Artist: John Trumbull.
On May 1, 2025, the Richardson Charter Review Commission continued their review of the Richardson Charter, covering Article 3 (City Council) and returning to Article 4 (Nomination and Election of City Council Members), as these two articles are interdependent. I anticipated big changes to Richardson's way of electing City Council, but in the end, not much was changed. Read on for details.
Still no video by the City to link you to, something that this commission isn't about to change. To paraphrase City policy: "Move along. There's nothing to see here."
Public Input
Justin Neth again spoke during the public comment portion. Unfortunately I wasn't taking notes so I can't report what he said. Needless to say, it was concise, direct, and reasoned. The City should have had him sitting on the Commission all along. Why they didn't is because of critical flaws in the way City Council picks members for boards and commissions. My recommendation to reform that process was submitted to the Commission, but was not passed. Not only wasn't it passed, it was never even brought up for discussion. My blog's slogan "Not Being Listened to Since 2006" is intact.
Residency
The Commission adopted an amendment that clarifies that council members from Places 1-4 must reside in their correspondingly numbered district for 12 months prior to election. There was discussion by some commission members admitting defeat on their desire for the City to somehow police residency requirements. Instead, if someone falsely claims to meet this requirement, it is up to citizens to use the courts to adjudicate the matter, or citizens to take action through the recall process, or the City Council to exercise their own power to expel the offending council member.
Council Misconduct
The Commission requested the language in Section 3.06 be clarified to ensure the exclusion of the offending council member from voting on their own misconduct.
Summoning Witnesses
At the request of the Richardon Chief of Police, language in Section 3.13 was changed to allow for service of process by any peace officer or authorized person, rather than just the chief of police.
Ranked Choice Voting
In public remarks at the start of the meeting, Justin Neth mentioned the differences between ranked-choice voting (RCV), plurality voting, and cumulative voting, expressing his support for RCV. He stated the benefits of RCV, including cost savings (it eliminates the cost of holding a run-off election, which was estimated at $100,000 by the City Secretary in a previous meeting).
When it came up later in the Commission's agenda, City Secretary Aimee Nemer started things off by saying she confirmed with Collin County that their current voting equipment does not support RCV. The first commissioner to talk said, "I wouldn't want to spend the time on it because I am adamantly opposed to change." They didn't offer any reasons. One commissioner said, "In trying to find a particular city in Texas that uses ranked-choice voting, I was not successful. There may be one hiding out there. I do not know them." There was a lot of cross talk suggesting to me some still didn't understand how RCV works. But I'll jump right to the verdict. The Commission decided to not change Richardson's system of majority vote, with a run-off if necessary.
Mayor Pro Tem
The Commission requested clarity in the language of when the Mayor Pro Tem is chosen. In the case of a run-off election for any council seat, choosing a Mayor Pro Tem will come after the run-off election, not right after the general election.
Term Lengths
In a candidate forum, Mayor Bob Dubey said he supported longer terms for Council "because it really, every two years, it weighs heavy on our staff. The staff is the one that has to train each council member." The Commission did deliberate on the Mayor's desired change, with some saying they initially favored this change, but then talked themselves out of it. In the end, the Commission decided to leave terms at two years and not staggered.
Term Limits
The Commission considered the implications of changing the term limits and decided to leave the Charter unchanged at a limit of 6 consecutive two-year terms, with no reset for the mayor.
Council Member Compensation
Currently, each council member receives $100 for each meeting attended, roughly $400/month, with a maximum of $5,200/year. City Attorney Pete Smith advised that "it would be administratively and maybe financially easier if it was just a fixed amount, maybe on a monthly basis, rather than having to count up the meetings they attend." The Commission agreed to change to a monthly salary.
The Commission discussed whether compensation should be set by charter, by ordinance, or by the budget process. They agreed to leave compensation set by Charter with one saying, "I would prefer Charter just because that way they're not voting their own compensation."
