Century Cuts Size Of Charter Review Committee Due To Declining Participation

June 24, 2022

The Town of Century has cut the size of their charter review committee nearly in half due to declining member participation.

The Century Town Council appointed an 11-member Century Charter Review Committee in August 2019 to explore the town charter — the document that establishes the town, outlines its powers and spells out how it should operate. The charter has not been updated in almost 40 years, and that often creates problems in the operation of the town.

The previous committee lost six members along the way, with just five people remaining by May 2021 when the council appointed three new members for a total of eight.

A simple majority of 6 of 11 members would be required for a vote. In April 2022, the committee improperly took a vote to approve minutes with just five members present, less than the required quorum.

This week, the Century Town Council voted to appoint the six remaining members as the entire committee, dropping the number needed for quorum to four in order to take a vote.

The six members are chair Mary Bourgeois, Shelisa McCall Abraham, Michelle Cunningham, Kathryn Fleming, Evelyn Hammond and Brenda Spencer.

Pictured: Member Evelyn Hammond reviews a draft charter during the last meeting of Century Charter Review Committee meeting in April. NorthEscambia.com photo, click to enlarge.

Comments

15 Responses to “Century Cuts Size Of Charter Review Committee Due To Declining Participation”

  1. Bignlock345 on June 25th, 2022 4:38 pm

    Everybody stop saying “Let the county take over”. The rest of us that live in the county don’t need Century’s problems to fix. We have our own problems to take care of. I say wall Century off from the rest of the county a la Escape from LA. Problem solved.

  2. Citizen on June 25th, 2022 12:18 pm

    Less people on the committee is probably better, they can make a decision to keep the charter like it is and sunset the committee, or make a change and get it on the ballot in time if it is not too late.
    We can look a t changes and vote yes or no.
    That council can appoint 2 more seats in January.
    No big deal.

  3. SueB on June 25th, 2022 11:23 am

    I’m not a resident of Century but of Pensacola, Florida. Century needs help, so let “outsiders” in to help Century. However, it would be ashame to shut down the town of Century & have Escambia County Commissioners take over as that will be another complete failure.

  4. DLo on June 25th, 2022 9:43 am

    There’s no interest because its like rearranging chars on the deck of the Titanic, there’s no reason for any of it. The only sane recommendation should be to put it on the ballot to dissolve this useless, corrupt, pointless layer of bureaucracy now.

  5. IMHO on June 24th, 2022 4:51 pm

    Did they ever find the missing minutes from previous meetings? If it’s not being done right, why bother?

  6. sam on June 24th, 2022 4:26 pm

    move city hall to odoms. bet you can get someone to sign up there.

  7. Willis on June 24th, 2022 1:15 pm

    Thank you to the members that continue to show up and put forth the effort.
    Anything to do with Government can be pretty thankless some days.

  8. joe on June 24th, 2022 12:22 pm

    Thank you to the members for what you do. It takes a group effort to save a town. Seems like no one wants to make effort to help these committee members. We all want someone else to do the work while we sit back and make Responses on here. Stop throwing rocks and try to help…Plenty of empty chairs need filling. If you got time to write on here, you got time to help…

  9. Anne on June 24th, 2022 10:06 am

    Lack of interest in attempting to maintain a “City” strongly suggests this was an experiment that has been nearly completely unsuccessful.
    Time to cut the losses of public funding and diverting of tax monies and hang up the “CLOSED” sign at both ends of city limits.

  10. RaD on June 24th, 2022 9:57 am

    @SW@Chris – It is so obvious to the outside observer what needs to happen but amazingly enough, I have never read for a call to have a referendum put on a ballot to have the citizens decide on the towns future. There is little doubt the county would do a better job.

  11. Oversight on June 24th, 2022 8:51 am

    Disappointing to see those who volunteered to be part of this committee have abandoned their commitment to the town. But like everything else Century, it’s not worth the effort.

  12. tg on June 24th, 2022 8:34 am

    No Vote No Town Get It!

  13. James on June 24th, 2022 8:13 am

    Seems like a waste of time and effort. 3-years later and no revision presented for approval. The committee doesn’t appear any more competent than the council.

  14. Chris on June 24th, 2022 7:53 am

    The signs are everywhere. Shut down Century. Absorb it into the county.

  15. SW on June 24th, 2022 6:57 am

    Just shut it down, auction off assets, and call it a day.