thank you awesome thank you so much i'm
gonna go ahead and call
our council committee meeting on the
charter abuse commission proposed
amendments to order
today is april 21st
uh i have asked council members klingler
and fibo to join me on this committee mr
harvey just for roll car
purposes would you please call the role
of our three members
uh sure ms lamke here miss fibel
i'm here mr klingler here
awesome thank you so much we are also
joined by uh city attorney mark official
and city auditor bill harvey
uh per my request would we all please
stand for the pledge of allegiance
oh pledge allegiance to the flag
of america and to three republic for
which it stands
one nation one nation
all right um earlier i circulated the
meeting minutes from april 7th
to our committee i did have two
amendments the first is to amend the
title to the
council committee on charter review
proposed amendments
and the second change is regarding who
was present
mayor kessler was not present so i would
like to propose
those two amendments are there any other
amendments by my committee members
i don't have it i don't have any
amendments okay then i vote to amend
the meetings as uh as the meeting
minutes as previously noted
uh i have a second yes second
okay all in favor say aye aye
aye aye anyone opposed
nope okay i vote to approve the amended
meeting minutes of april 7th
can i have a second please
second thank you all in favor say aye
anyone opposed okay the amendment
meeting
minutes of april 7th are hereby passed
as those in attendance
are aware this is our fourth council
committee
meeting to discuss the charter reviews
proposed amendments we previously met on
february
17th march 3rd and april 7th
and it is my hope that tonight is our
final
committee meeting earlier i circulated a
draft
document which i prepared based
on my recollection and notes based on
where i think
this council committee has moved the
discussion
i apologize for any errors or anything
that i
perhaps got wrong and i have asked
lori to to put that perhaps
up on the screen so that we can go
through it and hopefully
finalize our recommendation there are
still a few issues that
we will need to discuss but if lori if
it's possible to put
on it awesome thank you so much
is that it do i have it yes i see a half
a screen though
oh perfect can everyone see that
i'm going to just move it up guys
i'm going to get to the meat of it is
that okay yes that that would be great
um like i mentioned this is just a draft
that i have been working on trying to
uh succinctly and correctly summarize uh
some of our prior discussions
but as you may recall at our last
committee
meeting we had suggested bundling
sections one through four
of the charter review commission's
proposed amendments
i've included those here as the first
bundle
and they include sections one
two three and four with some edits
um lori if we're able to just scroll
down
um and pause right there if you don't
mind um under section two
you will see that i have redlined and
added two
additional sentences you might recall
that the sentence that starts
the city's strategic plan shall
incorporate
um that sentence i took from section 8
after our last discussion i i think that
we had all agreed that that was an
important statement
we just wanted to make sure that we
included it somewhere so that is where i
put it
for now and then the sentence that
begins
effects the mayor's court shall ensure
defendant's appearance
by the least restrictive means that
sentence there
thank you lori i took that from section
18 regarding mayor's court
i felt that based on the charter reviews
presentation to council
that was a sentence a significance
regarding diversity in equity and
inclusion for our defendants and mayor's
court
and i know that this committee discussed
had
uh keeping that one sentence as well so
those are the
i just wanted to explain where i came up
with those edits to section
two and then moving down section three
our city attorney uh gave us some really
good proposed language
uh that uh he felt comfortable with that
i believe we discussed
at our last committee meeting um there
and then there were no
changes to section four and then
this committee had discussed
putting a gender neutral pronoun and
terminology
provision on the ballot as part of that
first bundle
uh i'm certainly open to id uh
suggestions i think lori you you may
have had some
samples that you looked at as well but
one of the samples that i found
i heavily borrowed and put the suggested
language
as shown up on the screen regarding some
things that we could
consider regarding gender neutral
pronouns terminology
uh how do we how do folks feel about
the first bundle as shown up on the
screen and then the
draft memo i love
what you've done i think it i think it's
great i
think that um the gender neutral
um terminology is
um
it's perfectly stated in that
this terminology seems to
um be very fluid
um and i think that it is
um
i don't want to say it it's it's not
i guess the the word i keep the kidding
in my head is generic
it seems it seems all-encompassing
so i think that it's um it's not
specific
such that it that it i don't think it
will age itself
but i i you know maybe maybe ben maybe
um
mark can can can can tell us what he
thinks about that too just because i
know that other lawyers and lawyers are
are you know words are key
yeah i mean i like the language a lot
and i'll tell you
i know that uh during the charter review
um committees you know the the
the the big committee um the charter
review commission
um that there was efforts to go through
and come up with some
um more uh or less male-centric
um um language so there were places
where
i think you will find some his or her
this
sort of says we're not going to do his
or her which i'm fine with
and it's going to be more of the you
know
again you know there's something that
says chairman it would be chairperson
but more likely what's going to his or
her or where it said his before it's
going to be replaced with them
in other words with the plural pronoun
which again is grammar as i understand
it is grammatically acceptable
and that way by using the his using the
them versus his or her
um or he or she or whatever um you are
also
obviously incumbent we are also
encompassing those who don't identify
with um
male or as male or female so i think
what
it's it's good i like it it's very
doable
what would have to be done and i you
know i could have my locker to this
is that before we go to se if this goes
to city council this recommendation
i think it will also be necessary to
have all of the sections
where the changes would be attached not
only
first for your guys's review but then of
course for city council's review
that was probably a long-winded answer
than you wanted in a year no it's
appreciated
i mean i i think i forwarded to everyone
what um i think the latest
senate stuff what what what they they've
recently done in january and what
colorado the state of colorado is doing
and this
really sums it up really i think really
well
sorry bill i interrupted you forgive me
that's okay
i mark for the purposes of the vote and
the presentation on the ballot
um do we have to actually show
all those changes to the residents so
they can vote on them
or is something like this acceptable
so you know yes something oh i'm sorry
go ahead
well or is that something we that's a
uh board of elections question maybe
it could be a board of elections
question but my understanding
is that this language would be
sufficient
so um uh you know what what you know
the proposal would be that the chart
this language and then
at each polling site there needs to be
the and
all of the language that would be
affected so
one copy of it so anybody who wants to
read it can read it
so you know again even even and some of
the things like
i mean this all all of this first
proposed first bundle
there would be a summary of the adding
sections one two three four
and five three and uh one two three and
four
plus the gender neutral language and we
would have
i would have to come up with um a way to
summarize it
subject to and that would city council
would approve subject to the board of
elections approval
but we don't have to show every section
on the ballot at all
that's a really good question bill so
