Q: What is a charter?

A: A charter is a constitution for a county or city government. Like the U.S. Constitution, a charter establishes the structure of the local government and the rules and procedures for how it operates. It can also set limits on the power of the government and government officials. It can spell out the rights of citizens in relation to the local government, and it can reserve certain powers to the citizens.

The specific contents of each charter will be different because a charter can include as many or as few provisions as the voters think proper to include. And a charter can be amended by the voters whenever they see fit to do so.

However, just having a charter automatically gives the voters the right to initiate recall elections of elected officials who are not doing their jobs properly. Voters in non-charter counties do not have that right.

Q: Why don't all cities and counties have charters already?

A: All cities (municipalities) do have charters already. They could not exist as legal government entities without charters. There are five municipalities in Putnam County: Palatka, Crescent City, Interlachen, Welaka, and Pomona Park. Our other named communities, such as Georgetown or Bostwick, do not have charters and so have no local governments of their own; they are merely part of the county and are under the county government.

Counties, on the other hand, can operate without having their own charters by using the "default" county government structure that is set forth in the Florida Statutes. But counties also have the option of adopting their own individualized charters, and about a third of Florida's counties have already done so. Many of them waited until they grew so large that the non-charter "default" structure was no longer able to cope well with all of their needs and problems, but in some counties the voters have chosen to adopt charters sooner, before things got too far out of hand.

Q: If charters are such a great idea, and all municipalities have charters, how come we still see the city governments doing stupid things and catering to the special interests instead of listening to the people?

A: Okay, just having a charter doesn't automatically fix all the problems. But it does give citizens a powerful tool that they can use -- if they are aware of it. Even a poor or ineffective charter can be amended by the voters. As more people realize that they have that power, we hope to see more citizen-led initiatives to amend city as well as county charters to reflect the will of the people. However, you can't amend a charter if you don't have one.

Q: Will a county charter do away with the municipal governments?

A: No. You must be thinking of city/county government "consolidation," such as has been done with Jacksonville and Duval County. That's a whole different deal. The adoption of a county charter for Putnam County would not do away with the separate and independent governments of Palatka, Crescent City, Interlachen, Welaka, and Pomona Park. In fact, it wouldn't have much of any effect on them.

More FAQs

Q: Will a county charter eliminate the positions of or take away the authority of the county's independently elected sheriff, tax collector, property appraiser, supervisor of elections, and clerk of the court?

A: Not unless that is what the voters specifically wanted the charter to do. Although it would be legally possible for voters to choose to include in the county's charter provisions that would eliminate or curtail the roles of some or all of those officers, we can't think of any reason for doing that here in Putnam County. We haven't even heard of anybody who wants to do that.

In fact, a county charter wouldn't have to change anything about the structure of the county government. It all depends on what the citizens want to put in the charter. Most people who want a county charter for Putnam County do not seem very interested in changing the form or structure of the government; rather, they are more concerned with protecting citizens' rights and giving them more control over some of the actions that the county government takes, particularly in the areas of growth, taxes, and property codes.

Q: Will adopting a county charter make taxes go up?

A: No. Whether or not a county has a charter has no significant effect on the tax burden. If anything, taxes tend to go down slightly after a charter is adopted.

Of course if you simply compared the average tax burdens of all of the counties with charters to the average tax burdens of all of the counties without charters, you would find that the charter counties on average have higher taxes. However, that is only because most charter counties have much larger populations than most non-charter counties. A study done for Escambia County by the Whitman Center for Public Service, University of West Florida, showed that when counties of similar size population were compared, there was virtually no difference in tax burdens as between charter and non-charter counties -- except that per capita taxes tended to stop rising and actually go down a little in the counties that adopted charters.

So the most logical way to read the data is that the per capita tax burden is greater in more populous counties than it is in counties with fewer residents, regardless of whether or not a county has a charter. (This suggests that the best way to keep taxes low is to avoid large population increases.)

