Charter board narrows options for city‑manager residency question to include Broward County option

The Charter Revision Board debated how to frame a survey question about whether the city manager should be required to live in the city and approved staff's plan to include multiple‑choice prompts.

Why it matters: Residency requirements affect recruitment and expectations for top city officials and have implications for human resources and contract terms.

Discussion and staff proposal

Staff proposed converting an open‑ended survey question on city‑manager residency into a multiple‑choice question with suggested options: 1) must live within city limits, 2) must live within a defined distance or travel time, and 3) no residency requirement. Board members suggested alternative prompts and discussed practical enforcement mechanisms (for example, requiring the manager to move within the city within a set time after hire).

Decision and next steps

The board agreed to add three multiple‑choice options and discussed the suggestion to add a fourth option: must live within Broward County. After brief debate, board members settled on including "must live within Broward County" as a clear, administrable option. Staff also noted that human resources has asked the board to consider residency requirements for department directors in related policy work; the board deferred that deeper discussion for later and placed it on the radar for a future agenda.

Quotes

"How about they have to live in Broward County? Something like that," one member suggested during the meeting. Staff said HR had requested the board consider residency requirements for department directors as well.

Next steps

Staff will add the multiple‑choice prompts to the survey draft and bring the revised survey back to the board for review before broad distribution.