The Charter Review Task Force was created by a Cincinnati City Council in 2013 to oversee a complete and holistic review of Cincinnati’s Charter. The charter is the city’s constitution. It defines the roles of the mayor and city council, sets the number of council members, determines who they represent, and how council and the mayor are elected. The charter determines how our park system is governed, how zoning changes can and cannot be made, and impacts countless aspect of daily life in the city.
The Charter Review Task Force (CRTF) was given a mammoth task and no funding with which to accomplish it. Cincinnati Research Institute stepped in to provide infrastructure for keeping all CRTF meetings transparent and open to the public; to publish minutes and findings; to facilitate community engagement events; and to raise money to hire third-party professional consultants that supplied the task force with objective, non-partisan research and data that was critical to the successful completion of their mission and the production of sound recommendations.
The Charter Review Task force was not a group of people who were selected to re-write the charter. The role of the task force, composed of members from an intentionally diverse set of interests and backgrounds, was to facilitate an open, extensive, community discussion about how city government should function, and the ways in which it should be accountable to the citizens. The process included public meetings every week for roughly 18 months, research conducted by committees, and an extensive collection and assesment of studies and data.
The quality of the information that CRTF compiled, largely as a result of CRI, is clear from how citizens responded to the task force’s work:
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- Initial recommendations for removing obsolete and ambiguous language and clarifying the Charter were adopted by 73% of voters in 2014 and 72% of voters in 2015.
- The recommendation to permit City Council to conduct executive sessions (intended to improve functioning and decrease corruption) was adopted by 77% of voters in 2018.
- The recommendation to eliminate the Mayor’s “pocket veto” (another transparent government measure) was adopted by 80% of voters in 2022.
The final recommendations of the task force can be read here: CRTF-FinalReportJuly2015
CRI research regarding the abuse of “emergency” ordinances can be read here: CRI Emergency Ordinance Research
CRI research comparing Cincinnati city government to peer cities can be read here: Cincinnati report final with cover pic and ES
CRI research regarding City Council’s inability to conduct executive sessions can be read here: CRI Executive Session Research
CRTF Balance of Power Committee’s final report can be read here: CRTF-BOP-FinalReport
