5.5. SR 04-01-1996 - Laserfiche WebLink

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CHAFTER 6 mendattons. Committees may not make decisions on behalf of the council. Com- mittees ~re subject to the same rules ~s the full council under the open meeting Law. In many cities. It is routine for the council to automatically approve a committee's recommendations ff the committee has done a thorough and competent Job. But. the council's final decision, not the committee's recommen- dation, binds the city. To illustrate, committees may not enter into a contract or employ workers even ff a specific motion of the council delegates such power to them. Salaries of mayor and council members The council, by ordinance, fixes the saJazles o£ the mayor and council mcm- bcrs. The ordinance takes effect on the date set in the ordinance but not until after the next succeeding regular city elecUon. There is no referendum on the ordinance, by pent. ion or otherwise. ~ Until the council adopts an ordinance fl~ng salaries, previous salaries remain In effect. Salaries may be on tin armmt] or monthly lump sum or a per diem basis. The per diem may be payable for each regular meeting, for each regular and special meeUng, or for each day's service. Unless the ordinance provides otherwise, a lump sum salary covers special meetings. ?o An employer must allow a city council member to take t. tme off from regular employment to attend council meetings. 7] When the council member takes time off without pay. the employer must make an effort to allow the employee to make up the time with other hours when the 'employee is available. Iron Range cities have the authority to make per diem payments to council members of $25 per day, not to exceed $250 per year. for absences from the city while on official business, n Citizen Involvement One way to increase positive feelings about government is to increase citizen involvement. Cltywide or neighborhood committees, special project review committees, and even block organizations are some of the committees cropping up in many cities. In many cases, the council has formed or encouraged these citizen committees. They have saved time for public officials and have made contributions which could only occur through citizen participation. Council members have found that ignoring citizen concerns can result in their removal from office at the next electJon or in the defeat of a program or activity through citizen opposition. Although city officials cannot, in most cases, delegate decision-making authority to citizen groups, they can use citizens in advisory roles. This technique works, however, only ff the council listens to the advice. If the council doesn't follow the advice of the committee, it should give understandable reasons for talcing other action. When a council forms a citizens' advi- sory body, it should lay out the ground rules for its activities and point out that in the absence of clear statutory authority to delegate responsibility, the council must, by law. make the final decisions. State law allows, and in some cases requires, city councils to delegate deci- sion-making power to certain independent boards and commissions. Independent citizen boards and commissions Independent citizen boards and com- missions can help alleviate the council's workload. The amount of discretionary power the council can give to such bodies varies. In some instances, such as a utilities com- mission, the statutes give the commission all discretionary authority necessary to