Maintaining the Public Trust
Councilor Corner - Sherwood Archer
Excerpt from the October/November 2018 Sherwood Archer - Tim Rosener
I would like to start by thanking all of you in the community for giving me the opportunity to serve on City Council. My peers on City Council and the Mayor are all wonderful individuals. They are dedicated to maintaining the public trust and working for you, the citizens of Sherwood.
Henry Clay, Secretary of State under John Quincy Adams once said. “Government is a trust, and the officers of the government are trustees. And both the trust and the trustees are created for the benefit of the people.” These are powerful words that all elected officials should take to heart.
Garnering and maintaining the public trust is achieved, in part, by ensuring that your City Council works transparently and collaboratively with each other and the community. Creative, impactful and cost-effective solutions to the challenges that we face can only be found when we work together.
Toward that end, the City Council adopted a new “Code of Ethics” and “Council Rules.” These new ethical standards and rules ensure that no single individual or group of individuals can monopolize the agenda and subvert the will of the community. These improvements were born from the hard lessons learned as the public fought attempts of former council members to end a 20-year partnership with the YMCA last year. To make these changes lasting, and prevent possible turmoil with future councils, we should consider updating our City Charter.
Much like the U.S. Constitution and the Oregon State Constitution, the City Charter defines the rules that our staff and elected officials are bound to follow. Our charter should promote the efficient operation of our community and guarantee that citizens have a voice in the process of change.
The process of updating the charter should never start with the council; the process should start with you the residents of Sherwood. The Process should be transparent and open to the public. With that in mind, on September 18, 2018, the City Council approved Resolution 2018-073 appointing members to the newly created Charter Review Committee. The members include an individual from each of our boards and commissions as well as citizens at large.
This committee will review the charter and will make recommendations to the council for changes. This review is not limited in scope, any idea or suggestion from anyone in our community will be considered with equal weight. The City Council can then forward proposed changes to the voters for a final decision. It is important to note that the charter cannot be changed without a vote by the public.
The committee meetings will be open to the public; you will have the ability to comment during most sessions. Please get involved if you have ideas or suggestions that you would like the committee to consider.
Related Links
Charter Review Committee Website
Connect with Councilor Rosener on this Project
Send Suggestion for the committee to the to the city attorney: soperj@sherwoodoregon.gov
If you have questions or ideas on this project, feel free to reach out to the committee or me. (Click Hear to connect)