Public hearing on charter revisions draws no comment from audience

By JOHN MUNFORD
jmunford@TheCitizenNews.com

The public appears to have signed off on the changes to Peachtree City's charter, even if the City Council has yet to finally approve the document.

At last week's council meeting, no one in the audience offered any comment on the proposed changes the charter's first-ever significant revision. Council declined adopting the charter officially at the request of City Attorney Rick Lindsey.

Lindsey said he wanted a few more weeks so he could prepare the new drafts of city ordinances that will be referred to in the new charter document.

The charter revisions include provisions that somewhat weaken the mayor's power, particularly by giving the daily operation and administration of the city to the city manager. The mayor, however, retains "general supervision and jurisdiction over the affairs" of Peachtree City, the charter revision states.

The mayor's power to veto has been taken away, although for technical purposes since that provision may have been written before the mayor was required to have a vote on all council matters.

None of those issues was opposed by either of the two mayoral candidates in attendance: Steve Brown and Fred Wellman.

One new portion of the charter is designed to prevent council members from interfering with the work of city employees with unreasonable requests. Council members are forbidden from directly ordering city officers or employees; instead, such requests must be handled through the city manager.

The revised charter would allow council members to gather routine information which city officers and employees could easily and quickly assemble, however.

The charter revisions also clarify the role of the city clerk, one of the more contentious subjects council has discussed during the process. The clerk will now report to the city manager, but can only be terminated or removed from the position by council. Council is also given the option of appointing the city manager as city clerk.

The revised charter also eliminates the need to appoint officers such as the city clerk, city attorney and city auditor on an annual basis. Instead, such persons will serve at the pleasure of the mayor and council and can be removed at any time.

The charter revisions also address the possibility that more than one vacancy could occur on council. In such a case, the remaining members of council would be allowed to meet to appoint persons to those vacancies and, if the vacated term is longer than 12 months, set the date for a special election to permanently fill those vacancies.

The mayor or mayor pro tem would chose the process council will use to make its selection and must notify each council member of that process in writing at least 10 days prior to that meeting, the revised charter states.

In addition to rewriting portions of the charter to match with state law that has changed over the years, City Attorney Rick Lindsey also intended to simplify parts of the charter so citizens could better understand council's intentions.

The charter will also include references to the recreational path system, particularly in portions discussing the city rights of way.

Other parts of the charter were added because council felt they should be included. For instance, a section on the fire department is included since it was left out of the previous charter, which did address the police department.

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