1/ Lets turn our anger at how @ChmnMendelson manipulates his role into process reforms he must comply with. An open thread:

1. Pass legislation that requires the Chairperson to publicly release a final budget at least 7 days before a vote can happen. No changes w/out amendments.

2/ Amendments to the budget must be circulated 3 days before the budget vote. Substitutions of entire budget as an amendment should be prohibited so he can't game the system.

3/ No more individual committee votes on "their" budgets. The Chairperson can ignore them and can also stack committees to prevent progressive changes. Let Committee Chairs or any CM submit an agency budget via amendment. Yes longer meetings but much more transparent.

Mendelson will never allow MPD defunding and reinvestment happen in any substantial way in the current Committee budget setup. Bonds, Gray, and Pinto can block anything Allen tries to do and Mendelson can blame the committee.

4/ Pass meeting rules or legislation to create a discharge petition similar to Congress allowing any bill with 3/4 of the Council as co-signers to be brought to Committee of the Whole if the Committee won't hold hearings or a vote.

5/ Hire a full time Parliamentarian similar to Congress who can determine what is in order, based on precedent, meeting rules, legislation, and not personal agenda of the Chairperson. Mendelson does this to control what he wants to come up for a vote.

There are more examples of it but here is Mendelson using parliamentary procedure to try to prohibit some amendments https://twitter.com/RentControlDC/status/1280464831003254784?s=19

6/ Don't allow the Chairperson to assign committees anymore. It creates the potential for a horse trading system, corruption, or intentional stalling. Even if it doesn't exist now let's close the door on it while we can. h/t @Evan_Yeats https://twitter.com/Evan_Yeats/status/1280883830421929984

7/ Set which Committee has which agency oversight in long term operating policies & require a 3/4 vote to change it. Don't allow the Chairperson to take away Committee work to reward or punish votes. h/t @Evan_Yeats https://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/news/loose-lips/article/21077291/robert-white-flips-supports-solesource-sports-gambling-contract

This also prevents the Chairperson from moving agency oversight to prevent a Committee from producing budget recommendations they won't like. The potential to improperly influence so much with this power is too risky to leave unchecked.

8/ End the Chairperson's ability to stall bills that have been passed by the DC Council. Instead of letting the Chairperson transmit them let's look at legislation to automatically transmit them to the Mayor for signature. h/t @Evan_Yeats https://twitter.com/FenitN/status/1275900363175051265

If we can't automate it then we can put a 48 hour time limit on the Chairperson to require transmission or allow the Chair Pro Tempore to fulfill the obligation. An emergency bill should not sit for two weeks before it is sent to the Mayor to sign into law because of "staffing."

9/ Allow the full DC Council to adopt meeting agendas so the Chairperson cannot unilaterally block items they don't like. Roberts Rules allows this via a simple majority vote. https://twitter.com/amanduhgomez/status/1328368443855409152