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Model City Charter Revision Project- Eighth Edition Option Memo from: http://www.ncl.org/npp/charter/memos/recall.html 4sue: Recall Seventh Edition: The Model currently has no recall provisions. At the March meeting, the Committee requested an option memo that would introduce the possibility of having a recall provision to accompany the initiative and referendum provisions in the Model. Pros of Recall: According to the 2001 ICMA Municipal Form of Government Survey, 60.9%of U.S. cities have recall provisions, exceeding the percentages for initiative (57.8%) and popular referendum (46.7%). In the five years starting January 1996 and ending 2001, recall initiatives were filed against the mayor in 4.1% of U.S. cities, and against a council member in 5.3% of U.S. cities. Of those cities, the mayor was recalled in 17.6%of the elections, and the council member in 29.2% of the elections. These statistics indicate that recall is a reality that should be reflected in the charter. At the same time, they tell us that recall provisions are not being overused. In the same way that initiative and popular referendum are a pressure valve when elected officials are inadequately responsive to the will of the majority on policy issues, recall is a check on officials who run rampantly afoul of the expectations of the office they were elected to hold. Cons of Recall: Elected officials face reelection with enough frequency that an additional challenge to their tenure is unnecessary. An elected official's actions are judged sufficiently by the media and public. More serious violations of the public trust can be dealt with through a city ethics code and if necessary, civil or criminal penalties. The statistics show that recall is used infrequently and, more often than not, unsuccessfully. Recall undermines representative democracy and should not be encouraged. IllOptions: The Committee should adopt one of the following positions by the end of the June 12 meeting: 1. The Model should continue to have no recall provision. 2. The Model should have a recall provision. 1. Limitations may be included to reduce frivolous or precipitous actions. Below is a sample from a charter revision proposed for Kansas City in 2001. The Model should use this as charter language in addition to the recall provision. 2. The Kansas City sample language below should appear as commentary to the recall provision. 3. The Kansas City sample language below should appear neither as charter language nor commentary to the recall provision. "Grounds for recall." "Grounds for recall must relate to and affect the administration of the official's office, and be of a substantial nature directly affecting the rights and interests of the public. Grounds for recall are limited to objective reasons which reasonable people, regardless of their political persuasion, could agree would render any official's performance ineffective, such as acts of misfeasance, the improper performance of some act which may lawfully be done, malfeasance, the commission of some act wholly beyond the official's authority, and nonfeasance, the failure to perform a required duty." "Limitations on recall." o recall petition shall be filed against any official within six months after the official takes office, nor, in case of a member Ipbjected to a recall election and not removed, until at least six months after the election."