The Newton City Council’s Charter Subcommittee — a group appointed after the 2017 proposed revised charter was defeated to consider if any of the Charter Commission’s less controversial recommendations should be adopted — have issued a series recommended amendments.
Those recommendations can be found here. This includes a redlined and “clean” version of the amendments so scroll down to about page 44 see the proposed changes.
And for those who really want to wonk out, here’s the red lined version of the 2017 Charter Commission’s proposed revised charter.
There will be a public meeting on Weds. March 6, 7 p.m. in the City Council Chamber to give the public a chance to weigh in.
In my opinion, the Charter Commission did exactly what they were asked. They looked at the whole Charter, and suggested a number of reforms. Key amongst those reforms was a smaller City Council.
If the Charter Commission made one mistake, it was being a bit tone deaf to the public response about their proposed Council structure, which eliminated Ward Councilors. If the only proposal offered by the Charter Commission had been a reduced 16 member Council that retained Ward Councilors, the new Charter would have passed by an overwhelming majority of Newton voters. That should be the next step… A 16 person City Council comprised of 8 Ward Councilors and 8 At-large Councilors.
I would never vote for a 16-member council with a 1:1 proportion of Ward to at-large Councilors. I’d prefer to stay with the current 24-member council. Any number that maintains the 1/3 Ward : 2/3 at-large proportion is fine with me.
I wouldn’t have voted for it either.
Of course it’s just my opinion… But I think a smaller City Council is the #1 reform Newton voters want from their Charter.
@Mike Striar: I agree! In fact, that is what the then City Councilors proposed with 17 members of the Council voting for a 16 member Council with 8 from the Ward and 8 at-large from each of the Wards – yet both the sitting Mayor and the current objected to that being put before the voters.
It’s time to stop living in the past. What’s done is done. Time to move on.
It was an ill-conceived, underhanded attempt to force the outgoing mayor to approve an unvetted proposal. The city council’s lowest moment in recent history.
I hope the current council has the wisdom to thoroughly and thoughtfully vett all council size and composition proposals that are under consideration in the coming months.
A big thank you to Councilors Baker, Albright, Kalis, and Krintzman for laboring for the last year to review rejected charter proposal to identify and extract non-controversial items of value from the charter commission’s work.
I attended several of the meeting as did several members of the charter commission. As I stated back in 2017, I support these items getting addressed. Unfortunately, at the conclusion of the subcommittee’s process, the city’s law department weighed in with some very important legal feedback. The law department strongly recommends that the charter revision not contain changes of the follow three types:
1. Don’t wordsmith. It can have significant unintended legal consequences for the city. If it isn’t broke, don’t try to reword it.
2. Don’t summarize existing state laws (e.g. school regulation) just for the benefit of the public. It has potential for confusion and conflict, and reduces the timelessness of the charter.
3. Don’t micromanage government operations via the charter. Micromanagement belongs in ordinances, not in the charter.
This was feedback the commission had not received from the law department or their cosultant during their original work.
The city council needs to assess the subcommittee’s proposals with this guidance in mind. A good number of the proposed revisions fall into the above three categories. In the case of items falling into category 3, the council should move for up or down votes on ordinances that implement the commission’s operational recommendations.
One debated item was the proposed requirement for 20% participation in referenda votes for them to be approved. While this makes good sense on the surface, it does allow for the unintended consequence/strategy of “No” voters just sitting out a vote to make it invalid.
For example, in recent dispensary election, voters not wanting either proposal to pass could have opted to not take the municipal ballot if they felt their side was bound to lose. While the overall turnout was strong enough for that tactic not to have worked in that case, it could in a different context (e.g. most non mayoral elections barely get 20% and a special election certainly could get less). Better to require a majority 10% approval than a 20% turnout.
@Jack: I had that same thought when reading this draft. Admittedly it was something that didn’t occur to me during the Charter Commission debate of this item. If the goal is 20% participation and a 50% + 1 target to pass, I wonder if the correct way to prevent what you have described is to require that at least 10% of the voters be in the majority group voting for passage – so that if the other 10% – 1 stays home, it will still pass.
Jack – The charter commission met with the law department many times and consulted with them on every article that I worked on. I know other members of the commission did as well. The law department vetted many aspects of the commission work, as did several councilors. We had a positive, collaborative relationship with the law department throughout the process.
As for Article 4 (School Committee), that opinion reflects a difference of opinion about the approach to writing a charter in general. Just about the entire charter is covered by state law and we could have chosen to go with the generic one that many communities use. It’s not just Article 4. I’d suggest that telling residents to wade through a complex, poorly written state law is a mistake that could have unintended consequences.
