Frederick County Charter Review Commissions’ Applicants Being Considered

The commission will be charged with recommending changes to the county charter for County Council members to consider.

FREDERICK, MD. (LG) A registered Republican, who sat on Governor Larry Hogan’s emergency commission to redraw the borders of the 6th Congressional District, has submitted his name to become a member of the Frederick County Charter Review Commission. Walter Olson was a recent guest on WFMD’s Success Happens.

“Frederick County, of course adopted Charter Government, after a lot of discussion that went on for years,” said Olson. “And we’ve now gone through one electoral cycle, and under the expected procedure for this, its now time to take a look to see if there were parts that didn’t work or parts that did work well,” he continued.

The Frederick County Council recently announced that a list of applicants had applied to sit on the Charter Review Commission. Over the next several months applicants will be interviewed.

“By the structure of the thing, five of the people have to come from the various Districts, and that means that two of them can effectively come from the same District that someone else has, but there has to be geographical representation,” Olson added.

Applicants must be registered voters in the county and been residents for the past six years. Applicants also cannot be appointed to an elected position. Along with determining the requirements for applicants, the council said an advertisement must be publicly distributed to get applicants. That would start by March 30th, and the deadline for applying is April 26th. Council members would then approve members at their May 26 meeting, and the committee would be seated by June 3.

The commission will be charged with recommending changes to the county charter for County Council members to consider.

 

Loretta Gaines