Personnel Advisory & Appeals Board - Regular Meeting

Right. Good evening, everyone. Tonight is Wednesday, 06/04/2025 at 7PM. This is a, regularly scheduled meeting of the City of Hudson, Ohio Charter Review Commission. Calling meeting to order. I'll do a roll call. Mister Hall? Present. Miss Griffith? Present. Mister Hoover? Here. Miss McCoy? Here. Mister Ryan? Here. Miss Vitalari?

Here.

Mr. Trainor? Here. And I did hear earlier today from a partner that Ms. Norman would be here and would be delayed, but we do have a quorum. Ms. Kegler here. As roll call approval of minutes is item three, we have the draft minutes for the previous meeting on May 14. Is that right? Yes. Is there a motion to approve?

I'll motion.

Mr. Hall moves?

Second.

Ms. Griffith seconds. Roll call, Mr. Trainer? Approved. Ms. Griffith?

Approved. Ms. McCoy? Yes.

Ms. Vittelary? Approved. Mr. Hoover? Aye. Mr. Ryan?

Approved.

And Mr. Kegler? Yes. Motion approved unanimously. Line four is, correspondence and commissioner comments.

This is our ninth meeting. We have reviewed all 16 articles. We have, no articles left to remove, but we have deferred section 3.1, and I did not include that on the agenda. So I would like to ask that we, like to the agenda, I'd to ask that we take a look at that first based on the information that we've received. The separate issues that, we have yet to take a look at would be the elected official compensation in section 3.1.

It's actually counsel, just counsel compensation. Questions second, the question that was brought to us regarding ranked choice voting. Third, a question that was questions that were brought to us regarding boards, commissions, and committees, including adding, removing, or merging, or combining. And then and then finally, questions that I've grouped generally under the topic of accountability to taxpayers and voters. We also have in our wasn't in our original packet, but Aparna was able to email it out yesterday, I believe, were the draft section changes that mister Pitchford has drafted based on all of our discussions to date.

And he was kind enough to group them into, I think, nine or 10 different proposals, which I thought was a really clear way of organizing it and grouping them. So I thank him for that. Our next meeting is scheduled for the eighteenth, which is two weeks from tonight. And then we also have the ability to we have on our schedule, if we needed, an additional meeting on the the twenty fifth, the week after, with our deadline being right around the end of the month on the July 1. Would like to make a suggestion that under the review of charter articles, Item seven on the agenda before we move on, that we flip the order of items A and B and go through the draft sections first since I think that'll be hopefully that'll be a little more expedient.

We get through that. And, then we move on to the separate issues that I just mentioned. That, was number one to go through the easy stuff first before we move on to the big topics for discussion. Secondly, since the big topics just for discussion include, miss Norman had actually prepared a couple of summaries for us. I think it'd be good for her to be here for those big topics and should be here for that. So is everybody okay with that? Yes. Okay. So we'll switch the order of a and b. Any other commissioners have correspondence or comments to share?

Hearing none, we move on to item five, which is public comments. We have two opportunities on our agenda for public comments. Anyone who'd like to bring any matter before the commission within its jurisdiction would be asked to approach the podium, identify yourself by name and address. Please limit your comments to five minutes, direct your comments to the chair, and I will ask at this point if anyone has any comments. We have another opportunity later as well.

So hearing none, we move on to there's no scheduled presentation. So we move on to what was Item 7b. We'll consider it 7a, which is the draft for sections already reviewed to our nice handy handout that we received. And we've already read through all of these once. We talked about them, and we asked for them to be drafted.

So I'm gonna start with the simple version, which would be I'll I'll mention it first, like, first is the preamble proposal number one without reading it again. If if you want, we can read it again and see how it see how you think it sounds. But I'll just say does anybody I'll start with this one and say does anybody have any objections to the preamble as drafted? Does that comport with your prayer?

I don't have an objection, but I did

talk to Sarah earlier and she knew she

was gonna be late. She did ask me to ask we had a conversation on why the word municipality should be there instead city, and she wanted us to go back to it. I couldn't recall that, but I was wanted to just vocalize that and see if anybody else remembered or if we had that cover. I was looking through my notes and I couldn't

I remember talking about it, and I thought mister Kagler mentioned that it or or it might have been mister Pitcher that something one of them was all encompassing. The municipality is all encompassing because it used to be a village or if it ever wasn't that it has something to do with

So leaving municipality instead of city, I think is what she wanted.

That's what we had talked about.

I think you're right. Yeah.

So write the first

Mhmm.

Change and leave municipality. Okay.

So leave it

as a municipality. Yes. Mhmm.

My only question was, do we need to add Summit County? Or was that just like

It's a legal matter. Okay. I think it was my understanding. Those the changes that you see here were the ones that miss Norman That's

said. Mhmm.

Is there another Hudson, Ohio?

No. And and that's if you have a township, when you list the name of the township, have to list the name of the county afterwards because you can have 25 Jefferson townships throughout the state of Ohio. Maybe Jefferson Township, ABC County. But municipalities, there can only be one name. If somebody wanted to do another Hudson, it would have to be Hudson Hills or Hudson Heights or Hudson something else. So I've always understood that listing the county after municipality was not made was not necessary, but it's up to you. No.

I I agree that it's not necessary. Okay. Because it was a suggestion that I was provide Okay.

Would everybody be okay with leaving the Summit County off? Yes. Yes. Yep. Keep it simple.

