Frederick City Council Workshop on Charter Amendments - April 24, 2024
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Frederick City Council Workshop on Charter Amendments - April 24, 2024
The Mayor and Board of Aldermen held a workshop on April 24, 2024, to discuss seven proposed resolutions to amend the City Charter, based on recommendations from the Charter Review Committee. Due to the absence of a quorum, the business meeting items were postponed to a future consent agenda. The meeting included public comment on non-citizen voting and a detailed staff presentation on each charter amendment resolution.
Public Comments & Testimony
- A public commenter spoke against allowing non-citizens to vote in municipal elections, arguing that voting should be a right of citizenship and that non-citizens already have a voice through public input channels. He noted an unofficial Facebook survey showed opposition and requested a referendum before any change. He referenced approximately 6,500 non-citizens in Frederick and expressed concern that low voter turnout (about 10,000 out of 65,000 registered voters in 2017) could be exploited to create a voting base.
Discussion Items
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City Attorney Rachel’s Presentation: Rachel presented seven draft resolutions based on Charter Review Committee recommendations but noted they do not necessarily reflect her or the board’s consensus. She explained each resolution was drafted to be independent where possible.
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Resolution 1 (Separation of Branches): Would remove the mayor as president of the Board of Aldermen and presiding officer at meetings, along with related changes (e.g., veto process, check signing).
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Resolution 2 (Renaming Legislative Body): Would change the name from “Board of Aldermen” to “City Council” and individual members from “alderman” to “councillor.”
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Resolution 3 (City Council President): Would establish a City Council President elected by council members, with duties and a role in mayoral succession. Drafted assuming Resolutions 1 and 2 are in effect.
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Resolution 4 (Council Size and Districts): Combines recommendations for seven council members (four from districts, three at-large) and a districting process. A placeholder was left for detailed district creation criteria.
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Resolution 5 (Qualifications for Office): Would require mayor to be at least 21 and city council members at least 18, with durational residency requirements (two years for mayor, one year for council) and actual residency during term. City attorney noted legal challenges to longer residency requirements and recommended not increasing the mayor’s requirement beyond one year, but the draft reflects the committee’s two-year recommendation.
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Resolution 6 (Term Limits): Would limit mayor to two four-year terms and council members to three four-year terms, applying prospectively from the 2025 election. Alderman Russell stated he does not support term limits.
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Resolution 7 (Primary Elections): Would allow unaffiliated voters to vote in primary elections of the two principal political parties (semi-open primary). City attorney raised constitutional concerns based on a Fourth Circuit case, noting that other jurisdictions with open primaries have alternative nomination methods. She confirmed no other Maryland municipality has open primaries in partisan elections.
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Alderman Kazemchak’s Comments (read by staff): Expressed support for most changes, specifically four districts and three at-large members, consecutive term limits, and a semi-open primary. She opposed non-consecutive term limits and reiterated belief that anyone should be able to run for office regardless of party affiliation.
Key Outcomes
- No votes were taken on any of the resolutions; the discussion was informational only.
- The board agreed to continue the charter amendment conversations at the last workshop of each month, with the next discussion scheduled for the end of May 2024.
- The city attorney will research additional legal issues raised (e.g., durational residency requirements, enforcement of qualifications, constitutionality of open primaries) and provide further information.
Meeting Transcript
Good afternoon and welcome to the mayor and board of alderman business media and workshop for the 24th of April. We begin with the Pledge of Allegiance. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands. One nation under God. Indivisible justice for all. We did receive notification prior to today's meeting that a couple of members of the board are not able to be with us today in the absence of a quorum. We will not be able to take the business meeting agenda items, so we will move those to a future consent agenda item. One item on the workshop today, and that is discussion of proposed resolutions to amend the charter. Phyllis or just the city attorney. When it's time for public comment. Yes. Nope, we're gonna start with the presentation, and then we'll go to then we'll go to public comment. So I'll I'll turn it over to Rachel to walk through what she's prepared up until this point. Uh thank you, Mayor. So you do have several I can remember my password. Several charter amendment resolutions in front of you. Um just preliminarily, I wanted to make it clear what these represent. Um what I tried to do was what I tried to do and did not completely do successfully was one resolution for each recommendation of the charter review committee. So these resolutions reflect those committee recommendations. They do not necessarily reflect my recommendations, they do not necessarily reflect any consensus there may be of the of the board. These are strictly based on the charter review committee recommendations. Um they are in draft form, they they look sort of final-ish, but they're they're definitely drafts for discussion. Excuse me, can we take the conversation out of the room? These are your county attorneys, yes. Um I'm gonna ask the conversation to be taken out of the room, please. Okay, that's fine. She came up to me, she helped me. Thank you very much. She was just letting me know that there was not public comment tonight. See you on May 2nd, Mr. Mayor. Thank you, everyone. Thank you. Thank you. Um so with that, I guess we'll start on on the first. Uh it also I numbered these resolutions um in order of the recommendations as they were considered at the legislative work sessions. So uh it's a it's a little bit um maybe confusing just with the numbering, so I'll try to keep it as as clear as I can as we go through. So with that. Um, as you can see, that requires repealing or amending numerous provisions of the charter, essentially anything that references the mayor serving as the president of the board of aldermen and presiding over meetings needed to be addressed. Um I can I can walk through it. Uh again, section seven in Article 2 on meetings were currently talks about the mayor. Um mayor or majority of the board of aldermen calling special meetings. Deleted the mayor from that provision. Uh Article 2. Section 9. I need another hand and another set of eyes here. Um Article 2, Section 9 is the current section that says that the mayor is the president of the Board of Aldermen and uh establishes the president pro tem presiding over meetings in the absence of the mayor. So obviously, if you separate the branches, all that language would go away. Article 2 section 16 would be amended because that talks about the mayor vetoing resolutions at the meeting at which they are approved. So again, if the mayor's not at those meetings, um, what I did here was just made the process about the veto of a resolution, sort of similar to the the way the current processes for vetoing an ordinance, which is that the city clerk delivers it to the mayor, and he can either approve or sign, et cetera, after the meeting, since he wouldn't literally be at the meeting.
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