The Commission reviewed historical compensation adjustments, including a $100 per meeting rate from 2015, which would be equivalent to $129 in 2025 based on CPI inflation since then, or $516 per month. For comparison, Plano's compensation for council members is $1,000/mo. The Commission had a hard time finding an objective figure they could agree on, with one saying, "I could talk myself into and out of any of these conversations."
The Commission ended up proposing a monthly amount of $1,200, or about 3x the current pay. They justified the big bump by calculating the equivalent hourly rate based on an estimate of 19 hours/week spent on Council business. One commissioner argued, "Maybe it would encourage some people to actually run, knowing that they can do that part time and do another part time job" to make their total income equal a living wage.
They decided against adding an automatic inflation adjustment, partly because they already fear "sticker shock" by the voters, and partly because, as City Manager Don Magner pointed out, City employees don't have an automatic inflation adjustment, so why should council members.
Recorded Meetings
The Commission considered the public's interest in having all meetings recorded and the potential impact on transparency and accountability. They discussed rules for Council meetings and quasi-judicial board meetings.
There did seem to be a mistaken understanding of the current rules. In one of my suggestions for Charter amendments, I offered: "The City Council shall make a video and audio recording of reasonable quality of each regularly scheduled open meeting, including work sessions or special called meetings." Perhaps one reason why commissioners overlooked my suggestion is that they believe that for City Council meetings, this was already done, as required by State law. It isn't. In my post, I wrote, "State law on this matter (Texas Open Meetings Act, or TOMA) creates an exception that applies to about half of the meetings the Richardson City Council holds. So-called worksessions are NOT included in the law's requirements for video records. This Charter amendment closes that loophole." The Council records most worksessions, but not all. Because of the current loophole, the City Council does not record, for example, its biannual goals setting meeting. The City Council is aware of this loophole and exploits it to keep the cameras out of the people's business. The people, through the Charter, should close the loophole. But it won't happen by this Commission, because 1) they aren't aware of the loophole, and 2) they put a lot more faith than I do in the Council putting limits on their own willingness to exploit loopholes.
You can guess where this is going. Jumping to the verdict, the Commission concluded that the current system allows for flexibility and no changes are needed. Video recording of meetings is up to the whim of the City Council where allowed by state law.
Code of Ethics
Richardson's Code of Ethics is currently an ordinance, not part of the City Charter. One commissioner said, rightly, that "things that we feel council members shouldn't control themselves should be in the Charter. The ethics code should be part of the Charter." City Manager Don Magner spoke up. Although he should be there to answer factual questions, not to weigh in with his opinions, he said, "The ethics ordinance is a living document that gets reviewed every two years. I wouldn't want to tie our ability to update that to having to update a charter and call an election." Count him as in favor of letting council members control their own code of ethics.
Thinking of the Charter like the US Constitution, but for Richardson, there's a reason for the Constitution's clause, "Congress shall make no law abridging the freedom of speech." The Founders didn't say, "We don't want to tie our ability to update that without calling an election." They didn't write, "Congress shall make no law abridging the freedom of speech...unless a majority of them want to."
Again, let me save time by jumping right to the verdict. The Commission chose to leave the Council in complete control of the Code of Ethics, including how it applies to them or not. The commission chair, perhaps showing he was absent that day in school when the Bill of Rights was taught, said, "I'm fine with the Council having the discretion."
Another source of confusion was the lack of focus. The commission found themselves talking about, all at once, recording council meetings, City Plan Commission (CPC) meetings, quasi-judicial board meetings, and every other board and commission Richardson has. They should have discussed each type of board and commission separately.
And with that, the Commission completed their review of the entire Charter. Next meeting will be May 15 to review their work and finalize a report to the City Council, who will have the responsibility of accepting the recommendations, rejecting them, amending them, adding new ones, and deciding exactly what, if anything will go to the voters in November for their final consideration.
Quotes have been lightly edited for clarity and brevity.
"Charter near unscathed,
Though winds of change were forecast.
Steady as she goes."
—h/t ChatGPT
No comments:
Post a Comment