back
up two seconds so so all of these will
have to be
more concise for the ballot for ballot
purposes for example again
one of them would be you know and this
is totally spit spitballing all the time
i had
but to add non-discrimination provisions
to the city charter
and gender neutral language throughout
the city charter
including and then i would briefly
summarize you know
non-discrimination and citizen
participation and summarize that somehow
and
and establish requirements for diversity
in hiring and contracting
and to require ordinances to be uh
interpreted to avoid discrimination
based on
various protected classes something like
that
that would be on the ballot and then
like i said
the all the entire language would be
available
through various sources but it has to
legally be available
for anybody to read at the polling site
and mailed in advance right
yeah mail right yeah mailed in advance
i'm sure we'll post it on the website
right
but all of it in the paper advanced to
the electors of bexley
correct so i i remember from our uh
past discussions that there would be
some actions that we need to take in the
fall
to um educate our residents on what's
being put on the ballot as well as
complying with the board of elections
requirements
um i was going to share with you that i
did heavily borrow
this language from west link ohio
i believe that they just passed very
similar language for their charter uh
this past november
and my goal here was to keep it as
simple as possible
keeping in mind that uh hopefully if it
did make it onto the ballot and if it
was passed that it would be
fluid and flexible enough to maybe
anticipate additional changes that
we as a committee may not be thinking of
right now
so those were my thoughts um
matt did you have any thoughts on this
first bundle
anything that you'd want to add
no i think it's great i think it's
really really well done
um i've gone through several times
through the charter just to see
if there was any gender specific
language and i i haven't found any um
but um i i think the way it's
worded there is is great and and we
should include it for sure
so do you think our gender
our uh specific language is more
in our code than in our charter
it's in the charter it's not as much
it's not a ton of it but it's in there
but matt because i even looked it before
i've even looked at it before and i went
back and looked
for it again in anticipation this
meeting and it was
fine then i remembered um
so mark just i'm sorry to to double back
on this but i just saw that i understand
how we walk through this so we're going
to
we're going to decide as a group what we
want to present to council
council will do whatever they want to it
tweak it
change it mend it whatever they do to it
then i'm assuming you will take it and
put it into language
you think will fly with the board of
election
right and actually that language
probably
would need to be in the in one and
at least a third reading of the
ordinance so we would
so so we would
so council will eventually not only
approve
what we have decided to put forward but
they will
also approve or tweak or whatever
the the language that you summarize it
into right so one and and i think bill
was about to speak because bill actually
found some stuff from 10 years ago that
was very helpful
i i think council has to approve the
exact
wording in the final reading
that's going to be presented to
the voters oh you're right about that
what i'm saying is that i think the
ordinance should
i'm not so you're 100 correct about that
bill
that that that the exact wording
that we want the charter to look like
should should the voters approve it
um has to be in that ordinance what i'm
what i'm what i'm
what i was saying to laurie anne and
maybe this isn't crucial
for the ordinance i don't have to double
check is in addition to that
it should have the at least proposed
summary language
that would be again subject to the board
of elections approval
right i agree okay thank you that's very
very helpful um two other points real
quick on
this first bundle lorienne would you be
able to scroll back
to sections one and two
um okay go down a little bit thank you
so much
um i know we had discussed maybe two
meetings ago whether or not we wanted to
change the
titles of sections one and two
um now that i went ahead and just copied
word for word the titles that came to us
from
our charter review commission
is there anyone who thinks that they
have
maybe a strong desire to change the
titles now that you see it up on the
screen especially section two which now
has some additional
wording behind it i kind of don't feel
as strongly about it
um given that i that i know that we are
leaning towards keeping
um this uh almost word for word
yeah i'm okay with the title i think
they're fine
just i'm just going to move up just so
you can see the rest of it because it
does say
yeah i think the titles are fine i i'm
sorry guys i don't know how to make this
smaller so that
such that we could make it fit better on
one screen
so forgive me i'm sure there's a way but
i can't figure out
i'll just keep working looking
no problem okay so that is that is
section one i guess not really hearing
uh any any objections um
let's move on to the the second bundle
if we could
perfect right there um at our last
committee meeting
i'm sorry to interrupt i have lorianne
if you want to do this what you can do
is if you go to the bottom of the screen
there see where it's
well it looks like it says 22 uh 222.
make it small yeah there we go
our legal counsel and our technical
advisor
thank you so much but i am going to
leave it big enough such that even with
glasses on i can see it okay guys
and i did purposely redline it uh so
that i
uh this committee could see what had
been changed from what
the charter review commission was
proposing
okay so the second bundle i seem to
recall that our last committee meeting
we felt that the citizen review board
could be its own standalone bundle no
changes were made to it does anyone have
any concerns
with the second bundle appearing as is
up on the screen
i don't at all okay no i think that's a
great idea to have it as a second bundle
wonderful okay moving on to
the third bundle um you might recall
that
at our last meeting we had pulled out
four sections
of the proposed amendments regarding
staggered terms
and i apologize i did not get a chance
to
type it all up but i wanted to note
the four sections and to ask
mark uh mark is it
the i guess is it the smartest way to
just
um add those sections in their entirety
or were you thinking there was one
sentence we could pull out
and then phrase it so that it applies to
these four sections
you're muted yeah sorry i think we
should just add them in their entirety
uh so it's clear because the language is
a little bit different in each one
really we you know now a grant like i
just pulled up here
section 13 which is one of the sections
you referred to on my other screen
and now there's things in there that
we're not that you we're not going to
you know add but you could just we could
just cut and paste
section all four of these sections um
and just simply include the language
that the charter review
recommended regarding specifically
staggered terms and that should cover
this
and then again for purposes of the
ballot it would just say
um you know you know whether
you know yay or nay whether the city
should
modify sections for 1351 52 and 58 of
the charter
to allow for a staggered appointment of
staggered terms
uh for committees boards and commissions
or something like that
and have the actual language from the
four sections
okay great i i did uh
even later on this evening if this
committee is okay
with your suggestion just for me to add
the exact language of those four
sections regarding the stagger terms
that would then constitute
the third bundle uh gloria matt
are you okay with that i'm fine with
i'm fine with that does anyone need to
see those on the screen
no i've got them all in front of me yeah
okay great okay
they are a little bit different but i
mean it's pretty much all
okay they're essentially allowing for
less than three years
right okay
and again the key here is that it's not
you know one of them
one of these sections just talks to in
