Proposed City Charter Changes on Nov. 4 Ballot

We have updated this blog on Oct. 27 to add more information.

Cambridge’s Charter: We Urge a NO Vote
On November 4th, Cambridge voters will decide whether to amend our City Charter — the document that defines how our city is governed. While a few of the proposed changes have merit, most would move Cambridge away from its long tradition of professional, accountable, and non-partisan management. The risks far outweigh the benefits.
The charter review process was long and expensive but so mired in disagreements that the committee never reached consensus. The final version now before voters was written by the City Council after the committee failed to agree on recommendations. The process itself was deeply flawed: members were hand-picked by Councillors with strong stakes in the outcome, discussions quickly became politicized, and the three-quarters majority required for adoption was never achieved. As a result, major structural questions — such as whether to restore neighborhood representation or adopt a “strong mayor” system — were dismissed without meaningful debate.
For city voters, this is a simple yes-no vote (no amendments).

What we find problematic in the new City Charter:

1.Public participation would be significantly weakened.
Cambridge should be expanding public voice, not restricting it. Our current City Charter states, “the rules of the city council shall provide that citizens and employees of the city shall have a reasonable opportunity to be heard at any such meeting in regard to any matter considered thereat.” The new proposed charter removes this guarantee and substitutes platitudes, ballot initiatives and referenda. On p.24 of the proposed new charter we read simply boilerplate: “The city shall treat public engagement as an integral part of effective and trusted governance. The city shall treat engagement as a multi-channel endeavor including, but not limited to, face-to-face meetings, virtual interactions and other online communications. The departments of city government shall encourage collaboration in public engagement efforts with other government jurisdictions and authorities, anchor institutions, community-based organizations, civic groups, and individual residents.” Public comment at meetings is nowhere to be found.

2. The nomination calendar for City Council and School Committee candidates would move up by a several days — for no clear reason.
If this change passes, nomination papers would be available sometime between June 22 and June 28 and be due sometime between July 20 and July 26, all pegged to a specific amount of time before election day instead of the current July 1-31 window. That shift would create unnecessary confusion and potentially limit civic participation.

3. The City Council would gain new authority to confirm appointments to nearly all multi-member bodies.

While the Council has previously confirmed some appointments, this expansion across more than fifty boards, commissions, commissions and other bodies  — from zoning and transportation to libraries and aging services — risks turning civic appointments into political rewards. Cambridge deserves qualified, independent appointees, not patronage. However, if any member leaves before term end, the City Manager names the replacement without City Council confirmation.  

Together, these changes could do real harm: eroding the city’s professional standards, discouraging civic participation, and concentrating power in the hands of elected officials.

To be fair, there are a few positives worth noting.

1. The Mayor will no longer be required to chair the School Committee.
This is a welcome clarification that avoids potential conflicts of interest between the Council and the schools.

2. The Election Commission gains clearer authority over how votes are redistributed under Proportional Representation.
This modernization could improve administrative efficiency and accuracy.

3. Any departmental reorganization must include a public hearing.
This maintains transparency and public oversight of internal restructuring.

These are sound ideas — but they do not outweigh the serious structural problems embedded in the rest of the proposal. There are also a number of typos in the proposed Charter that further proofreading would have alleviated.

On September 9, the Cambridge Election Commission stated during a public meeting that it had not been  to find anyone to write an official opposition piece to the ballot question, delegating this instead to the City’s Law Department. The Election Commission could not have tried very hard, because the leadership of CCC had already been voicing concern.

Our Recommendation: Vote NO
Cambridge thrives when professional management and citizen participation work hand in hand. The proposed charter changes undermine both. While a few updates are reasonable, the overall package concentrates too much power in the City Council, weakens professional oversight, and curtails public involvement.

On the Charter Review Process itself, we received this email from one resident: 

I attended 10 of the Zooms and was impressed by the angry, biased tone. Several members of the committee proudly refused to read the final charter because they found it long and boring, and they claimed to have better ways to spend their time. Therefore they endorsed only the parts of the charter that they personally had discussed and voted on at meetings.  Most of the final meeting, which was supposed to reach closure, was devoted to demanding more benefits for participants on city boards and commissions: dinner delivery, child care, etc.

Errata and a CounCil Counter Point

So much was changed in the charter that it has been hard to do a side-by-side analysis of the existing one and the proposed new one. In part for that reason the original chart we posted with this blog was incorrect on several fronts so we have removd it. Councillor Nolan has put out a video supporting the Charter change, and critiquing the CCC's chart for including several items already in the existing charter. That is fair, although the structure of the new Charter made a one-to-one comparison very difficult. What she misses here however is that the Councillors dropped the existing charter text requiring pubic comment on business before the city, potentially greatly diminishing the ability of the public to participate in decision making. The new charter also  significantly changed the calendar for people running for City Council or School Committee, adding significant confusion to the process. Neither of these are mentioned in the City's overview of wht the Charter changes will mean. Here is Nolan's video: https://www.youtube.com/shorts/dnP4Mbgdmw0

**Our Original blog post:

There are many serious issues facing the City — none of which are addressed by these changes. The charter review process was 
long, expensive and so mired in disagreements that the committee itself couldn’t reach consensus.

While the proposal does remove the Mayor as the Chair of the School Committee (a good thing in our opinion) overall it strengthens the City Council at the expense of Cambridge’s long-standing and successful commitment to professional and apolitical management. Under these changes, Board appointments (which recently became paid positions) can devolve into a spoils system for Councillors to use to reward supporters. With over 50 Boards, touching on every aspect of life in Cambridge (from aging to the Library system, from traffic to zoning), we deserve dedicated and serious appointees, not patronage. 

There are many ways the City could be made to deliver better results for its residents. Sadly, this Charter Review takes us backwards with little to show in return.

We advise a NO vote.

More Information: The review process was messy from the start. Committee members were handpicked by councillors with strong stakes in the outcome, and meetings quickly turned politicized. The required three-quarters majority was never reached, so the final decisions went back to the Council. In the end, councillors chose to keep nine citywide “at large” seats, rather than restoring neighborhood representation as Cambridge once had and as Boston still does. That decision makes campaigns more expensive and limits accountability. Some of the more controversial ideas—like resident assemblies with arbitrarily chosen members, lowering the voting age to 16, four-year council terms, and letting councillors hike the budget—were rejected. Calls for a “Strong Mayor”  (elected mayor) system like Somerville and Boston were also brushed aside. Cambridge will stick with governance similar to a slightly modified  Plan E-type system with a City Manager, but one whose power will be weakened.

Most concerning in this move, the proposed changes give the Council new authority to confirm all appointments, in addition to the Planning Board, BZA, and Historical Commission—moves that risk further politicizing decisions that demand professional judgment

​This makes all the more imperative that on November 4 we elect a strong City Council that believes in professional decision making and accountability.

Read the proposed Charter changes on the November 4 Ballot HERE.
Read about the Charter Review process HERE.