Q: Why can't I see a copy of the proposed charter before I decide to sign the charter petition?

A: Because you haven't written it yet. Pursuant to Florida law (sections 125.60 - 125.64 of the Florida Statutes), we have to get the necessary number of petition signatures first. Then the County Commission will be required by law (whether they like it or not) to establish a charter commission for the purpose of holding hearings to gather citizens' input on what provisions should be included in the charter. Based on that public input process, a proposed charter will be drafted. That proposed charter will then be put to the voters in a referendum. You'll get to see the proposed charter before you vote on it, but we can't show it to you now because it doesn't exist yet. It won't exist until after enough people sign the petition to get the process started.

Q: Why don't the County Commissioners want a charter?

A: As yet, they don't see any need for it. (If we were in positions of power, we probably wouldn't see the need for something that might curtail our power, either.)

Q: We elect our County Commissioners by popular vote. Why should we want to limit their authority with a charter? Shouldn’t we just trust them?

A: Our nation’s founders certainly didn’t think that way. They knew better. They understood that in order to preserve a free republic, you must place limits on the authority of elected officials or they will inevitably come to exercise their power in ways that are contrary to the rights of citizens who elected them. As Thomas Jefferson said, “An elective despotism was not the government we fought for.”

And so our nation's wise founders came up with two ways to help keep elected officials from getting too powerful or too far out of line. One was a governmental structure of checks and balances, including a bicameral (two house) legislature, consisting of a separately elected Senate and House of Representatives, and a separate executive branch (the President) with legislative veto power. Thus any proposed new laws, new powers, or new taxes would have to be scrutinized and approved by all three of those entities. Most states, including Florida, have adopted similar structural checks and balances.

The second way to keep elected officials in check was to have a written constitution that, in addition to prescribing the structures of government, spelled out certain rights of the people and placed limits on what government officials could do in derogation of those rights. Again, the states, including Florida, also have constitutions with provisions limiting government power and guaranteeing certain rights and freedoms to the people.

However, a non-charter county government has neither of those means for keeping the elected county commissioners in check. There are no structural legislative checks and balances, as there is only on legislative body, the Board of County Commissioners, and there is no separately elected executive. And there is no local constitution (charter) to place limits on the powers of the county commissioners or reserve certain rights and powers to the local citizens. So in a non-charter counter, whatever the county commissioners say goes. Period. (Unless they do something blatantly illegal and someone with enough gumption and money decides to take them to court.)

A county charter could include provisions that would help put the brakes on county commissioners who, even if they mean well, might otherwise be tempted or misled into enacting land use changes, property codes, taxes, and fees that served the needs of special interests but that the people did not want. If nothing else, a county charter would at least give citizens the right to initiate recall elections of commissioners who get too far out of line.

Want To Volunteer?

Do you feel like you have no voice?  Feel like you're doing a lot of talking but no one is listening? Are you tired of being told you're behind the times by wanting to preserve the peaceful and small town atmosphere of Putnam County?  Are you angry that the city and county commissioners think that minimum wage jobs and hotel/conference service jobs are what we want for our children's future?

Well...you CAN do something about it!  You can support the charter movement which will give the citizens of Putnam County the ability to be heard! We need you! It will take many volunteers to get the job done. Getting signatures on petitions, answering email and phone calls, stuffing envelopes, working on websites, are just a few ways you can help.

You may just want to help out through a donation to the PCA (a non-profit) organization.

In ways great or small...you are needed and you CAN make a difference.  Contact us to learn more about becoming a volunteer or making a donation to the Putnam Citizens Alliance.

*PCA is a non-profit organization but is also a Political Action Committee.

Any donations to PCA are not tax deductible.

1-386-585-8438 (internet phone service)

Do You Have A Question?

If you have a question about charter government and how it will benefit you, please call or email and we'll be glad to try to answer it for you or find you the information you need.

Email your questions to:

putnamcharter@hotmail.com