the case of new boards and commissions
but this other language also is in some
of these other sections
explicitly allow it to be quote unquote
fixed as new appointments are made after
assuming it's passed after the set the
this this
uh charter provision would be approved
by the voters
yep that's right okay um
if i'm not really hearing any concerns
and about the third bundle
after our meeting i will simply cut and
paste the stagger terms language from
those four sections and add it as
our third bundle perfect
for our fourth bundle at the end
of our last committee meeting we had
some discussion about whether we wanted
to
include section 14 uh regarding
the ability to remove the city attorney
um as written here um i know actually
our city attorney felt strongly that
this should be on our ballot
i don't see any reason why we would not
include it
i didn't know folks wanted to have
additional discussion beyond
what we raised last time but
i did add it here as a fourth bundle as
a standalone
does anyone have any concerns about
having this be our fourth bundle
i don't i think that i think that we've
had great
discussion about that i think i think
not only did mark have
um some uh good
reasons why this should be in here i
know that i had a nice conversation with
bill
concerning this and i think that it was
um
i think it sounds really important okay
matt you good mark is this is this mark
caused by a change in some rulings or is
it just
our different interpretation no it's not
a change in rulings at all it's two
things number one is
from a completely practical standpoint
there is
no way that that a
city attorney should that the city
should have to prove
inefficiency neglect of duty or
malfeasance in office before getting rid
of a city attorney
you should be able to get rid of a city
attorney because
you're not comfortable with his or her
advice or
things way short of inefficiency
neglected duty or malfeasance
office also as jim wilson mentioned
and he's absolutely correct is that
a reasonable interpretation of the
ethical obligations
of an attorney is that i an attorney
should not be able to pose
impose themselves on a client who says i
don't want you anymore
outside of course and you know of an
elected
city attorney which would be a different
case so that's why i just
i just that makes me feel very
uncomfortable that the city should
would have to go through a hearing
process to prove one of those things
to get rid of its lawyer when you should
be able to get rid of your lawyer
anytime you want
the reason i asked and monique i want to
kind of go back to your question about
fourth and fifth bundle
i see this as something that we ought to
do because it's the right thing to do
and most people probably won't care i
also would throw into that same category
the issue that we have today in the
charter and i think i've mentioned this
to
a couple of you about the requirement
today
that says changes have to be published
in a
newspaper that's available in the city i
think
that should be changed because i think
for all we know in 10 years there won't
even be a newspaper
that's published in the city though but
i also think that's something that's uh
fairly simple easy to understand by the
public
and could be grouped with something like
this
so that that's this section 14 and that
section whatever that is
could be changed and put that in here
i'd hate to not put those in and get
them
noted fairly early and make it
you know bundle six and we say we don't
need all six up
so i was trying to figure out a way to
put 14
and the newspaper section together
perhaps as
as a fourth bundle and that that was
really the purpose of my question
and that the newspaper section could
easily be described
because of changes in you know
technological advances or something
that make that obsolete this is a little
bit different than that but
i i just i just think those are simple
changes that ought to be made
and i know last time there were changes
that the city
that the charter review commission
thought should be changed
but they're just so minor that nobody
wants to talk about them and residents
don't care about it
and yet every 10 years they're in there
and we've
got to do something about them
so bill i'm understanding you're right
you're thinking that maybe we
expand the fourth bundle to include
um i assume 24
and 77 is that essentially what you were
whatever those whatever those ordinance
those sections are
about the newspaper and uh
that's what it is isn't it now that's
well yeah
some of the things in 77 probably
need to be kept in there but the i don't
know if we want to continue
with the city clerk mailing a copy to
all the proposed
of the of the amendments to the
residents maybe we just change that to
say
we're going to post this on a website or
something but yeah i would suggest those
be item
be part of bundle four well if you look
at
the um recommendations from
the charter review commission on section
77 and i don't know if you have those
all there
monique that laurie anne's moving if you
move that down
i mean they specifically have some
language proposed language and paragraph
b
um there yeah the full text of the
proposed amendment shall be pleasant
electronically by the city on whatever
platform yeah so
actually this is more concise language
than uh right
yeah yeah yeah and if i can speak to
that i think what bill was mentioning on
77 which is what is up on the screen
um the charter review
did have some language regarding
electronic mailing
so i have put in my suggestions which
you're going to see
in redline i think i took out any sort
of reference
to specific email
or web pages just because in 10 years
you don't you don't know what kind of
platforms the city is going to be using
but what you see up on the screen in red
for section 77
was my suggested language to try to keep
it as broad as possible
and anticipate what the world would look
like
technology wise even five years out
bill did i miss um did i miss other
um no you got that that's that's good
okay you're you're good with what's on
there for 77
right okay um
just one note if i could monique if i
could
sure um in the in the proposed
amendments
for 77 that we got
from the final red line proposing
amendments the bexley charter is
presented to back to city council on
january 6th that document that i think
you printed and handed to us
they underlined i think it says they
deleted
at the bottom of the first paragraph
where it says
in accordance with section 66 of this
charter
i think they deleted because in their
notes it says over here deleted at the
next
they deleted the words at the next
regular municipal election if one shall
occur not less than 60
nor more than 120 days after its passion
passage
otherwise it shall provide for the
submission of the amendment at a special
election to be called they deleted
language and then put in in accordance
with
do we need to have that
language in red as well i know i put in
there i copied exactly i think as they
suggested it the only suggestion i made
is what you see in the red
line oh okay
wait can you go back up and and i got to
see what it says can you go back up
lorient
just anyway stop okay uh the ordinance
should be provided
uh yeah that is what they that is what
they recommended and actually
that yes so that's right so so 70 the
only
the only red line is what what i'm
suggesting investing
which i think looks great but what what
we can do though
is is bundle 77
whether or not you want to change 24 i
know we still talk about that
but clearly 66 seem like to be
seemed to be kind of an important thing
and and 66 and 77 can be bundled
together as one
um as one item
yeah i uh i wanted to have a little more
in-depth discussion about
66 but let me yeah i should have said it
yeah i'm sorry let me let me just keep
in mind that maybe 77
and 66 if we do those could be bundled
i'm hearing from bill harvey that
he would like to bundle potentially
section
14. um
we had discussed at previous committee
meetings
um section oh hang on lori ann go to the
looking for section 14 what are you i'm
not sure what that is
14 was the removal power of the removal
of the city attorney
oh oh oh okay i'm sorry forgive me okay
so where do you want to be
at 24 or 66 um to 66
just for a moment we're going to go back
to 24.