Anything else? Changes to that one, and then we'll get revised drafts at our next meeting so we can approve a sign off next would be section, proposal two, which was changing two sections regarding the commencement of elected officials' terms. This included changes or three sections. This included sections three point o one and three point o two for the council and four point o one for the mayor, basically removing the references to December and adding the county board of elections certification that it'd be the first council meeting after the County Board of Elections certification of the vote. So there were three relatively identical changes to those three sections.

So is everybody okay with those three changes as drafted or do you have any questions?

Mr. Pitchford? And I can just amplify the concept here. You may recall the question was the issuance by the Board of Elections of individuals, certificates of election to individual office holders. We've changed this so it is effective upon the vote that the board takes when it certifies it. We don't have to wait for the issuance because that was the administrative issue and it's caused problems in the past. So this will just so it was clear, it's the vote

Of the board of elections. Of the

board of elections. And then, of course, it should be sworn in.

And then I think in one or two of the sections, it said regular council meeting and the the other one, it said regularly scheduled. So with those three sections, no chance.

All right.

Next is proposal number three, described as requiring only website publication for legislative postings. This is a change to one section, section 3.08. It's removing all the references to, requiring newspaper publishing for different types of, legislation. So it's a lot of strike through and then adding the word posted in that section. Clear? Questions? Concerns?

Clear. Clear. Okay.

Number four, confirming at will employment for the city manager. This was striking two words from section five point o two. It was the word just on the first line and the fifth line. Suspension would be for cause as opposed to for just cause. Everybody clear on that?

Proposal five, a procedure for appointing and removing an acting finance director. This involved changes to one section, section six point o three, adding a paragraph with the method for appointment by the city manager, and then, ability for counsel to revoke the designation and appoint another officer to serve until the finance director returns. I thought

I thought it was

to to not have counsel be doing the appoint It was to when we discussed it before, it was to like, the first sentence would be fine, but the second sentence would be council revokes, and then the city manager may appoint another. I have would

add this was this was just a As you directed it. It was it's the same language that exists for the acting city manager.

Which council does appoint.

Correct. So if you would I have no problem taking out the second sentence.

Everybody alright with that?

I remember that too. Yeah.

Yeah. The discussion would make it like the city manager, so that's

why you see that.

Yeah. That makes sense. Okay.

Yeah. Mhmm.

So slightly changes. So So the city manager does the And the appointing to replace it. Mhmm. The council council revokes. Revokes. Great. Great. I I like like that. That one. Okay. Okay.

Any other So council may revoke, but then city officer

City manager.

Or city manager

Points another.

Will designate another one. Okay.

That how you wanna do it?

Yeah. That's right. When we

not not having city council involved at all. Well, I thought it

was value valuable for the council to be able to remove, but the only place where the council appoints is the manager. So, at least in terms of the chain going down. So at least it would be giving the city manager shot at appointing a replacement if the

Cal may revoke and the city manager may appoint another. That was my suggestion.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

I think that

reads more smoothly. Thank you. May be clarified?

Mhmm. Okay. So far,

of the five proposals, two will be tweaked, and the other three are as proposals one and five. Proposal six is regarding contract authorization. This involves, multiple changes throughout section six point o four, which is contracts and purchasing. One is, in paragraph a is the removal of the newspaper, requirement similar to the earlier proposal regarding legislative postings. But then there's other languages other language added in here.

Mr. Pitchford, did you want to review that or because I some of that I didn't remember from before,

but maybe we had discussed it in general. I'm happy to explain my thought process here. We are essentially taking this opportunity to reorganize the, this paragraph. If you read it, as it currently exists, it's somewhat, disjointed. It's repetitive in some places, so I I tried to reorganize it and create subparts so it will be easier to to read and to, enforce.

And the, I did add, two phrases, and you see them there, are two words. Right one's a word. Under b b one is as defined by city council. That gives us a a little more flexibility. There are some defined terms in the higher advice code as to what professional services might be.

You know, is a there might be some sort of debate as to whether or not, let's say, IT services are considered professional services. Well, I mean, or would you consider just a doctor or a lawyer or an engineer who are licensed? Are those professional services? So I've taken taken that essentially off the table and given the discretion to determine what is a professional service to city council. And then the the other the next one is the it was for acquisition. I just added for sale.

So it's

I and I had forgotten. So section 6.4 is this one big humongous paragraph right now. Correct. So it's this was organizing it, creating a's and b's and

Yes. Okay. Much easier read.

Yeah. Breaks it up. Just for the the for sale, point, we don't have any reason to add, for, like, a rental option as well in there. We wouldn't do that. Lease. Yeah. Lease run. Well, you know, any is there I'm just trying to think of all the different ways we could spend that money for real estate.

That's not a bad idea.

I don't know.

I don't

know how we do it.

I'm just have leases not very often, and are and there are different kinds of leases. So if we're gonna go chase that concept, we could say, for the lease acquisition, sale, or any other transfer. Right?

So you just got Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Is that I'll type it up here, I'll read it back to you.

This would be one because there's so many changes that would be helpful at least for me to see it. Fully digesting the impact

of I agree.

I trust that it's organized, but

acquisition sale or I

was going to

try to go back. No purchase or contract involving an expenditure of more than $25,000 shall be made without counsel approval in a lease of what are the following applies? We'll skip down. Without advertising for the lease, acquisition, sale, or any other transfer of real estate.

Yes. Yeah.

At least, wouldn't you need an unless or an if or something like that? Council approval. And if And if

And

when. I like when better. That council approver and win at least one of the following applies.

So win. And then acquisition sale or lease.

For the lease? Acquisition, sale, or any other transfer of real estate.

