City of Danville Corporation Council Leon Parker has informed the City Council that they’ve been referring to the wrong rules when it comes to determining a majority vote. Danville has 14 elected City Council members. What they’ve been doing is; if a couple people are absent, such as the night in December that a new budget and city gasoline tax adjustment were approved, they have been going by “majority of the quorum present.” And both of those votes passed that night 7-5.
According to the well known Robert’s Rules of Order meeting guidelines, that’s exactly how it’s supposed to be. But based upon Corporation Council Parker’s research; since Danville has not specifically set the rules, they are supposed to refer to Illinois Municipal Code BEFORE Robert’s Rules of Order. And the Illinois Municipal Code says the Council should be going by “majority of elected members.” Therefore, eight votes would be needed for a majority.
On the side note question of when should the mayor be allowed to vote; Parker stated that it would be, ONE, if there is a 7-7 tie, AND TWO, if there are less that 14 members present and the leading side only has seven votes; meaning the mayor would have the ability to cast the eighth vote.
It should also be noted that since Danville is a home rule community, the Council could pass their own rule on this; provided they have the currently required eight votes.
So what happens now? Danville’s Mayor Rickey Williams, Jr says both the budget vote and gasoline tax vote will come up again at the next full City Council meeting. After Tuesday evening’s City Council meeting, Mayor Williams was positive.
AUDIO: I’m relieved. I pride ourselves on doing things right and being decently in an order; and so I’m glad that we are going to know exactly what we need, and then we will proceed accordingly.
The new fiscal year does not start until May, and Mayor Williams says he thinks the budget will be fine. Williams says the more crucial of the two for him is the gasoline tax change. Because if the Council goes back on what they thought was approved, the mayor says that will bring trouble.
AUDIO: But the bottom line is, if we don’t make a change to the gas tax, it’s going to go up to over 20 cents. So we must do something to change it for the sake of our people. I do not support raising the tax that much; and it will go to that, according to our ordinance, if we do not make a change.
The next Danville City Council meeting will be Tuesday, January 21st.
