Outgoing Plattsburgh Mayor Chris Rosenquest has appointed a Charter Revision Commission. After more than a year of discussion, the move three weeks before the Democrat leaves office is receiving mixed reaction.
The mayor established the nine-member commission on November 22nd and publicly announced its formation on Wednesday.
The creation of a new commission has been discussed for over a year. Mayor Rosenquest, a Democrat, explains that an advisory committee was formed early this year to review any work the previous 2015 Charter Commission did related to the city’s form of government. In July it recommended that a commission be formed to review the entire charter, with a focus on reviewing the city’s form of government.
“There are hooks into other parts of the charter that this form will change and so there has to be a review of the entire charter to see where those hooks are and to see where those revisions need to be made,” explains Rosenquest. “But at the end of the day the focus is solely primarily on the form of government change from a strong mayor/council to a council/manager form of government. There are tons of changes that need to be cleaned up and clarified, removed or even added. But you know at this point I don’t think that that’s the scope and it’s certainly not the direction that this commission is taking. For this instance, the sole focus is to look at whatever charter revisions that need to be made to support the change of government.”
Rosenquest says forming the commission has been on the backburner and is one of the items he wants to address before he leaves office after one term.
Democratic Ward 2 Common Councilor Jacob Avery says he is glad the commission has formed, but is a bit surprised it was established in the waning days of Rosenquest’s tenure.
“I’m happy we’re reviewing it especially since we talked about it at length at the July and a lot of the summer about the city manager and then we realized we need more charter changes to make it happen,” Avery says. “The biggest issues that have come up in the last year: there’s a lot of gray area between the council role and the mayor’s role. I was very public when I first took office about looking forward to and wanting a city manager. I think it’s the best thing for Plattsburgh from my research and I think we need to do that and make the appropriate structural changes.”
Ward 6 Democrat Jeff Moore says formation of a charter change commission should have been left to Democratic Mayor-elect Wendell Hughes to create, should he desire.
“I think this should have been left for the new mayor to pick who he thought would do the best job on that. I don’t think he should have left the council out of the picture. I think the council may have had some selections that they would have liked to have had,” Moore says. “You know, there should be a council member on there because who is more familiar with the charter than a council member? So, I definitely think there should have been a current council member on there that’s dealing with these things. You know, I don’t have any heartburn with any of the people that were picked. But I really think some people that were a little more knowledgeable with city business would have been a good idea.”
Commission members include two former city councilors and two members of the city’s 2015 charter revision commission. Mayor Rosenquest says city councilors were asked to submit nominations for the commission. He adds that commission members must be impartial.
“Everybody’s job in terms of the council and the mayor is going to be impacted. I think it’d be nice to be agnostic, in this sense,” Rosenquest asserts. “These meetings are public though and it is encouraged that people attend these meetings, councilors and the incoming mayor attend these meetings, to provide feedback and to understand what changes are being proposed. But again, it’s critical to keep those two pieces separate. This commission operates independent of the legislative and executive branches of City Hall. And to keep them separate, I think it’s important.”
The commission must complete its work by November 2026.
Calls to Hughes were not immediately returned.