Any other questions, comments on that proposal? So we're at three and three. Three tweaks and three as

is. They're good. Yep. I've been looking at the work that's been done. It's really good. Yeah. Thank you.

This is a

great format.

Very helpful. Yes. Thank you. Understand Yes. This is great.

And it's not an eight point font, so I appreciate it.

I agree.

You're on

the side of the page right now.

All right. Proposal number seven, term limits for executive or elected officials. This was adding a new section seven point o five and then making a related deletion to section four point o one where the mayor has the unrestricted right to run for reelection. So this was intended to draft or intended to propose a three full four year or twelve year total limit. It does include, whichever is greater as an elected officer or as an elected officer municipality regardless of position.

Now I'll take the hit here and say I'm I'm not confident because in my instruction based on notes, I was going through the scenarios here. So if you if we say regardless of position, that would be does is a position a council member? Is a position a ward council member? Is a position a ward one council member? Yes. Thought we landed on they couldn't occupy the same position for more than twelve years.

So

in that scenario, are you describing somebody could be the ward one council person for twelve years and then become an at large for twelve years? Because I thought you had different numbers associated with that scenario, like two terms and then

Taking it to the extreme, someone every twelve years could move from Ward 1 to two to three to four and then serve as a large council member and then serve as a the mayor and you're serving for sixty years

or something. The way

I read this, it's 12 total. If you're This absolutely

Ward 1

This would

mean 12 total.

That's right. So I remember that because it was, hey, if you wanted to serve four on council, then you can serve eight as mayor or eight on council for us mayor and then Yeah.

This is that this is that extreme. This takes away any loophole. Yep. You're all good with that?

Yep. Yeah. Just wonder I wonder if the word position is the right word then. I mean, if if that's the case, maybe it's regardless of contribution or regardless of service. Regardless of elected position.

Yeah. I'm checking out right now. Like Oh,

are we doing it for board members too?

No. Is just the elected section. We'll get to Yeah. Mhmm.

There's a lot more for those board members.

Trying to get

Were you suggesting instead of position?

You can almost add elected in front of position. I mean, I'll try to see how many times we can get elected in one paragraph. That I think that would cover it.

The title as well, you notice? We got him

in the title. Nice. I was gonna change it to elected office.

There you go. Okay.

It makes sense.

Yep. Okay. So

the only change would be on line four to change position to elected office?

Yes. Okay.

I may agree with grammar as to whether or not to add on the word which, but right. Regardless of which elected office, but

Could you almost strike those last three words and just put a period after municipality? Yeah. Whichever is greater as an elected officer of the municipality, period.

I think that would potentially leave open crafty lawyers and gamemanship, you know, ambiguity as to whether or not, it's the

position. Okay.

Regardless of elected office was the shortest way we could try to capture that concept. I mean, we could say it in a whole another sentence, but I I was trying to capture just like in any office.

Okay.

Right? So it's

it's Right.

Regardless of any office, in any elected office.

Okay. So it would as an elected officer of the municipality regardless of elected office.

Yep. Twelve years totals. Right. I was

thinking maybe of which elected office, but I'm I'm not sure I like that, so I'm gonna think about it.

Okay. Some So I'll tweak. Yeah. Okay. Anything else?

Okay. Then this goes to Ms. McCoy's question, proposal number eight, Board, Commission and Committee member term limits. So this is for all the appointed

Chair. Back to the 4.01, the last sentence before it says the mayor shall assume office at their first regular council meeting in December. Would that section be changed with what we're talking about earlier when?

Following the certification.

Yeah. Should there be mention of like after the vote of the board elections in that paragraph?

I think there'd be separate independent changes to that section unless you wanna just say

Maybe get like all the consistent with

It's it's We actually

can make that change. We proposed that change under proposal number two.

So that proposal number two would then affect what's the language in this proposal? I

understand what you're saying now. No. You we we we would make them separately, each proposal, and then whichever one passes, that would go into effect. I I don't think they I don't think the different proposals contradict.

So that it's not confusing rather than restating all the four point o one, could you just say strike the last sentence?

Four zero one. 401. This 401 doesn't match this 401. Yeah. So mister Petford, the the 401 on the back of the second page doesn't match the four zero one on the proposal seven.

Right. The the the core language is the same. The original language is still the same. What what what you see is we're proposing two different changes to section four zero one, but we're chasing two different concepts.

Okay.

Right? So four zero one comes up twice. One is for the commencement of the term. The other one is term limits. Okay. Right? So they're and they're different sentences. So we're changing

Strikey different things. Okay.

I see what you mean. Okay.

Abbott approvals are challenging. Yeah. Just trying to navigate them.

Yeah. That's why I felt rather than putting the confusing conflicting language in, it might be simpler just to put for Section 4.01, strike the last sentence from the

I agree with I agree with that. Okay.

This is more.

Anything else for proposal seven? Back to proposal eight, board commission and committee member term limits. This involved changes to one, two, three, four, five, six, seven. Seven of the eight charter, create boards and commissions to make them identical, to remove consecutive, add 12, and it does say whichever is greater. Now I had in my notes when we discussed it earlier for the board and commissions, we said whichever is less.

But when we then we had a discussion about the elected and said whichever is greater. So I just wanna bring that out there. We also when we discussed this, I do recall us saying shall serve no more than blah blah blah blah on this board, on this commission so that someone's twelve year service would not be they could serve on multiple different boards, and that twelve would only apply to serving on that particular board. But that's not encapsulated in here. I'm just noticing that now. So what's your what what do you all recall?

What's your plan? Was that because we had the potential, vacancies being filled?

Mhmm.