For citizens interested in an overview of what the Charter Subcommittee of the Programs and Services Committee recommended, some of the major points are outlined beginning on page 2 of the Programs and Services Committee Report dated February 6, 2019. The Report also outlines the process anticipated going forward. You can read it here:
http://www.newtonma.gov/civicax/filebank/documents/95358/02-06-19%20Programs%20&%20Services%20Report.pdf.
– Councilor Lisle Baker, Chair, Charter Subcommittee
The primary goal of the Charter Commission and the powers behind it was to get rid of the Ward Councilors to centralize more power. By reducing the number of councilors, but keeping the 8 ward councilors would have given more power to the Ward Councilors, which runs counter to their goal.
is there any effort being put into cutting the size of the board these days??? I would support a redistricting of 4-5 wards and keeping 15 with a 10/5 composition.
I agree with Tom Sheff, unfortunately any discussion of reducing the Council size has gone mute. Is anyone on the Council willing to put a reduction of the Council size before the body? There should be NO discussion of pay raises until the Council size is reduced.
I would like to let people know that there are issues with the linked documents that Greg posted here.
For example, the clean version lacks Article 1. It jumps right from the new “definitions” section to Article 2.
Second, the redlined version does not accurately capturing the differences between the current and proposed charter (particularly for a key sentence in article 2, but likely others).
I’ve informed Councilor Baker of this and he is looking into it.
One additional issue — the clean version contains 2 different copies of Article 2.
So in summary:
1. clean version lacks article 1
2. clean version has 2 inconsistent copies of article 2
3. redlines fail to highlight at least one important change (“voters entitled to such representation”).
Mr. Prior is correct, and I have emailed the Clerk of the Programs and Services Committee, Ms. Dean, who worked with the Subcommittee, asking that we have the necessary corrections made in the documents. My apologies for the omissions. (Article 1 is in the red-lined version.) To clarify Mr. Prior’s third point, while proposed revised Article 2 provides that Ward Councilors are elected by the Ward (as does the current Charter), the parallel language was inadvertently omitted from the provision relating to special elections in the case of a vacancy. I will recommend to the Programs and Services Committee that we make this correction. Thanks for the careful review. – Councilor Lisle Baker
Here’s an updated link
Thank you Greg — Problem #3 remains. This is our current charter language with regard to filling vacancies:
“Sec. 2-5. Filling of Vacancies.
(a) Special Election—If there be a vacancy, by failure to elect or otherwise, on the city council within the first 15 calendar months of the term for which councilors are elected, the city council shall forthwith call a special election to fill the vacancy. The election shall be by the voters of the whole city in the case of councilors at large or by the voters entitled to such representation in the case of ward councilors.”
this is the proposal:
“SECTION 2-5. Filling of Vacancies
(a) If a vacancy occurs, by failure to elect, removal from residency in the city, death, resignation or otherwise, on the city council at any time before the final 9 months of the term for which the council member was elected, the city council shall at its next regular meeting introduce a measure calling for a special election to fill the vacancy for the remainder of the unexpired term and shall, within 45days, act on that measure. The election shall be by the voters of the city.” full stop.
Now I personally am quite fond of that last part of our current charter: “by the voters ENTITLED TO SUCH REPRESENTATION in the case of ward councilors.”
The proposed draft crops that from the sentence implying, if taken literally and legally, which it would be, that ward councilors would be replaced by city wide elections in the case of vacancies.
There is also reference to “councilor by ward” in the redlines, which is a term from the rejected charter, not from the current or proposed revision (except for a stray use in the proposed Section 8 (which references an undefined “councilor-by-ward” instead of “ward councilor”.
I’m sure that these are copy/paste mistakes in bringing in language from the rejected charter, which lacked ward representation, but the redlines do not catch these mistakes.
If the proposed document and the associated redlines have these issues, I’m concerned they are missing other changes as people reviewing the document need to know what is going away and what is being revised. I personally have only looked at the documents briefly to surface these issues and we area only have 24 hours before this hearing.
The redlines are not a simple msword document compare, as the creators had to deal with “new” definitions at the top of the document not as new but rather as moved from section 11.
At this point I think it may be significantly better if the council specifically considered the substantive proposed changes ( enumerates in the P&S memo) on their own merits and then, if approved, edited them directly into the current charter rather than embedding these among the large number of superficial changes that are coming along for the ride (e.g. Sec. -> Section., councilors -> council members, thereof, herein, etc). The complexity this is adding is already causing us problems and we don’t know what unintended consequences these may bring along.
