Outgoing Shorewood Council Attempts to Restrict Their Successors

Since the middle of October, the Shorewood City Council has devoted all or part of 3 work sessions to discuss adding proposed “bylaws” to govern council operations and member’s behavior. (See here on pg. 118) While clearly within the rights of the council to enact these “bylaws”, the details and timing of this initiative are concerning and raise quite a few questions. Here are just a few:

1. Timing – With the 40% of the membership of the Council set to change after the first of the year, why is the Council spending time on this now? While this process started before the last election, it appears that there is an urgency by some members to get these rules enacted and locked in before the next council is sworn in with new members. Why?

2. Content – Much of the content of these “bylaws” already exist in Minnesota statutes. It’s not clear why restating them is necessary. Any departure from the governing statutes for a Plan A city, whether stated here or not, is clearly prohibited. The proposed rules adopt Roberts Rule of Order for Small Boards which should sufficiently cover processes and behavior during meetings.

3. Roles and Responsibilities – This section appears to attempt to bestow on the role of Mayor the title “official head of the city”. This is not found anywhere in the governing statutes. The mayor’s powers in the weak mayor-council system are no greater than those of other members of the council, except that the mayor is the presiding officer at council meetings and has a few other legal responsibilities. Minnesota Statute 412.191

4. Administration of Rules – Section VI of these proposed rules is especially troublesome and suspect. This section states that a change to these rules requires a 4/5 vote of the Council membership. In Minnesota law, there are very few instances where a 4/5 vote is required by a council. Zoning and Comprehensive Plan changes along with un-petitioned special assessments are 3 notable requirements. Why do amendments to these “bylaws” rank in importance with those types of decisions? LMC-Letter of the Law Article

5. Enforceability – There is little the Council can do if any member disagrees with and does not adhere to any of the provisions listed. There was some discussion around “censure.” In practice, censure has no meaning. An unenforceable code is little better than no code at all.

SCA Opinion: These rules are redundant, overly bureaucratic, burdensome and unnecessary. The current Council has only one more meeting scheduled in their term so these proposed rules clearly aren’t meant to apply to them. The Council as currently constituted, with two lame duck members, including one that was appointed, should not be making it nearly impossible to change rules for future Councils.

This proposal is on the Monday, December 9 meeting agenda. It needs to be rejected, or at minimum tabled and deferred until the new council is seated.