II.        SALUTE TO THE FLAG

-          Salute to the flag lead by Council President Rodericks

-          Assistant City Solicitor, Dylan Conley

-          Dylan Conley walks through the document driven by the charter commission originating with the charter commission

o   Conley goes through the editorial changes.

o   Conley then goes through the substantive changes.

§  City council compensation

·         Give the council an annual stipend of $7,000 per year with an additional $1,000 for the council president

·         Have the stipend float in accordance with an annual cost of living increase

§  Council president shall have the power to set the city council meeting agenda with the assistance of the city clerk and law department

§  Pivoting from the city clerk to the canvasing clerk

·         Vice-President Rego states that the canvasing clerk should be part of the city clerk

§  Eliminate conflict between section 27 and section 11-14

Bk. 39                                                                                                                         Pg. 450

·         Section 27 – the first meeting of the newly elected council is held on the first Tuesday after the first Monday in January following a city general election

·         Section 11-14 – the first meeting of the newly elected council is held on the first Monday in December

§  In section 2-8, there’s a pivot on the description of quorum from the majority of the whole to quorum of three

§  Section 2-9 seems to be in conflict with section 3-12

·         Section 2-9 – distribute the work of divisions

·         Must choose which one of the conflicts to abide by

§  Section 2-10 – there’s no proposed change, but there was a long discussion and that the idea would be for the council to be given more power to reach out to the department heads

§  Section 2-12 – the proposed change was for the city clerk to be appointed by the mayor and for the council to have the power to appoints its own clerk which would have a new role or position called clerk of the city council

§  Section 3-3 – the compensation related to Mayor

·         The suggested change is establishment of a $110,000 annual salary and description of how that would work

·         Nobody can vote to raise any salary for itself. It would only take effect afterwards.

·         The mayor has absolutely no voting role and no capacity at all in charter changes – they are resolutions not ordinances so veto power doesn’t apply

·         The time period for an increase in compensation for the council is by law on the next election, but a change through the charter for the mayor would not follow the same rule. It does need to be a specific date.

§  Section 3-8 – vacancy

·         City versus the canvassing clerk

§  Section 3-12 – departmental visions

·         Discussion of striking section 29 in its entirety based on conflict

·         Section 3-12 talks about the distribution of work and how that’s done direct to the mayor

·         Section 29 states that the council has that power

§  Section 4-4 – finance

·         Question about whether or not a new section should be added which allows for the transfer of funds and capital projects to other items subject to prerequisite allocations of such capital.

§  Section 4-9 – striking the entire section on personnel

·         There were some First Amendment concerns – contribution of campaign funds and request for solicitations by any political party

§  Section 4-10 – public schools

Bk. 39                                                                                                                         Pg. 451

·         Proposal for a staggered four year term

§  Section 4-15 - recommendation for partisan elections, so the election procedure section would need to change in order to match partisan election structure

-          Dylan Conley walks through the document brought to the charter commission drafted by Dylan Conley. This document is based on a set of conversations that he had with the solicitor’s office and more.

o   Conley then goes through the substantive changes.

§  Section 2-12 – add the additional letter I to all ordinances and resolutions passed by the council that’ll be recorded then transmitted to the mayor by the end of the following business day.

§  Section 2-16 – Dylan Conley recommends language changes based on the open meetings act

§  Section 4-3 – the director of finance salary

·         The suggestion is to remove this section because it is an outlier

§  Section 4-10 – unexpended appropriations

·         Add language “except for capital” so all appropriations except for capital shall lapse at the end of the budget year to the extent that not have been expended or lawfully encumbered

§  Section 4-13 – competitive bidding

·         Competitive bidding is a phenomenon which is very highly regulated at the state level

·         Dan Conley is adding the word “re-notice” because advertise seems to have the implication that it is a newspaper published advertisement. It’s awkward because some of the areas that they talk about aren’t about newspaper advertisements, they’re just about notices.

·         Vice-President Rego states that they need to add city services to section 4-13.

§  Section 4-17 – Dylan Conley recommends that 4-17 match 4-16

·         4-16 describes how emergency appropriation should work

·         4-17 talks about emergency appropriation borrowing

§  Section 5-1 – defines the “budget year”

·         Dylan Conley suggests the addition of language that allows the change of the budget year to coincide with the fiscal year of the state of Rhode Island

§  Section 5-5 – revenues anticipated

·         Language that is derived from recommendations from director

·         There is some awkward language on how revenues are supposed to be anticipated and how they actually are anticipated and how they interact with state budgetary requirements

·         The recommendation from the finance department was to eliminate this language both in section four and section 5

§  Section 5-7 – talking about eliminating the definition of surplus

Bk. 39                                                                                                                         Pg. 452

§  Section 5-8 - expenditures proposed

·         Proposed to be altered because it doesn’t reflect reality

§  Section 5-10 – the budget to be public record

§  Section 5-11 – each of these changes are all areas where Dylan Conley is trying to eliminate awkward notice and advertising requirements that go above and beyond the open meetings act

§  Section 5-12 – adoption of the budget

·         Dylan Conley wrote a memo on this issue several years ago. Since that period of time, the council adopted an ordinance to clarify all the different time periods on how budget passage works. The finally language is awkward because there exists a veto.

·         Dylan Conley changed it from 7 to 11 days.

§  Section 5-13 - talks about moving to a website

§  Section 5-14 – there’s a cap on maximum tax rate increase.

§  Section 5-15 – the fund balance and budget act.