Councilman’s Absence Leads To Amendment Colliton Wants To Change Charter, Put Issue Of Lengthy Leaves Before City Voters

A Spokane City Council member angered by a colleague’s lengthy absence is proposing a change to the city’s charter that would make similar long-term leaves impossible.

The council will decide during a special meeting today whether to put Councilman Jeff Colliton’s proposed charter amendment before voters Nov. 5.

Colliton wants the charter to limit absences to four consecutive council meetings before a seat is declared vacant. Council members who need to be gone longer would need their colleagues’ approval.

Currently, a council member can be gone up to six months.

Colliton and other members have grown increasingly frustrated with the absence of Councilman Chris Anderson, who has been working on the “Dante’s Peak” movie set since June 2.

“We’ve had numerous correspondence and telephone calls asking why don’t we do something about this, take sanctions against our colleague,” Colliton said. “The answer is we can’t.”

Colliton said he thinks the attendance issue was an oversight on the part of the charter’s writers. “A sixth-month continuous absence is not in the best interest of the electorate,” he said.

Attempts to reach Anderson on Wednesday were unsuccessful, but he did address the proposed charter-change amendment in a widely circulated memo dated Sept. 2.

While he supported the amendment as both “appropriate and necessary,” Anderson said the charter needed more than a one-item change.

“The number of meetings (if that is to be the benchmark) from which a member of the council can be absent should be realistic in terms of the current part-time status of the members,” he said.

He added that “other council members should have no say as to whether or not a fellow member should be allowed to be absent … “

The measure would be placed on the November ballot if the strong mayor initiative fails Sept. 17, Colliton said.

The council is meeting today because council members Roberta Greene, Mike Brewer and Anderson will be absent next Monday.

Five members must be present to vote on an “emergency budget item” that originally was planned for next week’s meeting. The item involves the sale of $625,000 in bonds for local improvement districts.

“If we don’t have the vote now, one week may cause interest rates to go up,” said Acting City Manager Bill Pupo.

The council plans to have a briefing next week but not a regular meeting.

, DataTimes MEMO: This sidebar appeared with the story: MEETING Today’s meeting is at 4:30 p.m. at City Hall, 808 W. Spokane Falls Blvd. A 1997 budget workshop begins at 3 p.m. in the lower-level conference room.