So it had to be or greater instead of or less. Am I remembering that right?

Yeah. Was like if someone fills in Yeah.

Because it was true over your last

And then it would mess up the term.

Yeah. Messing it. Yeah. Okay.

Was where we got greater. I see what mister Kegler is saying though.

This would be extremely

it doesn't 12 in general, regardless of which boards you are serving on. Right?

I mean, I don't know if it's implied by

I know.

Meaning shall serve no more than blah, on this board. If he own this board

is is

implied because everything in that section is about that board.

I agree with that concern because we would not wanna restrict people from serving in multiple boards.

I do not interpret it to be any board commission I think it relates to just the board.

Yeah. Think that's what we discussed was we didn't want anybody to make a dynasty of a particular board, but their service would be transferable from a leadership standpoint other boards. So I think the way it reads is probably good for this because it's a big difference between you're on the park board and then all of a sudden you're on architectural well, maybe that's similar but you get it.

I think the only thing

you could do to clarify is just after the after the term limitations, just say on cemetery board or just to repeat the title of it that you're making it this board Yeah.

On this board. Yeah.

Is that overkill though?

Mean

No. Okay.

Yeah. Knew it. Nice.

Mister Kangla, that was your suggestion. Right? That That's what I thought too. Yeah.

Like, we wanted to make it

Three terms on that board. Yes.

Yes.

Yep. But then you can move on and serve in a different way.

Yep. Right.

So no member shall serve. I will put it right there because I think that's the easiest place to put it. That's not clunky.

Oh, yeah.

No member shall serve on the park board. After the rest.

Mhmm. Yeah. So it would

after or committee, your commission or commission. I think they're all boards or commissions. So it's after serve in seven places. Any, anything else from anyone on that proposal? Make sense?

I asked one pokey question. So it it's related to the serve without compensation. Like, if somebody on the board got paid a dollar, would that blow that up and reset their clock? Actually playing a devil's advocate.

Is without compensation, is that somewhere

Yes. So it's it's so the park board, it's a third line, serve without compensation for staggered four year terms. So, like, if I am

thinking like They all say the same thing.

Crafty lawyer. Like, if somebody were to pay somebody a dollar.

It'd have to be the city.

It would have be the city.

And the city doesn't have a mechanism to pay those folks. Okay. If we made it paid, that would be I I think it would have to come back to the charter review.

Pay. The city is not

as we were reviewing that.

Okay. So that's the safeguard. The city does not have a mechanism to pay anybody on a board. Correct.

I I think this is actually designed to state that these are volunteer positions.

We're not

getting a dime. So

No. I'm it's not so

much about getting a dime or

a dime.

I know what you're saying like. Yeah.

Oh. Like, here's a secret.

Twelve twelve years. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. I'm just that's a pokey question. Figured I'd ask. Good to ask.

I'm just impressed that you came up with that.

Oh, thank you.

Potential loophole. Was a really one. I'll take this as compliment. That's a good one.

One of these meetings. Yes. So

on this border on blankety blank board or on blankety blank commission in seven places, any other changes to this

one? Mm-mm.

Okay. This is good. The

idea was to get rid of loopholes,

I think.

And it's beautiful and consistent, I'll say, from the council side as we're trying to navigate what the expectations are of every board having to look, is this one limited? Is that one, you know?

Oh.

Just being consistent. Yeah. Yeah.

Saves time.

Okay. Proposal nine, to require the clerk of counsel to process initiative and referendum petitions instead of the finance director. This involves changes to changes just to 12.12 o one and twelve point o

two. Mhmm.

It changes clerk of counsel to finance director in several places in both of those sections, and I think that was it. Any questions, concerns with that or pretty straightforward? Straightforward. Alright. And then I think this is the last one.

Mister Gitchford, sorry to interrupt. Just I'm sure you're gonna catch it, but there's just one strike through missing in the very last paragraph on finance director.

Oh, yeah.

Just in case you didn't catch it when you're actually Last

very last Fourth line down.

Oh, well, second line down. And then fourth line down. And I don't Is that right? Or election submission orders or other statuses with

Yeah. Yeah. Section 12 o two.

Yeah. 12 o two paragraph. Just read look at all the words that say finance director.

We

we don't want the finance director in that sentence. Is that what you're saying?

Okay. Just these we're replacing it. Strike through. Okay.

Yeah.

And then I think, so with second paragraph, when a referendum by the clerk of counsel then strike through finance director continue on

Line four.

Line four, I think it needs to strike out and have clerk of counsel replace. Look at your fourth line too just to be safe.

Thank you. Was it only two?

Yeah. Yeah.

I think so. Jokes have been ripped. Yeah.

Keep it fun.

Okay. Proposal 10 to change the threshold number of signatures required to initiate a recall. A couple of changes in paragraph two, replacing gubernatorial with municipal for election, and then, adding reference to Ohio law in, paragraph three.

Let me ask this from a clarity side. When I read to change the threshold number of signatures needed to initiate a recall, to me, it seems like we're changing the number of signatures. Will that be written differently? And one of the things from my concern is I want things to be transparent and clear to people. Every time I see these things come out, I'm always wondering what they're trying to slip through, you know, and that would send alarm bells to me. You're changing the threshold number of signatures. Didn't they try to do that at the state a couple years ago? That's not what we're trying to do. We're correcting language.

The longer way of describing it would be to change the election upon which the threshold is measured and to be that was like too wonky, too confusing. But I don't know if these these proposal titles, which I found very helpful and illustrative. I don't know if they're gonna be in the ordinance or not. I think they could they could be very helpful even for voters to understand Oh, yeah. Summarize them.

