Hooper City Council approves ordinance to expand Planning Commission from 5 to 7 members

The Hooper City Council voted Jan. 23 to adopt Ordinance O-2025-1, increasing the Hooper City Planning Commission from five members to seven.

Council Member Ryan D. Wilcox moved to approve the ordinance, with Council Member Hill seconding. The motion approved the ordinance “in its entirety minus 10-5 B-2 number 1, the first sentence,” which concerns a changed appointment process; the council agreed that that specific sentence would be returned as a discussion item at the Feb. 6 council meeting. The ordinance was approved by voice vote; the motion carried.

Why it matters: expanding the commission makes room for two additional appointees and prompted council discussion about how to stagger members’ terms, when newly appointed commissioners should be sworn in and whether changing the appointment method would require a different voting threshold under state law.

Council discussion traced the item’s procedural history. Wilcox summarized actions from the Jan. 2 meeting and said the council had intended to consider an ordinance increasing commission membership and to provide two additional candidate names. Several council members said they expected a public hearing to accompany changes to Title 10. Legal counsel and staff flagged a specific line in the draft ordinance that would alter the mayor’s appointment authority; counsel noted that changing that appointment method could require either a council majority plus the mayor or a unanimous council vote under state law.

The council left several implementation details unresolved. Members discussed staggering terms so that no more than two seats rotate in a single year, and debated options (for example, a 2–2–2–1 rotation over four years versus a 3–2–2 split). The ordinance text adopted includes a provision that “newly appointed members of the commission shall be sworn in during the same city council meeting in which they are approved and appointed,” while the clause that would change the nomination/appointment process was removed from the adopted version and set for further consideration on Feb. 6.

Council members also set an effective date for the ordinance. The motion stated the document would be in effect “no later than Jan. 28, 2025 at 4 p.m.,” and council agreed on that timeline while acknowledging publication and posting requirements must be met before appointments take effect.

Direct quotes from the meeting reflect the procedural focus. Council Member Wilcox opened the discussion by recounting earlier actions: “So I’ll start. Okay. Back on January 2nd, we had a city council meeting.” A staff member cautioned about changing appointment processes without following state code: “The only one that causes me to wonder is that second one because it just changes the process that we’ve done a little bit.”

What’s next: The council directed that the omitted sentence about mayoral/council nomination procedure be placed on the Feb. 6 agenda as the first action item, with legal counsel and staff available to advise. The council also indicated it would finalize staggering and specific term lengths before appointing the two additional members for the now seven-member commission.

Votes at a glance

• Ordinance O-2025-1 — Increase Planning Commission membership from 5 to 7 (adopted, with one sentence on appointment method deferred for Feb. 6). Motion by Council Member Wilcox; second by Council Member Hill. Voice vote; motion carries.