okay um mark if i recall correctly you
had mentioned that
obviously there had been talk at the
charter review commission about maybe
more access to the ballot
and making it so that our residents
didn't have to wait
so long to get to the ballot
if if there was an important issue that
arose and that you were fine with the
proposed language
466 am i recalling that right
yeah i'm perfectly fine with it sure
okay
i would be okay including 66 um
including it in a bundle or as a stand
alone
how do uh how do matt and lorien feel
i prefer to see it as a standalone
say that again matt i said i would
prefer to see it as a standalone
tell me more
i just think it's too
you're talking about 66 and 14 together
no 66 and 77 together
okay um
do they have anything i don't know i
mean
they they really are different topics
that's why they're different topics
yeah except current current i'm sorry in
interrupt
current 77 specifically refers to
this 100
first to the current municipal if well
i i unfortunately i had it up on my
screen and i
just moved it and i just got rid of it
because i was moving on
to something else hang on let me bring
this back up real quick
um here i got right here um no that's
not
it of course um hang on hang on
all right well it does you're right it
does it does reference
section 66 and section 67
or 77 i do see that right and that would
be my concern because
section 77 says this last sentence of
section 70
first paragraph of 77 currently says
the ordinance providing for the
submission of any such amendment shall
require them to be submitted to the
electors
at the next regular municipal election
of one shall occur blah blah
blah um and we're saying it doesn't
if 66 passes it doesn't have to wait to
the next regular municipal
election it could occur any within
at any election not just the odd number
of years
so i guess if you do them separately
there's a risk that one would pass and
the other wouldn't
right so
okay yeah i would be okay to bundle 66
and
77 since they do reference each other
and again in my head logically i can
you know envision a way to write that in
a summary fashion just to say
to provide for uh the right of
initiative and referendum
um in at any regular or
potential special election and to allow
for
notice us notice of those amendments
proposed amendments by um uh
electronic platform or whatever we would
say so it can he
can i think i think they fit together
well
matt are you are you okay to maybe
bundle
given the concern that if you don't
one could pass and the other wouldn't
which would make them then
at odds with each other yeah i see that
now i was thinking
one's talking about amendments to this
charter
um maybe submitted to this and then the
other one's talking about regular
municipal elections
uh that's why i thought they were two
different two different topics
that's why that's why i thought they
should be separate uh
but it could be two different topics but
they don't have to be
and it could be the same topic mark is
that what you're saying
i've been saying that there's a logical
connection that doesn't
always be the same or always work that
way but there's a logical connection
because again
you know the idea of the idea of
allowing
elections um or access to the ballot for
initiative and referendum
is not limited it came up this last time
this issue came up as a result
of some citizens wanting to put charter
re uh
citizens review board on the latin note
on the ballot
last november so in that situation it
did come up as a result of
a potential charter change
but it doesn't have to always be a
charter change it could be
an initiative petition where citizens
take the action because they feel city
council hasn't
in a particular legal ordinance or a
referendum petition
which which would be submitted to the
electors
if city council took an action you know
passed an ordinance
and a group of citizens wanted to make
it subject to referendum to try to
reverse that
decision um so it's more than 66 is more
than just
charter re charter changes but it
certainly includes charter changes
you mean 77 no 66
oh about when they could go on the
ballot but it also has to do with
when other things can go on the ballot
as well
in the end do you think it's
this makes sense um it just seems like
financially if people
if we had to have a special election
are really expensive so this would kind
of help guard against that too right
give more opportunities
it would make it less likely there would
be a need for a special election not
impossible
um let me ask you another thing mark
when we present this
to um
so let's say we we we passed it as a
committee
can monique and matt and i work
together to present this to
to counsel without
and still be okay with sunshine laws
you can if you look if somebody says
here's a
starts putting together a powerpoint and
you guys get and you guys
one person's put and and ah i can't talk
um if somebody puts together a
powerpoint and the other two
and email it to the other two and say
what are your thoughts and make
suggestions on changes
that is perfectly fine i would be
uncomfortable
if you guys actually met in person or
via zoom
to go through it that's what we're
making but we could say to monique
monique
please make sure you remember to explain
why these two things are being bundled
because initially matt and i couldn't
quite find the connection
sort of thing that's fine
okay so monique make note of that
[Laughter]
okay um i guess based on this discussion
lori and matt are you okay with us
bundling as 166 and 77
as shown up on the screen yes
yeah okay thank you mark for clarifying
oh no problem all right so then let's go
back
if we can um
yep let's look at those two 14 and 24
um
and i know bill bill was thinking that
maybe we could bundle these
as well um
i still think that the city attorney won
doesn't really fit with with 24 um
does do do do weather see a connection
or um do we do we want to consider
rearranging these or maybe
even including 24 with the bundle that's
going to include
66 and 27 and 77.