This is all very confusing. Will someone post a doc with the main issues in bullet points?
@Laurie — from the P&S memo that Councilor Baker posted above:
“• Some changes were made to vacancies in the Mayor’s office, School Committee and City Council provisions relative to special elections if the vacancy occurred prior to the first nine months in office. A special election is to be called within 45 days of the vacancy and then the election must be held within a certain number of days with a provision to allow an election in September if it were to fall in July and August. It does not prohibit elections in July and August, however. These changes are to allow offices to be filled in a timely matter. Residency requirements were added as well.
• Legal Counsel for City Council is a recommendation by the Charter Commission that the Subcommittee accepted, however, the Mayor’s office is very concerned about this provision and is not supportive. The subcommittee felt unanimously that this was a wise safety valve to have and would be used quite sparingly. This should be discussed further.
• Succession rules were changed. Currently the City Council convenes and would vote for an acting Mayor in the case of a vacancy in the office. The change states that the President of the Council would serve as the acting Mayor, with no vote by the City Council.
• A vacancy in a high level position would require notification by the Mayor to the City Council within 72 hours.
• A Charter Commission recommendation was to have a Committee to review Boards and Commissions. The Subcommittee felt that could be accomplished without putting it in the Charter. A Charter makes something constitutional and difficult to change. If something is important it can be put in an ordinance. There is a provision that says a city official cannot chair a committee, however, the Traffic Council is chaired by a city employee. The Subcommittee agreed to go along with the recommendation of the Charter Commission but will docket an item to exempt that provision by ordinance if necessary.
• A provision that reorganization plans could be initiated by the City Council was deleted as recommended by the Charter Commission because it had never been done.
• The powers of the School Committee are set by state law. The Charter Commission recommendation listing the various powers of the school committee in the Charter and the Law Department advised against that. The majority of the subcommittee felt that it was important to rewrite the Article on the School Committee because it was out of date, but that there was value in informing the citizenry about the duties of the School Committee.
• The threshold of required signatures was raised for group petitions, initiatives and referenda based on many other charters throughout the state.
• The requirement for charter review was changed to 15 years from the Charter Commission recommendation of 10 years.
• The Charter Commission recommended stating that zoning had to be not inconsistent with the Comprehensive Plan. The Subcommittee felt it would be problematic if the comprehensive plan and zoning are in conflict and could cause litigation issues. The Comprehensive Plan should be guide, but not controlling.
• Area Councils were left in the Charter and there was some sentiment in the Subcommittee that they should be in the ordinances instead. However, the subcommittee was only reviewing Charter Commission recommendations and not creating new recommendations. The subcommittee agreed to accept the Charter Commission amendments.
• The Subcommittee agreed to the removal of statement of “previous elected offices held” on signature papers for office.
The Chair noted that he has heard many negative reactions about the changes to the Area Council section of the Charter. The Charter Commission recommendation is that the City Council decides how an area council is created and this is going to create a controversy. The Chair said he the Subcommittee was unaware of the controversy. This will require further discussions.”
The school committee article in the current charter was not out of date – Article 4 has been completely obsolete for 25 years, thus providing inaccurate information to potential candidates and residents about the school committee’s role, powers, and responsibilities. There was no choice but to rewrite it.
This is an example as to why a new charter should include a periodic review.
I got a revised copy of the proposed charter and did a document compare with current charter using an online tool (workshare compare). This seems to be more robust in assessing revisions that Word.
Here is the comparison:
http://newtonwatch.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/proposed_and_current_charter_comparision5Mar2019.pdf
The last page of the pdf has a color key for the revisions (e.g. what indicates deletion, insertion, or movement) along with some stats. Here it is for easier reference:
http://newtonwatch.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/doc-compare-stats-and-legend-4Mar2019-1200×1465.png
Overall the program found the proposed charter has 1700 revisions vs. the current. One issue raised by the law department is that there is a chance that a well-intentioned word-smithed revision could open an unanticipated legal issue for the city. It is hard to focus on the substantive policy changes with this many changes to assess.
The wordsmithing removes dated language that had different meaning in 1972. Language is organic and meaning of individual words or phrases change over time. That’s one reason why a periodic review of the charter is an important part of a new one.
Here is the law department assessment (from January) of the revisions that calls out specific wordsmithing issues as well as items best addressed by ordinance or the underlying State statutes.
http://newtonwatch.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/190103-LAW-memo-Charter-Revision.pdf