But if I read the voter to change the threshold number of signatures needed to initiate a recall, see where I'm going?

Does that

I'm thinking you're trying to change 25% to 30% or or something,

which is just a couple years ago. The state had that same

top Title. Yeah. Sure.

So all we're doing is changing some words from Theoretically,

we're changing the denominator, making the barrier easier because there's likely to be less people in some years based on that being the last

election. Changing the number.

You are changing the numbers. However,

why I

Could you say lessening? Like, is there a different Yes. Revising. Could you just say revise?

Didn't realize or I didn't say increase or decrease. I just said And then I didn't wanna presuppose, but How

how about to change the the method of calculating the threshold?

How about Something like that. How about clarifying requirements to initiate a recall?

That's super ambitious. Threshold requirements?

Clarifying threshold requirements to initiate a recall.

Why did we change it from gubernatorial to municipal? I'm forgetting. Or

was it a timing? Because

you're doing the threshold, you go back, you figure which election do I have to look at, how many vote, like. How many people voted in it and the percentages, how many signatures I need to get.

What's the swing in elect electors in each like, it's a it's a decent swing between a municipal and gubernatorial.

So What is it for the state?

Yeah. This this tracks the gubernatorial the state language.

When we changed to municipal? Because it was saying gubernatorial. No.

The state offices are all tracked on the gubernatorial. Gubernatorial.

Right. And we're changing away from gubernatorial. That's why I'm asking why. Because 25 is a pretty low number anyway. That could just be a couple 100 people if it

Actually, 5% is higher, isn't it normally 10? Is it? A 39%

threshold. Okay. So that's why we would go to municipal.

If we're to I mean, the main thing I think miss Norman had suggested adding Ohio reference to Ohio law in here. If we're having some issues remembering why or I mean, I would suggest not doing that change because I to me, it confuses Problem we're trying to solve. Yeah. Yeah. Which and and in that case, then it's not changing the threshold. It's clarifying or Right. Clarifying requirements? Yeah. Clarifying requirements for initiating a recall. And it really has nothing to do with signatures.

Because I say that because I think that's a if we were changing it, that'd be a big topic for people, which we'd have to I don't think we'd have to have a reason to be changing it to talk about it.

This context, the the argument and I'm not advocating one way or the other. Yeah. But the argument would be that you are providing more access to the ballot, easier access to the ballot. It's a much easier argument to make going this way as opposed to going the other way.

Govern via the ballot advice, govern via governance. And that's why I'm saying, like, what would be the reason I couldn't explain it? Not that I'm for or against. I haven't done any numbers here, but yeah.

You ever seen any place measure their signatures on the municipal election? I can't

specifically recall that I have, but By and large, it's usually gubernatorial. I don't I don't wanna say I've never really like, I I haven't studied that issue. It does not at all strike me as odd to make it the municipal election.

It's representative of the electors in that last cycle. That's sort of how I think I recall the discussion. It's like so the onus is on the people to get out and vote. The onus is then on the people to in a representative manner of 25%, and I guess that would be a research we could certainly take on is is 25% high as compared to 10% if the state is 10%. I know it seems like 25% is not a lot of electors, but You

go back to the last election, there was one judge and, like, one issue and how many people showed up minimum. You could be changing governance with like 50 people.

But that's the question. Do we know the swing in Hudson of how many people vote off cycle?

Not many.

There are certain I mean, without being forensic, right? There are certain elections more people will show up for it. Gubernatorial is more consistent, and then it depends on what's on the ballot after that. Like, this last one, I would think you have a pretty low I have no hearing the numbers, and I can't remember. It was pretty low because it was, like, one judge and and a couple of issues.

And I make the argument that we leave it for gubernatorial. For the reasons that you're talking about just to kinda Just

to say.

There's three types of elections. Right? If you're presidential, you got your gubernatorial year, and then you've got your municipal years. Yep. And presidential are always an immense amount, and so we don't wanna do that because that would that would almost your work. It's hard. On lawyers. Right. Yeah. You know, municipal, to your point, is is is lowers that significantly, in my opinion. The gubernatorial is the is the compromise. Yeah.

It's a more regular attendance kind of number.

So state chat GPT. State, you know, some states are 12%, but some are as high as 25% of gubernatorial. It does seem to be consistently gubernatorial. So I guess the question just remains, what are we trying to solve?

And if that was Are

we do should we my questions.

Was it in one of the comments? Like, do we do we

remember them? No. I Was

it a request? Remember.

Thing. Did somebody make a comment or submit a request? Maybe if they did, there might be a We probably

reviewed this the first day.

It was 01/29. January It twenty nine.

So the very last Bonnie.

This was us that came up with it.

Yeah. CRC We

got excited. We were getting we gotta make some changes. Ready to go.

Let your service I wonder if there was something that sparked it. That miss Norman had suggested she's not here.

That's fair.

You should

I don't have it in my notes for 01/29.

Paragraph to change. We just

we should have our XRC. Yeah.

CRC, but then list them. List the member. I would love call the next charter review commission, like, some suggestions. Not that I have

great ones. Would whatever you want. I would love to

be be able to know who know who did it. Yeah.

Well, it It's a pleasure.

And also, just so we know, by way of thought process, we're talking about a recall. We're not talking about actually getting on the ballot. And so this is a recall which you would tend to make it a little harder. Right? So making it municipal. This this makes a recall easier, which

So you just had an election. Now you can recall with 50 people.

Which is?