can i ask a question sure somebody's
heart set on changing 24
no for some reason i think we had
discussed at the end of our last meeting
that
24 and 77 kind of went together hang on
mark let me
let me pull up my 24 to see
um the the main change there
from the charter review is um
the clause that reads provided at least
six hours
in advance of the special meeting and
then the sentence beginning with
written notice may be provided
electronically
those were the only uh actually in the
first sentence
when the four-year term would start
beginning on january 1st
um you mentioned then that the
swearing-in is a formality
is this something that we we could just
address
via ordinance or have further discussion
on and not need to include
no i don't think there are things in
there proposed changes in there that you
cannot do just through ordinance
um but what i would say here is that
first of all
the four-year term begins on january
first you don't need that
whether it's in the charter or not it
just does that's what the law says
so that's not crucial um second thing
um um the the the second part of that i
mean the six hours
and in advance of the special meeting is
already in there
um i believe um someplace
so yeah it is being added by
charter review well it was it was being
moved around
oh okay because if you there's there if
you look at the original one there the
current sentence
right now i'm just going to read it says
the mayor president of council or any
four members thereof may call special
meetings of council
upon written notice served personally
upon each member
or left at the members usual place of
residence at least six hours
previous to the time fixed for such
meeting so the proposal is
that we change it to say this can be
done electronically
the potential issue there and this is
something the mayor had mentioned
um and i think he's right the patent
right now
if you do it pers in person um
there there's almost no way to avoid
some legitimate contact
with each council member oftentimes as
you guys know it's been
oh will you accept it by email and waive
your personal service and everyone says
yes
um if you change this it literally four
members of council
could fi if they if they want to do
something
under dark of night they could
say okay here's what we're going to do
we're going to
i'm going to send out a notice at
midnight on saturday and we're going to
schedule a meeting for six
in the morning and i don't want matt
laurie ann and monique there because
they'll muck things up
so i'll send it to them too but i will
call the other three that i will
the other four will know so it's some
subject to games gamesmanship here and i
think
that you know i you know nobody on this
current council would do that
but at the same time you know i've seen
we've all seen strange things go on in
other
cities um so that that makes me a little
bit
nervous even though certainly on the
surface it's a
very innocuous change
are you saying mark then that
logistically we don't really need
section 24 to be on the ballot
because the proposed changes
um some of them are already existing and
the others have the propensity to
perhaps
um not be as clear or misconstrued as we
want
yes that is what i'm saying i am that's
why i asked are you sure you
i mean i i didn't recall where we left
24 but i
so that's why i see you know ask the
question are you guys sure you want 24
for those
i just had a note at the end that we
were talking maybe combining 24 and 77
but from what i hear you say um
it's not something that necessarily
would be so urgent that it needs to be
included
as proposed right because the
conjunction
factor that comes along with it seems to
me to be
built in to you know
already built in that most people are
saying yeah i'll wave personal service
when there's a need for special meeting
so so that's the process that that will
continue
they have to have a six-hour
notification
but if they want to
they have to have a six hour hand
delivered notification
but but people can waive that
um and let that go
and i assume that if one of the six uh
one of the seven
members says no i'm unwilling to waive
that
then you have to go with uh the hand
delivery
notification is that correct at least to
that one member yes
and then you might have to push that
meeting back
if they have to actually have the hand
delivered
information six hours prior to the
meeting
well you know that's right but there are
there's never been
there should never be a situation where
you have to have
six uh well you have to have a special
meeting with less than six hours
advanced notice
unless it's in what under the revised
code is an emergency
where you can do it with one hour notice
as long
as but only on a particular topic and
there's a whole bunch of hoops to jump
through
so again that's not even worth talking
about here i don't want to confuse it
but
right so normally as you guys know what
happens is somebody says oh crap we need
to have a special meeting
uh because co here's cobot and you know
i think we had one on a sunday and
it was a thursday or friday people said
you know you made calls can everybody do
this
and once everybody said yes you know if
somebody said
i'm but i'm not waving then you'd have
to get it in their hands at least six
hours in advance
or at their usual place of residence so
they can't dodge it either
you can still leave it at their usual
place of residence
guess what it's never been even with the
most difficult council members it's
never been
it's never been an issue and i i
i can't i can't see it being an issue
but matt sorry did you have a suggestion
yeah i just didn't know if we could put
in some sort of phrase like
you know as long as you know
written notification can be
electronically via email
as as long as acknowledgement is made by
all council members or something um to
that effect that way we could keep it in
there
we didn't i don't know i was just trying
to come up with a way
there has to be some way we can keep it
in there without
um and sort of bypass or
you know rule out the nefarious actions
that mark
has brought up that could potentially
happen well
no change rules that out because today
they have to have it hand delivered
unless
all seven members say i'm willing to
waive that
so making no change avoids the
particular problem that we have it
i think the intent of this was to
eliminate the requirement of
dealing with paper and if we don't want
to change that then
we don't have to do anything but to
matt's point i think what he's saying is
that
we can leave in so right so the proposed
new sentence that you see on your screen
there
is written notice may be provided
electronically via email
or similar electronic means commonly
used for console notification
or delivered personally to the member or
left it is
the member's place of residence what it
could say is written notification may be
provided
electronically via email or some similar
electronic means
provided the member acknowledges receipt
or delivered personally or
left at the residence so it can be a cop
math suggesting can be accomplished
and then we you know again to the extent
you guys want to make sure for the next
10 years that
electronic means is absolutely the way
to do it
or an option without but again
you know that would i do think there has
to be something in there like matt
suggesting
that would say fine we could you could
do it that way but there has to be some
affirmative acknowledgement
um that i received it so i have noticed
could that one sentence be added or
combined as a bundle with something else
no because we'd have to well it sure can
i think it could be combined in this
bundle with 66 and 77
because it at least deals with
electronic me notation
okay okay so if we go back then we
already
kind of agreed we're going to do 67
definitely with
66 with 77. lorianne do you have the
ability to
type on this i think i sent it in word
yeah i think i i think i i think i can
yeah where do you want me to do what
mark the final story right after after
um
electronic means which is the fourth
sentence from the bottom
fourth sentence from the bottom in the
paragraph i'm in wait a second i'm
finding you yep you have the words
electronic means on the left
fourth line fourth line from the bottom
okay right there yep after
means
um mark you said provided the member
acknowledges receipt
right loriann are you able to track your
changes if not i can
um i can tweak it when i get it back
yeah well at least bold it or something
wait a second i think i do
uh wait a second go to review
yeah i'm working on it just my something
popped up there we go
and track changes there we go right
beautiful
and i'm going back to means provided
the member acknowledges receipt mark is
that what you mentioned
yeah i think it should go after after
commonly used for console notifications
yeah sorry automatically it makes sense
to put it there and not where
i wait a second just let me write it and
then i'll put it where it needs to be
that member acknowledges receipt
wait a second what am i doing
bell receipt guys my spelling is
horrible when i have an audience
c-e-i-p
when i have an audience my spelling is
horrible
okay so where do you want this and my my
spelling's horrible any time but
especially horrible now i have an
audience
okay uh cut where do you want it um
put it at bef after console
notifications
here yeah yep
sorry sorry i'm so lame
no you're fine this is great um i'm
sorry i'm looking so close because
my eyesight is terrible mine is horrible
too and i still and i have glasses on
okay so with that with that one change
um mark does that alleviate the concerns
that that you had
yes it does now what i would suggest
however is we don't need the other
changes in the section 24
and i think it just makes things more
possibly a little confusing
so i would take out the what was the
proposed new
first sentence the first sentence
what do you think uh yeah just two
sentences
[Music]
the whole sentence yeah it flipped for
on me
will you learn will you practice i will
i'll work on it um
yeah so i would delete just go ahead and
just press delete on that
okay oh wait it didn't track changes
that's okay no big deal
nevermind
um then mark what about the six hours
notice does that need to be taken out
yes that needs to be taken out as well
okay so lorianne wait no no no no no
no i don't think so right
okay leave that in the provided at least
six hours in advance of the special
meeting
yeah it's just it's just how you're
getting that
that that information to them not the
win
we don't want to change the win we just
want to change the how we just want to
be able to be less antiquated we don't
want to change the time
right that's right no that's correct now
and again you could you could go back to
this later monique if you're doing it
but if you look at the city at city the
charter review commission suggested
changes
there's also some suggested deletions
which you have incorporated
into section 24 unrelated to this issue
but related to the january first date
thing
that should go back in you don't have to
type that in right now i mean i could
read it to you if you want me to
i have it up on my screen um or you can
just go back and type it in later
from what city counts i'm sorry from
what charter review
suggested to be deleted okay
just because there's no reason to change
that it's unrelated to this
notice issue okay
i will uh make a quick note lorianne
thank you for
typing that um okay so if
if i'm recalling correctly we want to
then bundle
24 as changed up on the screen with
66 and 77 as noted
um do we then want to leave section 14
as its own bundle or combine with those
other three sections i have a question
can i
can i chime in i have a question mark
why did we delete the first
sentence section in that sentence in
that section 24.
