FRANKLIN—Residents now have an opportunity to speak at city Planning Commission meetings other than during public hearings.

At its meeting Thursday night, the commission amended the by-laws to include citizen’s time.

The rules seems to be pretty straightforward: Any person that wants to speak during that time about issues related to the duties or responsibilities of the planning commission will indicate their name, address and topic on the citizen’s time register. They will also state their name and address to to the commission before speaking on the chosen topic.

A person shouldn’t address an item during that time that is already scheduled that night for a public hearing. There will be two separate sign-up sheets for citizens prior to the meetings.

Citizen’s time will take place after the approval of the last meeting’s minutes for 20 minutes, with each speaker being allowed three minutes to comment. If the speaker is representing a group, he or she is allotted seven minutes to speak.