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<br />Motion carried. Voting Yes: Vice-Chair Deemer, Commissioners Cleveland, Frederick, <br />Bergfalk, and Erickson. Voting No: None. Absent: Chair LaMere and Commissioners <br />Sherman and Simenson. <br /> <br />City Attorney Goodrich introduced new member, Roger Bergfalk, whom City Clerk <br />Thieling had sworn in earlier. in the week. <br /> <br />COMMISSION BUSINESS: <br /> <br />Case #1: <br /> <br />Consider Amending Subsection 4.5.5 of the City's Charter <br /> <br />City Attorney Goodrich stated that the Commission was 'working on cleaning up some of <br />the City's Charter language to reflect the change in the ward and primary election <br />systems. He distributed some revisions that were suggested at the last meeting. He <br />stated that he had worked with Commissioner Cleveland to make it more readable and <br />user friendly. He read aloud the changes to section 4.1. <br /> <br />There was a Consensus that the changes to section 4.1 were consistent and reasonable. <br /> <br />City Attorney Goodrich read aloud section 4.5.5.2 and stated that at the last meeting, it <br />was the consensus of the Commission, that in the case of a vacancy less than 8 weeks <br />prior to the primary election, that the incoming person take office right away. He stated <br />that he has not yet been able to confirm whether the City can legally do this. He stated <br />that all other terms for elected officials in the State begin the first business day in January <br />following the election, from the Governor on down. <br /> <br />Vice-Chair Deemer stated that he thinks there was an exception to this rule when Senator <br />Wellstone died, because he thinks the person who was elected was appointed early by the <br />Governor. <br /> <br />Commissioner Cleveland stated that perhaps there could be a requirement that there <br />needs to be special action taken by the Council, in this situation, to appoint this person <br />early. <br /> <br />Commissioner Frederick stated that he thinks the Council could, after the election, <br />appoint this person to fill the position in the interim, but they would not officially take <br />office until January. <br /> <br />City Attorney Goodrich asked the Commission to look at Section 2.5 on the yellow sheet, <br />and noted the importance of the bottom paragraph. He stated that this states that the <br />Council appoints a current Councilmember to act as liaison until the vacancy is filled. He <br />stated that this way, there would be a ward person on the Commission, so people would <br />have someone to go to. He asked if the Commission would like to just go this route with <br />a Councilmember liaison. He stated that he is concerned about the precedent that anyone <br />elected could take office early also. <br /> <br />Charter Commission/April 17, 2008 <br />Page 2 of 5 <br />