that's the law okay that's all right
so we don't need to say that in our okay
you don't need to say that's correct and
i was
it doesn't hurt to say it but then it
makes these things more complicated
to explain whereas if we just leave the
only change in 24
is electronic notification then it
relates back to 77
so we can say to allow for a certain
electronic notification of meetings
blah blah blah yeah got it okay
with the law but in fact
because this came up during charter
review i think i made
i think i raised the issue because i had
heard about it from other council
members
well what happens if we're not sworn in
yet and the sworn
swearing-in stuff is just ministerial in
nature and if you're never sworn in
you're still
you're taking you you're you have you if
you're elected you're you're
on council matt when when uh taylor
klingler swore you win
so beautifully i'm sorry to tell you it
was a formality
good to gotcha all right it counted but
it didn't really count
it was worth it though i won't tell her
that i will never
i will never tell her that yeah and then
i actually have it on film if you ever
need it
so you know lori ann said if she run
wins again
she's gonna make her dogs compete with
which one's gonna get to swear
in whatever mark
all right so wait go let me let me bring
you guys back because we want to make
sure we are
efficient with our time and hopefully i
think we are we are
moving right along um one bundle is
going to be then
24 66 and 77 has shown up
on this document we want to leave
section
14 as its own standalone or
uh go with bill's suggestion to try to
perhaps bundle it bill were you
suggesting now
um to bundle it with these other three
i i don't have a problem leaving it as a
separate item
now that you have three together okay
so in reality if we if we keep it as its
own bundle section 14
we then would only have a
fifth bundle because we're moving 66 to
the fifth bundle
is everyone with me yup okay
okay um are we good then with
the fourth and lorianne if you want to
just
so that we are making sure
our our folks who are joining us do you
want to
maybe delete six bundle the the words at
the end there
just so that it's understood that
66 is included in the fifth bundle
awesome
thank you so much okay
okay all right so far we've got
five bundles some are standalones some
are a little more comprehensive
and evolve uh different provisions
the two other bigger items that i think
we wanted to consider and have
additional discussion on were
section 40 recall
and then i was honestly trying to
remember if
this committee felt strongly about
section 79
future charter review um i seem to
recall
that there had been a comment that we
wanted to see what else was being
bundled
to maybe have additional discussion on
whether that should be included
or not any thoughts
i think we have a lot on here already i
will
i will say that i agree
yeah i'm i'm i'm good with what we have
i i am too and i i will say that um it's
not because i don't think
uh the repub recall provision is
important but it's my understanding
based on what mark sent around that the
recall
some version of it already does exist in
state law this would be a deviation from
state law but that mechanism
does in essence already exist am i wrong
mark
are correct okay and then as to uh
future charter review 79
um mark is that something that
possibly council could address by
by ordinance for the next round or or
not really
i think that there is a lot in that that
council could address by ordinance if
need be
um here i'm i'm pulling up 79 here on my
other side we certainly did it our own
way last time around
right i think the concern was that
i think there were two concerns and
again i'm not here at to advocate to
change it
is that you did it but you you know
some people thought and then you know it
is not
totally clear about how you select the
charter review
commission the members of that
commission but look i i think it worked
out
pretty darn well this is amazing
and or this time around so uh yeah
but but certainly council could for
example pass an
ordinance that says thou shall do it
on you know by february 1st
2029 or whatever and thou
shall have this is how we will appoint
uh the charter review members but again
anything you pass by
ordinance can be changed by another
council or by the same council
that's the issue but i just don't see
a need well what i what i'd like to
suggest that we
we do maybe based on what i'm hearing
from the committee is
um lorianne at the last committee
meeting you had asked me to put together
kind of the section eight which is what
this committee is recommending
to people is being included on the
ballot and then there was a section b
here called group b things for them
noting that we've discussed them but
that perhaps could be addressed by
legislative action or ordinance by
council
and then the last category i think that
you wanted me to include was
things that were kind of on the informal
back burner things that we could address
possibly in the future um what if we
include section 79 future charter review
under
under group b and we present our
recommendations to council
we make sure that we um discuss that
under group b
i think that sounds great and then would
recall though be
more under group c
i believe so that's not really something
that
is that's not really something
legislative
right no i think because mark just said
there's already some version of it that
is provided for
um and the law okay
matter you are you good with um 79 going
under group b
and section 40 going under group c
yes okay just
for sake of argument bill and mark
what are your thoughts i
i'm fine with that and and i was going
to say just for sake of argument or
or conversation if the other four
council members
feel strongly that pick a number section
79
ought to be added obviously they can
raise that question
at this time and and put it on
and they can always add it in two years
rather than waiting 10 years
not that they'll probably do that but we
don't have to only do this every 10
years
you don't have to only do this every 10
years you're absolutely right bill um
i i did want to mention again i think i
mentioned it at our previous meetings
that these are just
recommendations that um
the three of us would be making to
council but certainly
the other four could could tweak they
could add they could revise
um however uh however they want to
proceed and then council would vote
on this um when a third reading of an
ordinance accompanying this
is presented to them but you're right
just because this committee
would recommend it doesn't make it so
that that's
that's it thank you for for mentioning
that so i will um
i will then revise this and put
section 40 under c and section 79 under
b okay
is there anything else that
this committee would like to
put forth to make a recommendation to
council that should be included on the
ballot other than
what is shown up on the screen
did i miss anything do we need to tweak
anything
just by time the staggered terms
um do we think that needs to go on the
it's it's staggered terms for boards and
commissions and the terms already there
and it's just stating that the mayor can
stagger the terms correct for all all
four of those sections
is it mark do you feel like that i don't
know i i don't know if it needs to go on
the ballot or can we make that change
via council no that's part of the on the
ballot
oh it doesn't have to come about the
term
shall be three years bill harper
that of us of that a couple years ago
and he's absolutely right
so okay my fault okay
okay i i appreciate you mentioning that
