Harford County could limit county council members to two successive terms in office and require a county redistricting committee to be less partisan, if recommendations by the charter review board are approved.
Also likely to be recommended is a requirement that public notices of meetings, legislation and other government actions be published on an official website accessible to the public.
The charter board, however, still appeared unclear if it could end a requirement that such legal notice information be published in a newspaper, something members have clearly showed a preference for doing if it doesn't run afoul of state law.
At its meeting in Bel Air Thursday evening, the charter review board released a draft of the report it plans to give to the county council later this month.
Board members at Thursday's meeting continued to hammer out details of the proposal, which they have been working on since the board convened in August. Members were appointed by the county council with the mandate that they review the charter and recommend changes by February.
Significant changes proposed by the board include establishing term limits for council members, filling a vacancy in the office of the county executive in the same manner as for a council member and allowing a redistricting committee to have two members from any political party that had 15 percent of registered voters during the election.
Although a county executive is limited to serving two successive four-year terms, the charter does not limit how many terms a council member can serve in succession. If a term limitation were to be put in place prior to the 2014 election, all but one of the current seven council members would be ineligible to run again.
With regard to the redistricting issues, which was a major reason the review board was appointed, board members are also recommending that the county council select one additional member to the redistricting committee who is not a member of any political party already represented there, but who must be a Harford registered voter. The 15-percent rule would no longer apply to election results.
In the section regarding filling a vacancy in the office of the county executive, the board is suggesting the replacement be nominated by the governing body of the political party to which the county executive belonged at the time of his or her election.
The existing charter gives the county council sole discretion of filling a county executive vacancy without regard to political affiliation. Conversely, council vacancies must be filled from the same party of the member who left, under a two-tiered process in which the party central committee nominates three people and the council makes the final selection.
Besides these changes, the board is recommending changing language in a section dealing with conflicts of interest, if an elected or appointed official is a shareholder in a corporation. The language would include those who have legal, equitable or beneficial ownership of more than 5 percent of the stock.
The board is also suggesting adding a housing element and an agricultural element to the master plan.
Publication issues
Still being debated by the board last week were changes to provisions regarding publication of documents and events.
The group's draft recommendations state that public notice of such items shall be posted prominently on an official website accessible to the public, and by every other means of communication required by the Constitution of Maryland or by law.
Some thought the wording about the constitution was superfluous. Board member Richard Norling ultimately suggested changing the language in the charter that requires two sites of publication to one site, and also adding wording about making items available online.
"I think that's what people look for increasingly, is electronic," board member Stephanie Hallock said. "That's what people go to before a newspaper to look for something."
Board member Frank Hajek noted it would be tough to conform to a requirement of pursuing every means of communication the constitution requires.
Board members also raised concern with legislative liaison Nancy Giorno that some of the issues they had brought up did not make it into the draft report.
"The language that we had that we quoted is what you voted on," Giorno said. "If you have different language that you believe a majority of what you voted on, send it to us."
Board chairman Maurice Baldwin, a retired county Circuit Court judge, said the board expects to have one final meeting.
"This month we will give a report to the council. It will recommend various changes to the charter," he told the group. "If they vote 'yes' on any recommendations, then the legislation would be prepared. If, once it gets in legislative form that is between the council, and one or all of us don't think it's really what we meant... we as individuals could appear before the council, and say, 'Look, what we meant was this.'"
Baldwin and several others also wanted to include some type of justification or explanation for their reasoning in the report and to simplify some of the language to make it more user-friendly.
"There are no reasons stated for our recommendations. It really isn't complete without us stating some reason for our recommendations," Baldwin said, suggesting that each board committee come up with a sentence or paragraph with reasons for the change suggested.
Norling added: "I do think there's a benefit to having a fairly short, English-language explanation for what we are proposing."
Any changes proposed to Harford's 39-year-old charter follow a two tiered-amendment process in which the county council first approves an amendment which is in turn submitted to referendum by the county's voters.