(1/22) On November 6, 2012 the citizens of Frederick County approved the first Frederick County Charter. The original charter called for a Charter Review Commission to be appointed in 2019 to “review the provisions of the Charter and make recommendations as to the necessity for deleting, adding, or amending its contents.”

In May, the Frederick County Council appointed a Charter Review Commission and charged them with presenting a comprehensive report and recommendations before February 28.

Shortly after its organizational meeting in July, the Commission established a three-step process that it would follow in its mission. At step one, the Commission compiled a list of all of the proposals for amendments, additions, and other changes to charter government received from the public and the various stakeholders that met with the Commission. At step two, the Commission would take a vote on which of these many proposals warranted further discussion, research, and deliberation in a “workshop.” At step three, after the workshop, the Commission would vote on the proposal as to whether it merited recommendation to the County Council in this Final Report.

After sixteen public meetings and extensive public hearings, research, and deliberation, the Frederick County Charter Review Commission is making nine specific recommendations for amendments to the Frederick County Charter:

• Allow fringe benefits to be provided to the County Council
• Allow up to a 10% additional salary for the County Council President
• Make it easier for the County Council to issue subpoenas (5 votes instead of 6)
• Allow individual council members to request information from the executive branch
• Adjust the completion dates of the Redistricting Commission to compensate for presidential election years
• Require an appointed County Executive to be of the same party as the departing County Executive when he or she was elected and require the party central committees to nominate two individuals instead of one
• Reduce the permissible debt limits of the county from 5% to 3% of real property and from 15% to 9% of personal property
• Adjust the language of the budget terminology to reflect current practices
• Add a Table of Contents to future printings of the Charter

In total 41 proposals were received throughout the course of its work. The Commission decided early in the process that if a certain proposal had the support of at least three of seven members, that it would be moved to this “workshop” level of consideration and warrant further consideration. Most of these votes at this level of consideration were unanimous, with a few exceptions. If a proposal did not receive the votes of three members of the Commission to move forward, there was no further consideration of that specific proposal.

If a proposal received at least three votes of the Commission members, a volunteer “floor manager” was assigned to the proposal to lead further discussion. Most of the floor managers for the proposals that were moved to the workshop level presented written findings and recommendations on the specific proposal when the Commission considered it at this level.

At the conclusion of the “workshop,” a final vote on each proposal was taken. The Commission also decided early in the process that if a certain proposal had the support of at least four of seven members, that it would be recommended to the County Council as an amendment to the Charter. Of the twenty-six proposals that made it to the workshop level, nine of these work-shopped proposals received the support of the Commission to be passed onto the County Council as final recommendations.