um biller mark did you have
anything further um for us to consider
for
our recommendations to counsel on what
should go on the ballot
yeah i think we should go to a city
manager form of government
i'd second that yeah i'm not connected
to for sure
so just a clarification
are we you have uh
you have five meetings before the recess
which means you realistically have five
meetings
before we have to get something into uh
the board of elections so and i'm just
asking you to think out loud a little
bit about what your plan is i suppose
at the next meeting next week you could
present this say here's where we are
and then maybe at the meeting the first
meeting in may present
something you'd have then
four meetings to talk about it three and
if you needed a fourth one you'd have
the fourth meeting in may
uh and then you could pass that and i'd
give you the month or meeting in june
and you get the month of july to present
that to uh
to the board of elections that's sort of
what you're thinking yeah i'm so glad
you brought that up i i know we've
we've talked about it at prior meetings
but um i do want to make sure we are
consistent
um it was my hope that uh tonight
uh hopefully being our last council
committee meeting
um that we would uh finalize
our recommendations and it sounds like
we
have have have done that um i would like
to
present our recommendations to council
at the april 27th meeting
um just verbally going through and
explaining
and also giving counsel this document
um laurie ann are you able to scroll to
the very beginning
of this document bill just so you know i
had anticipated
that we would do it obviously then so i
went ahead
and put together this introduction
in this document indicating how many
times we've met
what our purpose and our intent was um
and then listing out um groups a b
and c once we do do that
at the april 27th meeting i had hoped to
then
introduce a first reading of an
ordinance at the may
11th meeting have the second reading
may 25th and then
followed by the third reading at the
first council meeting
in june possibly vote on it that night
or if we need more time table it and
then vote on it
at the second meeting in june that would
leave
you and mark and others plenty of time
to get things to the board of election
as needed that was my
my hope that sounds reasonable to me i
think
okay are you uh and maybe this a
laureanne question
and maybe this comes up in your first
meeting and you're
reading in april are you thinking that
you're going to need a a special i don't
know set it aside a half an hour or an
hour
to talk through this the first time with
people or
i don't know what you're monique you
said that you're gonna
give uh you're gonna we're we are going
to
you're going to have a document
for for everyone to look at this tuesday
night
yes yes we're going basically this
document right
yes subject to the changes that we have
talked about tonight
but it will reflect each and every one
of those changes
and then i'm proposing that i send this
to
council and then give a broad overview
at the april 27th meeting um
give them time obviously to digest it
and then
at the may 11th council meeting when we
introduce
the ordinance for the first reading
perhaps get into more of a discussion
as to each and every issue here and then
obviously we'll have other readings to
answer questions and further discussion
with with council
okay yeah my thought bill was that it's
probably going to be this exact document
um i just want to i want to make sure i
get it in the format
to clearly reflect the recommendations
that we've uh agreed on tonight
right and it would be my suggestion
you know i think that's wonderful
monique i think that's a great idea and
i think
um two things i think on tuesday night
when you talk about this i think it
would be so helpful for people to look
at
your document and the charter reviews
document
uh committee document side by side
on paper together i i just think that
would be a really healthy thing to
suggest for them to do because
that is what was so helpful for me to
actually see it concrete
then i hear bill's words and i think
that
could be something we need to do but i
would say
first monique does what she's suggesting
she's going to do
this this uh next council meeting the
next council meeting we'll see what kind
of discussions arise and then if the
second meeting in may we need to we
could say
we're gonna set a half an hour aside
either
before our six o'clock meeting or some
at some point during our six o'clock
meeting to have a more
you know in-depth conversation if if
council
needs it i don't know if people sit and
do their homework
like they really need to do their
homework and look at this
and if we are able to explain
why we did a lot of this why we why we
why i i they had you know council is
going to have to understand
some of the some of the logistics
that we have spent a lot of time trying
to understand
you know um
the logistics of what i asked about
uh earlier with mark and and you know
how does the vote work
how do we proceed through this um why
why do we need to narrow it down to so
many
you know why did we bundle them a
certain way
why do we not include some of them uh
the fact that we can do it in two years
if if council
feel strongly enough about certain ones
you know that that they think that we
need to include kind of thing
so that was really windy and i'm sorry
but i just think monique's ideas are
great i think they're on target i think
that's how we
need to do it but i think there's a
little bit of an education
that we need to be able to give to our
other council members that we had
the you know we had the opportunity to
get in a slower pace
and i think too by bringing it up so
often too it'll give our
our members of the public an opportunity
to listen and to
see our work and to um to kind of weigh
in on that process as well
right but what one suggestion though
monique on this document you're going to
send around to council
i think any current sections that have
changes
in other words not one two three four
five but all the other ones
really needs to be shown in a full
strike through version
okay otherwise it'll be very difficult
for a council member to look at section
2014 and say
wait what's uh or you know anyway you
know what i mean
yeah so what you think strikethrough
would be easiest and remind me lorianne
and um
and matt i think
when we first got the proposed
amendments by
the charter review i think i delivered
to
every council member the proposed
amendments and the original charter
in written form i think i gave you guys
this this booklet right here
yeah i have it yeah so every council
member hopefully still has this but we
did
the original charter we did the proposed
amendments and then
mark i'm happy to do the strike through
version so that it's crystal clear for
other council yep lori ann i would
suggest
i'm sure they're all watching right now
just a comment when she sends that out
bring that document with you
okay okay and then the other
thing to say then the other thing of
course is
that after it's presented at city
council that that your memo should be
put on the website too so people can
find it
you know under charter review ben will
take sure take care of that
okay matt you've got your hands raised
i was just going to say if you need help
i could help you
um with that putting i don't know if you
want to do a powerpoint or
because i'm with mark i think you know
we'll have the book
in front but for presentation it cancels
like a full strike through
of what is being deleted and then in
bold what is being added