Because of a low municipal turnout. Which is, again

I argue about, or I you hear me talk about, gamemanship. Right? I mean, that you you it could be distracting.

Yeah. And that

Is it possible we thought municipal not necessarily like this last election where nobody showed up, but like when there's actually a council member on the ballot. Is that

what we meant?

That's what a municipal election means, an odd numbered year when there are municipal elections. Not a time when the polling places in the municipality are open for it refers to what's on the ballot. So municipal election means the municipal offices are on the ballot. So that that

So it wouldn't have been based on this one that just happened in May where No.

That's true. Yeah.

Not a general election, not a primary, not a and not even numbered years. It's just odd numbered years.

Mister Koehler, can we can we table it until miss Norman comes when I think Scott or

Solon and Chagrin Falls are both 25% of general and municipal.

And I just looked at background, and actually, it was 20% of the municipal. Right? So it's the

think there was some precedent that we were saying that we were out of date or something on gubernatorial. And I only looked at Solon and Chagrin Falls based on Yeah. Know, anything demographic or

somebody saying that there were concerns the last time someone tried to initiate a recall about how onerous the requirement was for getting signatures because it was gubernatorial. They say that.

I have not heard that.

I thought I I thought heard it or I thought I heard somebody

say I feel like that's better than the alternative. If we do municipal and it's so low, that could just fracture. I mean, think about like

Constantly doing

It'd be constantly people trying to rerun. It would just be so disruptive to counsel. I mean, it would take not much as you can we can see in the past couple months. It would take not much to get those then it

would

just I know it works.

I think could House will be so focused on that and they might be afraid to actually make hard decisions because like, oh, if we only need 400 people to make a signature, I don't know, to do a recall, it's not that much. Then it it could actually not that I'm doubting counsel, they could actually be focused on that or they just focus on I don't know. Just I'm just trying to play the other side, like Mhmm. And it would just be so divisive, and I feel like maybe just keeping what it is, it should be hard for a reason.

Right? Like, if we look if we look at the original

Those votes.

Excuse me. If we if we look at

the

original paragraph in section twelve one o three from the charter, this petition may be circulated in separate parts, but the parts shall be bound together and filed as one instrument. Each part shall contain the name and office of the person whose removal is sought in a statement, blah blah blah, and no more than 200 words of the grounds for the removal. Such petition shall be signed by at least that number of electors, which 25% of the total number of electors who voted in the most recent gubernatorial election in the applicable area of the municipality from which the elected officer was elected. In other words, we're trying to change something that really probably doesn't need to be changed.

I agree. I have one clarifying question. Does the way that that read to me makes it sound like the only way you could petition for the recall is if you are also an elector of or also a also a participant of the election. So if you did not vote, you are not eligible to give to participate in the recall. Right? Because it says of the total number of elect well, guess it doesn't. No.

No. It's just that it's

a calculation and if you're if you're registered to vote, you can vote.

You're right. Okay.

I see that. Your your voice counts.

Okay. Alright. Never mind. Yep.

Would that last sentence mean that it's easier to recall somebody that's in a ward specific versus Yes. Oh, yeah.

At large.

Yeah. Because they're beholden to the ward. Yep.

I believe it's the same. That's my opinion.

I I don't dis normally, I would agree with that except every city or town I'm looking at is saying it's municipal in Ohio. Like, I've gone through a series of Shaker. I was gonna do a few

big village. Think this is miss Norman. The more we talk about it, I just remember her she had a list. I don't wanna put words in her mouth, but maybe

we We can wait

I think we should.

Yep. Alright. So this will remain pending.

Cleveland is 20% of the most recent municipal. So again, bigger city. I was trying to look at cities about the, you know, whatever. 20,000 ish. Mhmm.

Yeah. I think it's a debatable topic, right? Do you want to lower the threshold, retain the threshold? What I would be curious is what's the impetus? In compliance with law? Did someone suggest it? If the public is not suggesting it, then why are we tackling it?

Was probably a consistency thing of and it's kinda like what we're gonna go through about counsel salaries. Like, so we wanna be in line with the times. Do we? So my

argument has always been, like, will say, hey, Chagrin Falls has that. Solon has that. I don't care. What does Hudson want for Hudson? Like, what do our residents want?

So I am That depends on the time.

I am

a different way of thinking, and you can write me off on that, like, I don't care. I mean, if everybody's going off the cliff, I'm not going with them. What do we want as a community? And it it's to the pay thing too. I've never felt like we need to pay. That's a personal bid in. I think you get different people when you pay or don't pay. It could be for the group to decide.

Let's see if we can get a recall from miss Norman because I She's locked in.

She's lit.

We talked about it and we ended up on it for a reason. She's gonna be

like, I wasn't here at that meeting.

Yeah. Well, that was me.

Why don't set that aside then and then talk next in since we had deferred it before about section 3.1, which was that was specific. That was the section we deferred regarding elected official compensation. Now within our packets, mister Hoover, was this something you prepared or a partner prepared?

This is something from a clerk discussion group that we're both

a part of. Well, Thank you. You're any part of it.

So we have probably a couple dozen different examples of municipalities with populations and salary salaries for council members and also for the President of Council. They are not really in any they're not ordered by population and not ordered by looks like they are ordered by dollar amount of president. No. No. I can't

find the

I they're not really

I can't find

the system. So did anyone have any observations about this? But I I would back up to the issue of I was trying to think getting the Goodyear blimp of what are what were we trying to accomplish or discuss here? Was it were we trying to give the council a bump? Were we trying to have the council salaries be at a level comparable to surrounding communities? Were we trying to have them be at a level that justified contributing or participating in Ohio Public Employee Retirement System or something else?

