City Council Meeting Date: January 21, 2025
To: Mayor and City Council
From: Ben Martig, City Administrator
Title
Consider Resolution Approving Updated Charter Commission Administrative Process Policy 13.01.
Body
Action Requested:
The Northfield City Council is being asked to approve a Resolution approving updated policy 13.01 Charter Commission Administrative Policy.
Summary Report:
In an effort to standardize Council policy formats and to ensure all policies have an easily editable document, staff has reorganized and edited Council policies.
While working with existing Council policies, staff noticed that there were numerous formats being used, some had no true policy but were simply a Council staff report and related actions, many had outdated information, and very few had editable (Word) versions available. It was determined that it would be best for staff to completely retype and reformat all Council policies. Administration staff created a format, retyped all documents, reviewed and edited for basic changes such as replacing staff names with titles to minimize the need to update policies with staff turnover, and then handed off to the individual departments for further editing. Some Council policies had minor changes, while others did have more moderate changes.
All other policies were updated mid 2024 and have been updated on the City website.
The suggested updates for 13.01 Charter Commission Administrative Process were sent to the Charter Commission for their review. The clean version (attachment 2) and redlined version (attachment 3) containing Charter Commission updates and staff updates are attached. The current version of the process (numbered as 1.09) is also attached (attachment 4).
Details of the changes made to the policy are noted below:
COUNCIL POLICIES
• 13.01 Charter Commission Administrative Process
Minor changes to process and formatting were made. References to wider board/commission processes were removed. References to the Mayor’s involvement in the Charter Commission process were removed due to the appointments going through the Chief Judge.
The Charter commission did approve the same substantive language at their meeting. The formatting for the City is the only change from the Charter revised version. This is not an actual charter amendment so this is only a majority approval needed to approve the process change to align with the policy the Charter commission acted on as well.
Alternative Options:
The Council can choose to make additional edits. The item would need to be removed from consent for separate discussion. Additionally, the goal would be to align with the Charter Commission so that the process was the same for both entities. So, if the Council wanted other changes staff would request Charter commission feedback to proposed changes.
Financial Impacts:
N/A
Tentative Timelines:
Once approved, the policy will be updated to the City website.