Louisville Charter Wording Changes

Louisville's City Council referred Question 2H in Ordinance No. 1934, Series 2026, which passed first reading on July 14 and came up for second reading on July 21. The ordinance rewrites passages in eleven sections of the Home Rule Charter, all in Articles 3, 4 and 5. Voters take every change together: a yes vote puts all of the new wording into the charter, and a no vote leaves the present text in place. City staff advised the council that charter amendments "should be presented as ballot questions that address single subjects," even when a question touches several sections. The ordinance treats updating terminology as that single subject. The same ballot carries five other charter amendments, Questions 2C through 2G, each as a separate question.

Most of the edits replace "his or her" with "their" and "he or she" with "they." They fall in the ward residency rule for councilmembers, the rules for objecting that a study session or meeting violates the charter, the executive session procedure, the financial disclosure statement, and the code of ethics, including its bans on trading votes and on using city information for private gain. The ordinance changes no duty or penalty in these passages.

"Citizen" changes in two sections. Section 4-16, the open-government policy, requires training for councilmembers and board members and a published summary of the charter's procedure and open-government articles. Under the amendment, "citizen participation in municipal government" becomes participation "by members of the public," and the city makes the summary freely available to members of the public instead of citizens. Section 5-5 promises "prompt disclosure of City records" to citizens; the amendment makes that promise to members of the public. The same section already opens city records to inspection "by any person."

Louisville voters adopted both sections by initiative on November 2, 2004, as they did Sections 4-3 and 5-18, whose pronouns also change. The ordinance does not amend the charter's prefatory synopsis, which calls the charter "a document of limitation" on the city's home rule powers and says the government "is formed by the citizens."

When the council publishes an ordinance by title only, or adopts a code by reference, the charter requires a notice that copies are available "at City offices." The amendment names the City Clerk's office and the city website. In Section 5-5(f), the city must display documents handed in during a meeting, whenever feasible, for people watching council or planning commission meetings "on television"; the new wording covers members of the public watching "virtually." The council added that change at second reading.