because like on on the things that you
gave us or that we got from charter
that deleted all of the edits are on the
right hand side
right you know what i mean um versus if
you have the full
original paragraph and then strike
through the words that are being deleted
that way that way you can still
read what was there versus you know and
put the new ones in red or something
like that and i could help you do that
if you need help if not
um that's okay dude yeah that would be
great if you are willing
i will certainly take you up on that
does it help you
matt if i take this
memo spend a little spend a day or two
with it
um and then send it to you
so then you can go back and look at it
and add the original strikethroughs
um like mark suggesting can you is that
all right
party great okay for us to do
yes does anyone have the original in a
word document
the original charter i'll have it via
pdf
and print it out on part paper if you
have the original
in word or something right now i'm
pretty sure i
do that'd be helpful that would be great
thank you matt
if not i can copy and paste the pdf but
then the formatting is all messed up and
you have to do it yeah and then you can
give that to ben
to post it electronically so it's on the
screen as we go through it it makes it
just so much cleaner
yeah right that's what i was yeah that's
what i was thinking
yeah so matt the plan is after tonight
just give me a day or two
to update this memo with all of the
updates and changes that we have decided
as a committee
to do and i will send it to you and then
you can
um kind of delve in and make sure that
the strikethroughs and all of the
added and deleted language is included
so council can follow
okay and then i'll send that back to you
pre-counsel meeting so you can
grade it i've got my red pen
ready yes that sounds great i think i'm
the only teacher in this group and
i just want to let you know here we go
always graded and green i
hate red pens just saying
i'm looking for my red pen right now
i have i have um
i have i have a whole i have a whole
thing of green ones so if you want a
green one i'll i'll provide
well thank you so much mark do we need
to formally
like vote on these recommendations or
has this discussion and our
decision making along the way uh suffice
i think i think it surprises you okay
monique let me can i make a suggestion
if there are
any more participants here who might
want to comment before we
close them out i'd like to give those
folks a chance to comment yes i was
going to definitely open it up to public
comments ness i just wanted to uh
to see if there was any more formal
action that we needed to consider
but um that that being said um
if we turn now to agenda item six which
is public comments i do know that
uh i believe there are a few members of
the public joining us on our call
tonight
and this is your opportunity to please
share with us your input and thoughts
um if you uh raise your hand or
make a gesture that i can see indicating
that you would like to speak
i will gladly unmute you and you can
have
five minutes to please address us giving
us your name
and your address and we would love to
hear from you
or i could say uh jim or rachel would
either one of you like to
speak rachel raised me
but i see mr i see jim wilson raising
his hand
so um let's see
all you have to do is unmute yourself
there you go there he is jim wilson you
have the floor would you please give us
your name and address and your thoughts
please on
the proposed amendments i'm jim wilson
and i live at 2404 bexley park road and
i was actually just
waving to all of you i only showed up
because i thought you'd be disappointed
if i didn't
come to this meeting so you're you're
right
we would have been disappointed
yeah we love you a whole lot and we're
just
we wanted to have one more opportunity
to tell you thank you so much for all
your help
thank you so much jim and i'm sure you
heard us just recite kind of our
intended plan of action and our dates
um it's actually been i think very
consistent we've been saying since
our first meeting what our intended
timeline was so thank you for staying
with us kind of every step of the way
um anyone else from the public uh
is there anyone else who would like to
share their input or give us their
thoughts
i thought rachel had her hand up she
does yep she does have her hand raised
let me
see if we can find her
i think all she has to do is unmute
herself rachel if you'd like
yes i can i did it worked that was so
easy
give us your name and address please and
we would love to hear your thoughts and
input
rachel lang 755 vernon road and
um i had meant to chime in earlier at
some of your earlier meetings um
at somewhat at jim's behest but he is
the devoted
charter review member and i'm only quasi
devoted um i was just going to comment
and say that i was glad
to see matt's suggestion of a way to
include the electronic method um
while while avoiding any problems i
think that's
great um i know that this isn't at least
for school board a question and answer
thing i thought that the mayor's court
maybe that was for bundling
i think it makes more sense to have it
in the mayor's court section i don't
feel strongly about that at all but i
think just from an ease of people
finding it but it makes sense if you're
trying to
coalesce um and otherwise i was just
gonna say i
am impressed i think that that this will
it seemed overwhelming the way that we
left it um there was so much and i think
that you guys have
really tidied it up and made it succinct
so that it
could be understandable by the public so
i was just gonna
kudos thank you thank you so much rachel
i you know while i have you and jim here
on the phone um
i i want to make sure that you you see
the the second sentence in this memo
that i wrote
indicating that what this committee
considered by way of amendments
was the collective work of 15 folks who
met
over two hours twice a month for well
over a year
and the input and thought process that
went into
every single word on the amendments was
carefully considered
i also know rachel that you i think
headed up the dei
subcommittee group so you had additional
meetings beyond
regular charter review so thank you for
taking the time to head that up
and we hope that you will speak at
future
council meetings where these proposed
amendments are being discussed
rachel everybody that i talked to i
talked to um
john offenberg um on the regular while
uh
this all was going on and he marveled
about your work so um
and and and jim's given a big thumbs up
so um
when will dinner be ready because i
think we're about closing up rachel and
they've eaten in it it's been cleared
but thank you so much for your kind
words i appreciate it
well we are grateful thank you both so
much
um seeing no other members of the public
who would like to weigh in with public
comments
um is there anything else from the
committee before we adjourn
yes one more thing thank you monique
thank you thank you
thank you thank you for organizing all
of us and
keeping us on top of all of this and
anyway
please feel appreciated
thank you so much to my committee
members as well as bill and mark
we have spent um almost eight hours
discussing these amendments and i think
that we have put forth
a good collective plan um i'm going to
tweak this and then send it over to matt
klingler for further review and then we
will
plan on presenting our recommendations
in an overview fashion at our council
meeting on april 27th
so that is the plan folks um i moved to
adjourn can i get a second please
second all in favor say aye aye
aye aye
see you guys