ALTUS, Okla_The Altus City Council
wants to implement a new form of government, but it will ultimately be up to
the city's voters to decide. The city council voted Monday night to put the
proposal on the ballot next April.
Currently, the
city runs under an aldermanic form of government which gives most of the
control to the mayor, balanced by a city council. The proposal would change it
to a charter-based system.
"I think
it would be easier to change those things within the charter for effective
governing as opposed to change the form of government every time we need to
look at a change," Mayor David Webb said.
At the council
meeting, Councilman Jack Smiley pushed hard for the change, saying the
day-to-day operations of the city should not be managed by the council.
"Folks
this is a $50 million entity, you don't need eight people involved in the day
to day operations of the city. How absurd is that, that we are supposed to be
involved in the activities more so than in a charter form of government."
Mayor Webb said
under the charter government, a city manager or administrator will assist in
handling the city's daily needs. Even though the city already has a city
administrator, the responsibilities are not fully there, yet.
"It is not
taken into consideration under our aldermanic form of government. We have
adapted our situation to include a city administrator to handle a lot of those
professional duties, but as far as authorities, no authority is granted that
position under the statue."
Under the
charter government, most of the operational duties would be taken away from the
mayor.
"Which I
think is good, it would return the mayor to more of the figure head for the
city, for special events, to be the spokesperson, and communications at the
state level that sort of thing."
A charter form
government was proposed years ago in Altus,
but never gained enough support.
"The
reason it was voted down was because people did not want to get away from an
elected police chief, treasurer, road street commissioner," Smiley said.
"Part of
it was lack of information, part of it was trying to do too much too soon,"
Webb said.
Mayor Webb
remains optimistic this time citizens will vote for the change.
"The
desire is not to make rapid change, but take what we have, take what we like
and mold that into a charter. We want to listen to what the citizens have to
say about this. We want to know what's important."
If voters approve the change next spring, a board of free holders will be
responsible for determining what goes in the charter.