From my recollection, I think we were in research mode to make sure that it felt and looked right. And I don't know what right is, but I think we just said we don't we didn't know. Is it is it comparable to other cities? Is it comparable to other communities? Municipalities?

And I

think this was a this was something mister Hoover was already working on anyway, so it felt like a low hanging fruit to get

Agree. Yeah. Think it was relative to the public retirement system as well.

I agree. Yep.

From what I remember, there is a threshold

Mhmm.

And counsel is currently below that threshold.

I would agree. That's how I remember it as well.

Do we know what that threshold is?

And I

think it also just came out of there were submissions to this big list of people

commenting

on

the Yeah. There were. There were It doesn't

mean we'd act on it, Yeah.

There were certainly people involved in government, but there was also at least one resident said that we

it's all good.

We pay our council way too low.

I just want hold on. I just want the record to note, miss, Norman has joined us. It's 07:54PM, and we miss Norman, we did switch around the agenda. So we've been going through the charter sections that we already reviewed and got through the drafts that Marshall had prepared. I can review with you separately if you wish. There's one section that we deferred to discuss with you and that was the proposal 10, but we're not going put you on the spot at the moment. We'll come back to that. And where we were now was on section 3.1, which was elected official compensation, just to bring you up to speed.

Thank you.

You would I did not officially check with OPRS on that question, but the in talking with Tom and I, I just googled it here, and it the numbers are very similar to what Tom and I had talked about. But it's mean, when I said a thousand dollars, that's for, PRS credit, like your compensation plus health care. The threshold is lower for just, right, which is compensation. And in 2024, that dollar amount was, $7.21 44, and it's on a, like a it's on an increase of 1.75%, every year until 2029. So it's on a slow ticker until, 2029.

They don't do the level on again. So it's probably, let's call it, $750 in income a month.

You need to make that per month?

In order to get OPRS credits. Okay.

I I would say Monthly amount. Monthly amount.

What is it a month?

So It's $7.50.

2 so there's two two types of benefits for PRS. Right? It's your your retirement, your compensation, right, a check, and then there's health care because OPRS offers both. For the compensation, we're just gonna round it off to say 750. If you wanna be eligible for health care, it's 1,000 per month in income.

So that may have affect our mayor of choice some at some point. Right?

Here's not the count. Mayor compensation's up to council. We're just talking about council

So just council. Okay. So the so just doing the math, right? $80 a week or $80 four times a month is the most you can make in Hudson City Council. So what we're talking about is $3,200 a year maximum. Yeah. So just Oh, yeah. And not hitting that threshold. Now our council is made up, I believe, of people that have other professions and all of that, so I get that part of it too.

Actually, $30.38, 3,900 slash 12 times four times 12.

I say yeah. 3,800. Sorry. 30 so 3,800 with 52 or is the max.

So if the and, Oprah, if if that's if that was the goal to try and have the elected official, the council compensation be at a level that qualifies them for full time elected service participation in OPERS,

it then would have to be at least 9,000.

It would be

said $7.50 or be have to be 12,000.

Thousand. Right?

It's just So it has to be 12,000.

Yeah. Well, but if if you put it in as a dollar amount, then as OPERS adjust the dollar amount up, then at some point, it's gonna become noncompliant. So if the goal Oh,

we talked about indexing with OPERS,

if I recall. Other language would be, you know, whatever the, statutory minimum is as set by the Ohio Public Retirement.

So I changed my search to the minimum for elected officials and it gave me a very different answer where there's a calculation rather

than

a minimum. And so I don't know if it is if you remove Is it both? Well, this is saying, like if you don't search it with elected the term elected official, it gives you that what we were just talking about. When you add elected official, it says in Ohio, the minimum salary for an elected official is determined by a formula based on years of service and final average salary kind of like, I think some teacher organizations, some of the unions are doing that. Traditional There's no specific minimum retirement Sorry about it. Maybe I'm just reading this wrong. I just wanna make sure we get it really really nailed down.

Well, and I'd be concerned about reading out of context too if you're read are you reading from the Ohio Advice Code? This is from

where did they source this?

My understanding is that the rules are the same for elected officials on

our website.

Public officials?

The OPERS website.

The only difference is for at the end of your career, if you're an elected official, you can, buy buy time. So you can retire early, but you just have to pay. You were reading is the the the calculation for how much you get paid. Okay. Your high they call it high five. Right? Whatever your high five year the average of your high five years of highest years of comp, that's your retirement based on a percentage. And the percentages change based on how many years you have.

I think my what I was hoping to just guard against was if there's any designation that's different in OPERS for elected officials versus just general. Public officials. Yeah. Public. You know, because it seems like there could be a nuance there that we would maybe miss.

There's specific requirements for elected officials. Yeah. I think that's what

That's fine. This is a good conversation.

I'm not aware that there is, but it's possible because they didn't look it

Totally fine. I don't mean to muddy this up.

Would you like me to look it up?

No. I think we're having a good conversation here, unless somebody else wants to take it.

Well, back to my original question. Is the intent to give counsel a bump, or is the intent to is the intent to raise the level of counsel to the minimum necessary to justify OPUR's participation, if at all. The other is no change, give a bump, or raise to

Question. If we give them a raise or we give them a bump, what's that gonna do to the budget?

On that level, you're talking 7,000 times seven people, so it's $50,000 a year in the $25,000,000 discretionary budget approximately.

