By Greg Bassett

A 15-member panel appointed to recommend any needed changes to Wicomico County’s charter has issued some stiff advice for the government’s legislative and executive branches:

Stay. In. Your. Lanes.

Competing interpretations of the County Charter did little to ease Bob Culver’s tenure as County Executive, as Culver repeatedly sought to read the charter in a manner that suited his office best. Meanwhile, the County Council used two election cycles to pass charter amendments that were seen as weakening the executive’s powers.

Culver died in office in 2020 and the council appointed his top deputy, John Psota, to succeed him. But even that appointment process exposed communications weaknesses among elected leaders that took weeks to sort out.

After eight months of open hearings and discussion, the Charter Review Committee made its official report to the County Council on Tuesday. And while the committee’s 24 recommendations could be regarded as mere housekeeping suggestions, the council-appointed group came away with some strong observations concerning county leaders’ conduct.

Report details

“Time and time again throughout the course of deliberations over these last eight months, issues were raised — and examples given — of actions by a prior County Executive and/or County Council that the CRC felt were likely violations of the plain language of the County Charter,” the members wrote in their report.

“The committee began its work after a period of great conflict between the two branches of county government,” the report said. “From the committee’s review, it seems clear that not only was there a lack of communication, but there appeared to be an outright dislike and/or distrust of the other branch.”

The Charter Review Committee’s appointment was unrelated to any ongoing issues between the two governmental branches. The charter requires that a citizens committee review the document once every decade and suggest any necessary changes — 2021 just happened to be the 10-year review window.

Chaired by Greater Salisbury Committee President and CEO Mike Dunn, the diverse committee included former and currently elected officials, business leaders, and professionals representing an array of local interests.

Rather than find problems with the County Charter as a document, the panel found problems with the leaders themselves.

Dunn joined Robert Benson, the committee’s Vice Chair, in presenting their report to the County Council on Tuesday. Dunn later said he hoped the council “will take our suggestions seriously.”

“It was clear during our months of meeting together that a fundamental question needed to be looked at — are the challenges that have confronted the county over the last five years people problems or charter problems?

“We concluded overwhelmingly that they were people problems,” Dunn said.

“Where we found weaknesses in the actual charter, our goal was to offer solutions to fix it,” he said.

‘People problems’

“The consensus of the CRC was that these so-called ‘charter problems’ were more often, people problems and were best resolved by a stronger resolve by the County Council and the County Executive to work together, and to avoid taking/changing/altering the power structure that is outlined in the charter’” the committee members wrote.

When the committee began its work in March, it began by addressing a list of questions posed by the council members themselves. The council was advocating a list of punitive measures designed to keep the executive branch in line and less inclined to argue the charter’s intent.

In its final report, the review committee rejected any such punitive insertions.

“After exhaustive research on the topic, and exhaustive opinions on the topic from legal counsel, it was determined that punitive actions are difficult, at best,” committee members wrote.

“If punitive provisions could be added to the charter, there would need to also be added some form of quasi-judicial proceeding to adjudicate such complaints or to hear such allegations.

“Therefore, the CRC concluded that adding punitive provisions were not practical … .”

Form of government

The Charter Review Committee decided early in its review that it would not weigh in on suggestions the county return to its pre-2006 form of government, in which the council ran things with the help of a hired County Administrator.

Changing back to a council government, in theory, would reduce tensions because only one branch would be in charge.

“In considering the question of whether the CRC should undertake a review of County Executive vs. County Council form of government, Tony Sarbanes, a former President of the County Council prior to the enactment of the County Executive form of government, made the motion that the CRC not undertake that review and argued that the county voters selected the County Executive form of government and that the role of the CRC was not to second guess decisions of the voters, but rather to address and correct any problems in the charter to improve the type of governance selected by the voters of the county,” the panel report said.

Revenue cap

The committee was also expected to discuss the county’s controversial property tax revenue cap, approved by voters in 2002. Again, it was determined that the cap was a decision best made by the citizens.

The committee did, however, recommend that the council consult with leaders in nearby Talbot County, which approved its own revenue cap two decades ago and has a appointed a citizens committee to review it.

“It was the CRC’s understanding that this provision was initially adopted by voter initiative and was modeled after a similar provision from the Talbot County Charter. As such, the CRC reached out to Talbot County to better understand the process that Talbot County had followed in making recent changes to its revenue cap provision, and it was determined that the Talbot County Council appointed a committee to research this one charter provision and to make recommendations to the council for any proposed charter amendment,” the committee wrote.

“Should the County Council believe changes to the Wicomico County revenue cap be considered, a similar procedure could be followed.”

Amendment overload

In 2016, Wicomico’s council placed 10 amendments on a referendum ballot, which seemed like a lot of decision-making to occur at the voting booth. Two more were included on the 2018 ballot. The committee was slightly critical of that process.

The committee wrote: “... (T)he consensus of the CRC was that while many of the amendments were perceived to be necessary to address the actions of the then County Executive, the end result was that many of the changes actually weakened the charter.”

Other recommendations

• Appoint a citizen panel to review if the current way in which the County Council is elected is still sufficient for the times. There are very few counties in Maryland which still elect their council members using the hybrid model that Wicomico County currently uses — there are five council members elected from the five councilmanic districts; there are two members elected at-large.
• The council might consider asking the citizen’s panel to explore reducing district sizes and have seven district seats.
• Eliminate the council’s needing to approve reappointment of the County Executive’s department heads following an election.
• The County Council has never formally adopted any rules of order on how it should conduct its meetings. The council should adopt “Robert’s Rules Of Order” as its guiding principle.
• The council should consider making its Code Of Conduct stronger. The council could look “at adding punitive actions, such as censures, to deal with conflict of interest/ethics violations/charter violations that may occur,” the committee wrote.
• Set the minimum age for County Executive to 30, from the current 25.
• Establish a two-year Wicomico County residency requirement before a person can run for County Council.

The council will review the committee’s report and debate what changes — if any — to accept.

On Tuesday, council members didn’t ask many questions and instead concentrated their reaction to thanking the committee members.