The newly established Charter Review Committee set a direction for its work, prepared a meeting schedule and appointed a vice-chair at its first meeting on Thursday 22 August.
The committee will spend a year reviewing the city charter, the document that provides the basic guidelines by which the city operates. The committee will review each of the 20 chapters of the city charter between now and June. In addition, it will hold five meetings dedicated solely to gathering public input. While some meetings will be devoted solely to gathering public input, all meetings will be open to the public. Meetings will be held at 6:30 p.m. in the Hannah Community Center.
At the beginning of the August 22 meeting, the seven committee members and two alternates introduced themselves. City Attorney Tony Chubb then explained relevant legal information to the committee, such as the Freedom of Information Act, the Home Rule City Act and the Open Meetings Act.
Chubb said he has chaired three charter review commissions and is currently assisting Saline’s charter review committee. He explained that charter review commissions are elected and will undertake a more thorough overhaul of the city charter, while commissions like the one in East Lansing will recommend less comprehensive changes.
Chubb said he will stay in touch with the state’s deputy attorney general, George Elworth, throughout the process to ensure the committee is working within its authority.
“(Elsworth) would like to get the information up front, but the legal, technical review under the Home Rule City Act doesn’t happen until after the resolution is passed by the City Council. Then it’s officially submitted to the governor, who sends it to him (Elsworth) for review. He recommends her (the governor) approve it, and she then sends that approval back to us,” Chubb explained.
Chubb also clarified that he and council liaison Mark Meadows will provide “technical” support to the committee and that the “creativity” and “thoughts” of committee members will guide the work. In other words, committee members will propose changes and Meadows and Chubb will help committee members understand whether changes are permissible and how to make them.
Once the committee makes its recommendations, the council will vote on whether or not to put the charter changes before voters for a vote in the upcoming election. Meadows explained that the last time the charter was reviewed in the 1990s, there were 47 or 48 amendments for voters to vote on, and all of them passed. He said those votes came in two elections where there wasn’t much else up for vote.
Chubb said other cities he has worked in have put two or three amendments on the ballot in multiple elections so voters aren’t overwhelmed. He said cities prioritize the most urgent amendments so they get voted on first.
Uncovering any changes that might be needed will take a year, but Meadows gave an example of a change that should be made. He said in the previous review, the city changed the gender-specific language from “he” to “he/she.” He said this review should go a step further and change the language to “she” or “her.”
During a discussion about the length of various cities’ charters, Chubb also said that some charters were shortened because state law overrode certain parts of the charters, making them irrelevant. Identifying and removing redundant parts of the charters will be one of the committee’s tasks.
The committee has made some requests for materials to help it move forward. Members asked organizations that work with cities, such as the Michigan Municipal League, for information on recent changes to the city’s charter or best practices for charter review. Meadows said the last time the charter was reviewed, the committee received a model charter for the city.
The committee also asked about previous proposed charter amendments that voters rejected. Members said this could give them ideas for changes that might need to be revisited and give them ideas for the kinds of changes residents had previously expressed interest in.
There were a few recent proposals to amend the city constitution that did not pass in the 2023 election. One of these would have expanded the size of the City Council from five to seven members. Another amendment, which was passed by the City Council but blocked from reaching voters by the Governor’s office, would have moved city elections from odd to even years.
Jeffrey Hank was elected Vice-Chair of the Committee. Alternates are invited to participate in the discussion.
On his Meeting on August 13the City Council appointed Diane Goddeeris, Jeffrey Hank, Jonathan Forman, Veronica Wilkerson-Johnson, Ruben Martinez, Jill Rhode and Pam Weil to the committee. The Council also appointed Goddeeris, a former mayor of East Lansing, as committee chair. Learn more about the committee members in ELi’s past. report here.
The council voted to appoint Dale Kruithoff as the first alternate and Lynn Richardson as the second alternate of the committee. The alternates were appointed to attend meetings and be ready to step in as a voting member if a committee member is unable to complete the one-year term.
Goddeeris said it was important to have good replacements because after about seven months, a member of the last charter review committee left and it was difficult to train the replacement.
At the August 22 meeting, Goddeeris announced that the alternates will be active participants in the committee’s discussions. The alternates will not be voting members unless a current member resigns.
“As this one person said to me, ‘I don’t want to wait until the end and then not be able to admit that I saw something that you may not have noticed (before),'” Goddeeris said.
The alternates, who were sitting in the audience at the beginning of the meeting, were then asked to sit at the table with the other committee member.
The meeting also unanimously voted to make Hank vice-chair of the committee, meaning he will chair meetings when Goddeeris is absent.
Hank, who works as an attorney, has previously worked on charter changes in Lansing and East Lansing, giving him unique insight into the committee’s work.
The next meeting of the Committee will be on Thursday, September 12. At this meeting, the Committee is expected to discuss the structure of its public meetings and the process for implementing bylaw amendments.
