Agenda - Charter Commission - 04/19/2012

Home

amount of 50 percent from 35 percent and bringing it back to the Charter Commission for approval. Further discussion: Commissioner Anderson felt that this is a housekeeping kind of change and she felt this could be done by the vote of the City Council. Motion carried. Voting Yes: Chairperson Field, Commissioners Niska, Deemer, Anderson, Shea and Sivertson. Voting No: None. Absent: Commissioners Bendtsen, Niedeerhaus, and Sherman. 5.4: Review Requirements for Ramsey Newsletter City Clerk Thieling reported that the Charter currently requires that the City publish a newsletter at regular intervals at least six times each year and that the postal role for the City shall be used for distribution. During budget conversations, it has been mentioned that possibly the newsletter could be distributed quarterly versus six times a year, thereby reducing the cost of publishing and distributing. Mrs. Thieling noted there is advertising in the newsletter currently to help defray costs. She pointed out that a few examples of cities with fewer publications are listed in the staff report. She also mentioned it may be possible to publish an electronic newsletter, however the argument could be made that not everyone has the ability to review the newsletter electronically. Motion by Commissioner Sivertson, seconded by Commissioner Anderson that the newsletter should remain at six publications per year, noting it's a vital part of keeping the community involved and in the know. Further discussion: Commissioner Deemer stated he likes the newsletter format — it has improved immensely. He mentioned that maybe we could get all of our news in The Anoka County Union. He noted they do our legal notices already so maybe they would just give us a special rate so each household would be able to get the paper and they could offer us a core page and staff could submit articles every week. City Administrator Ulrich stated we could explore these more innovative options but we are a little handcuffed with regard to the distribution. We could look at other options if the Charter did not say it will be distributed using the postal role. He suggested we may still want to get out the same number of issues but the current distribution to do so is a little antiquated. We have some discretion in what the newsletter looks like but we do not have the discretion of options for distribution. Other forms that could be a possibility could be having it delivered like The Shopper or deliver it via email. Commissioner Anderson stated she would like to see it in the newspaper form. She has trouble with the website and feels there are a lot of people who have this same problem. She felt that when this comes out six times a year — people do read it. She summarized that she would hate to drop the print version altogether. City Attorney Goodrich stated that as you know, The Anoka County Union has a reporter who reports on City of Ramsey issues but all the different programs do not get covered. He stated that his church sends out email letters and it seems to work well. He suggested that could be an option. Commissioner Sivertson stated that he really likes knowing about all the programs going on within the City and the area and he feels that if we use The Anoka County Union in place of our own newsletter, it would get lost in the shuffle. Commissioner Shea talked about the green team at her work where their team member magazine was put out on the website Charter Commission/ March 26, 2012 Page 6 of 8