Dade City is on track to become the first municipality in Pasco County to embed an anti-corruption measure into its city charter.
The Dade City Commission and members of the Charter Review Advisory Committee met Dec. 5 to discuss recommendations on charter revisions.
Plans are to let voters decide on at least some of those recommendations during the April 2018 city elections. Other items might be handled through an ordinance instead.
Details on which charter items to include on the ballot will be determined in coming weeks.
A handful of residents attended the Dec. 5 meeting at City Hall, including members of the nonpartisan citizens’ group, Representing Pasco.
The activists are part of a growing anti-corruption movement in Florida.
Tallahassee and Cocoa Beach have been at the forefront of approving ethical standards for elected officials and government employees.
Locally, Representing Pasco wants the county and other cities in Pasco to follow Dade City’s example.
“We think people are basically protected through ethics provisions (in the charter),” said Land O’ Lakes resident Elyse Mysles.
She told committee members and city commissioners that Representing Pasco plans to actively educate the public about the charter’s ethics measure.
The charter committee has recommended that the city fund its own educational outreach effort.
The citizens’ group also had a request.
“It is our hope you’re including at least one citizen as part of the board to investigate complaints,” Mysles said.
The charter review is routinely completed every 10 years. Committee members began meeting last summer and presented their final report in November.
Committee members were Judge Lynn Tepper, Steve Hickman, Julie Hale, Dr. Bernice Mathis, Pablo Vela-Guerrero, Mattie Jones and Jim Ward.
Marilyn Crotty served as facilitator. She is the director of the Florida Institute of Government at the University of Central Florida.
Crotty said there is an anti-corruption trend statewide. Some cities have ordinances, or they designate someone as an ethics officer who investigates complaints, she said.
However, using a charter to establish ethics standards is rare, she added, and it has more permanency that an ordinance.
The amendment, if adopted, would require a code of ethical standards for elected officials and employees. The city commission would have six months to establish a local ethics code once the amendment passed.
“You can establish how strong you want it to be,” Crotty said.
Other recommendations from the charter review committee include:
- Banning former city commissioners from doing business with the city for one year
- Removing a city commissioner from office for a misdemeanor conviction for dishonesty or making a false statement (The current standard is conviction for a felony)
- Making the finance officer a charter position, which is appointed and removed by a simple majority vote of the City Commission
The charter review committee also discussed some issues that are not included in the charter revisions.
Members suggested an ordinance that would cap local finance campaign contributions at $250 per individual per election.
Crotty said several cities, including Tallahassee and Cocoa Beach, have adopted limitations.
“This would remove the possibility of someone trying to buy a seat,” she said.
However, Dade City Commissioner Nicole Deese Newlon wondered how that would work in races where one candidate could afford to fund his or her own campaign. The cap didn’t seem to address that, she said.
“I feel like that hurts the candidate who is not, as an individual, as well-funded,” Newlon said.
Committee members also didn’t include a recommendation that the city manager live within city limits. Some favored that, but there wasn’t a consensus.
“I do feel he or she should be fully invested in the city and its goings on,” said Hale.
Others said there should be some flexibility, and it should be an issue addressed in contract negotiations.
There also were differences on whether hiring or firing a city manager should require a super majority vote, rather than the simple majority required now.
“When you have a super majority, it does give job security,” said Dade City Commissioner Scott Black, who favors the switch. With a simple majority, he said, a qualified candidate might hesitate to apply.
Tepper observed: “Making it stable should be the goal.”
Published December 13, 2017