Okay. If I I think I was the one who brought it up originally. And I think if I'm remembering correctly, what I my this is where my mind's going. Obviously, this was reviewed five years ago. Was it it it I don't believe well, I don't think it was I don't think the $80 was amended at that time. So I think I I just wondered, was it in line? Is it in line? I don't know if mister Ramay, like, a council member

Yeah. I I I won't give you my I've already given you my opinion. I don't think we need to make money.

But Yeah.

It's not in line with anything else. And I think that may have been deliberate, and we wanted more volunteer like, more volunteer.

More volunteer. But yeah.

If you look at the number of meetings, like, those four meetings a month Mhmm. As an example, like, I I may miss one for a drill or something, but on the calendar, like, I'm here tonight, you look at all the subcommittee meetings and stuff, you max out at four. So you're generally gonna max out because you're in way more than four meetings a month.

It's not just council meetings, it's any meeting you attend.

Yeah. It's What what is the definition of that? Is Like subcommittee meetings? It's not like if I go meet with a resident board commission subcommittee for

you. This counts, you're saying?

Yeah. But it's I'm already in for months.

Yeah. So you're getting nothing forward essentially.

Right. And I I'm not asking for anything. I'm just saying, yeah, it if you attend all the meetings, you're already maxed. And those are I mean, most of us are there all the time.

Have we discussed at all the and and and has the Charter Review Commission discussed in the past whether to have a menu that, you know, when you're present for, let's say, the bulk of a meeting, you're gonna get I'm gonna make up numbers. A $100 for a council meeting. You go to a committee or board meeting, you're getting $50 per meeting. If you're the president of council, I noticed that some presidents of council are paid higher, you have more job duties. You get a bonus for that so that your salary isn't just handed out pro perfunctory, like Right.

Whether you show up or not, but it's actually you give us your re receipts. How much work are we asking the city to do, mister Sheridan, to to keep track of that kind of stuff negligible?

I I think where we because I remember this conversation, I think where at least where I landed was there's a minimum requirement. If they meet the minimum, they get whatever the stipend is Because we had I had taken it to the gamesmanship of, hey, I'm gonna attend stuff I'm not even invited to if I'm gonna make a $100 every time I show up.

Well, that that would not be a

Well, not I'll I'll say this is I'm twenty years as a government stabilization person looking at how people mess with systems. That would be my concern. The more complicated you make it and the more bonuses or things. The opening chapter of the dictator's handbook, which goes through the manipulation of systems, talks about, like, the poorest county in Texas had the richest council people because they kept voting themselves bonuses for attending meetings. It was all legal, but it's a big case study on the abuse of elected power. So simpler, more transparent in my mind leads to a more stable government with less opportunity for nefariousness. That's just my opinion. Would two observations.

One is an answer to one of the questions that was asked. I think that the $80 per meeting, it goes back. It's it's really it's not a salary. It's a capped stipend. And it goes back to it's it's basically volunteer service that you're getting, you know, thrown a bone for.

And I think it's fine to I've always thought of it's it's strange, especially as the city has as as Hudson has grown to base this stipend on the number of meetings because I don't first of all, there's no council member that is not attending at least four meetings. And but secondly, and more importantly, I actually see the meeting attendance as a probably and Mr. Bandway can confirm this, probably a small portion of what they actually do. They're getting yakked at on the phone all the time and having to talk to people and

I'll tell you, it depends on the council person, and that's not to slight anyone. We have different we play different roles at large versus ward, and some people play those roles better or worse. And I've said too, like, with the mayor, those requirements of you earn your seat in the way you interact with your people. So if I'm answering a lot of calls, yes. Some people answer less calls, and that's a choice that they make how they're managing their time. But, yes, there is a significant amount of interaction with residents outside of any meeting.

So if based on that, I really see we have three options here. One is just leave it alone. Two is if you like the stipend model, then basically we're adjusting the dollar amount to keep keep it a stipend and and not fiddle with anything else. And then third, if you wanna switch to something else that's based on OPERS, scrap the reference to meetings and just reference monthly salary. Agree. Yeah. Based upon OPERS. Perhaps a minimum

of attendance or something. I would add that.

Well, and isn't that already called out though in the council sec I don't remember which exact section it is.

It's the one about not missing three consecutive meetings. Would that

be redundant to call that? I have an opinion here, but I think that we

I don't think it is because it's too easy to miss because the workshops, under my understanding, did not count for Right. That

And you can be ex like, they can vote and excused. If there was a requirement, like, the three meetings, that's six weeks that you'd be gone effectively. I think you can have a vote to make it excused. So So it would be unexcused absences potentially, and I'm getting into the minutiae. Yeah. Sure. I know I look at it through the reserve duty, like, miss every once in while because I have two weeks a year or whatever it is, so I'm gonna miss one. I never miss three. But if it's excused, like, you wanna punish somebody for something that's legitimate? No. You could always have the excused absences.

Think for me I don't mean to interrupt. I think for me, it just goes back to the scaling of the community. And I observe how much work it is to be on council on any commission really. Think I see our opportunity as a nod to both the growth in Hudson and also a nod to the work that's being done in our local government. If we were to stick with the stipend and then just acknowledge some sort of increase to the stipend program, and then the next charter can take a look at maybe another option to the stipend on stipend solution.

But I I think it I would like to see at least some sort of increase to the stipend program just because I I know there's so much work going on.

I agree, but I'd go further. I think we're grown up enough town city that we can really salary. I agree. Our council representatives.

Yeah.

We're a lot of people. We ask a lot of expertise from them. And having attended council meetings in everything from City Of Cleveland where it's a job, and you better not have to go to work every day

Right.