed Flynn alleged that politics and personality should not come into play when deciding where and how to enforce the rules, but said he does think Central Staff and the Clerk act impartially.

“Year after year, they have shown they are impartial and work to serve the residents of Boston. At this time, the Boston City Council needs to put politics aside and focus on quality-of-life and public-safety issues. We can disagree, but let’s not be disagreeable,” he said in a statement.