Legal Documents of Sweetwater

Section 4. Ordinance adoption--resolutions. Ordinances shall be passed in the following manner. Every proposed ordinance shall be in writing, with copies furnished in advance to the mayor and each commissioner. After adoption of a Code of Ordinances, each ordinance of a general and permanent nature shall be adopted as amending or adding a section or subsection of the Code. Each ordinance amending an existing ordinance, or section or subsection of the Code, shall state the section or subsection of the ordinance or Code as amended in its entirety. Each ordinance shall be passed on two separate days at regular, adjourned or special meetings. However, at least fourteen (14) days shall have lapsed between the first and final passage of any ordinance. At the first meeting a brief summary shall be given of the proposed ordinance, and the meeting shall be open for questions and discussion of it. A reasonable number of written copies of ordinances shall be available to the public at the meetings and at city hall before the second and final passage by the board. Ordinances, resolutions and other measures of the board shall be passed by an affirmative vote of a majority of the board present and voting. Abstentions shall be counted neither as a yes nor a no vote. The record of how each commissioner or the mayor voted shall be spread on the minutes. A summary of the material provisions of the ordinance and a notice that the ordinance is on file in the recorder's office for anyone wishing to see it shall be published in a newspaper circulating in the city. The effective date of the ordinance may be at any time within ninety days of its final passage, but in no case shall it be effective until such summary and notice are published. After passage, each ordinance shall be authenticated by the mayor and recorder, or in their absence by two commissioners, and placed in an ordinance book. It shall not be necessary to copy the ordinance in the minutes, but reference to it shall be made in the minutes. A separate binder may also be provided for resolutions in which event they shall be authenticated as are ordinances, and their inclusion in the minutes dispensed within the same manner as ordinances.