It’s finally happening. Augusta commissioners will sit down this week to discuss possibly amending the 28-year-old Consolidation Act.
The commission has a work session at 1 p.m. Wednesday with officials from the University of Georgia Carl Vinson Institute of Government. The topic is discussion of the “preliminary process” of “considering the possible creation” of a Charter Review Committee.
The commission also has rescheduled its regular Tuesday meeting for 2 p.m. Wednesday. The meeting will be the first at which Mayor Garnett Johnson has the opportunity to vote on all commission actions. Meetings are held at the Augusta Municipal Building.
The UGA institute routinely assists Georgia governments with charter reviews, training and other tasks such as compensation studies. In recent years it has helped Warner Robins, DeKalb County and the Consolidated Columbus Government with charter reviews.
Debate already has surfaced over the makeup of a Charter Review Committee and how its members are identified. Some cities take applications from the public, while Augusta tends to go with legislative or commission appointments.
Since Augusta voters approved consolidation in 1995, the document combining Augusta and Richmond County has changed very little.
Johnson’s successful campaign to gain the mayor a vote on all matters – the charter allows him only to break commission ties – is one of the biggest adjustments ever, aside from pay hikes the commission obtained for its members.
Details included in the charter that could be changed include:
- The number of commissioners
- Eligibility to serve as mayor or commissioner
- The requirement the positions are nonpartisan
- Mayor and commission term limits
- The powers of the mayor and commissioners
- The commission’s authority over most department heads
- The number required for a quorum
- The number of votes required to pass a measure
- Eliminating the mayor’s ability to break a tie
- The division between the Urban and Suburban service districts
- The requirement of an in-house legal department and its powers
- The composition of boards, committees and authorities
Within a few years of consolidation, efforts began to change the charter, including several by state legislators, a grand jury, city staff and local committees, although few or none survived to implementation.
They proposed changes such as increasing the mayor’s authority, changing the role of abstentions, centralizing authority in a single individual, defining the administrator’s powers, implementing mandatory ethics training and making the positions partisan.
Johnson called to create the committee. Former mayors Hardie Davis and Bob Young made similar attempts.
