Columbus City Council restructures for 2024: Here's what to know
COLUMBUS, Ohio (WCMH) -- Columbus City Council held a reorganizational meeting on Tuesday to determine which members will serve for how long in its new form.
The council underwent a restructuring as 2024 began, adding two seats, districts, and welcoming three new members. With the changes now official, the council held its first meeting of the year to determine which councilmembers will serve for four-year terms and which will serve for two-year terms. In 2026, all councilmembers will begin to serve four-year terms.
At the meeting, districts were divided into two lots via random draw. The five members selected into the first lot will serve for four years, with the four members in the second lot serving for just two years. The lots were divided as listed below.
Four-year terms
- Nancy Day-Achauer (District 2)
- Nicholas Bankston (District 5)
- Melissa Green (District 6)
- Lourdes Barroso de Padilla (District 8)
- Shannon Hardin (District 9)
Two-year terms
- Christopher Wyche (District 1)
- Rob Dorans (District 3)
- Emmanuel Remy (District 4)
- Shayla Favor (District 7)
In addition to settling on term lengths, the council re-elected Hardin to serve as council president and Dorans as president pro tempore. The city also reappointed Andrea Blevins as city clerk and Deborah Klie as city treasurer.
The council's last action of the night was to pass an ordinance that reduced its number of committees from 21 to 11.
"We believe that this will allow for more focus and council priorities to be lifted up in those committee assignments," Hardin said. "We're really excited about each committee and the leadership of each one of the councilmembers as chair and the co-chairs and all the work that we will do together."
The 11 committees and their chairs include the following:
- Rules and Policy: Chair Hardin and vice chair Dorans
- Finance and Governance: Chair Bankston and vice chair Dorans
- Zoning: Chair Dorans and vice chair Hardin
- Workforce, Education and Labor: Chair Dorans and vice chair Hardin
- Economic Development and Small Business: Chair Bankston and vice chair Barroso de Padilla
- Housing, Homelessness, and Building: Chair Favor and vice chair Green
- Public Safety and Criminal Justice: Chair Remy and vice chair Favor
- Public Service and Transportation: Chair Barroso de Padilla and vice chair Day-Achauer
- Public Utilities and Sustainability: Chair Wyche and vice chair Remy
- Health, Human Services and Equity: Chair Green and vice chair Favor
- Neighborhoods, Recreation and Parks: Chair Day-Achauer and vice chair Wyche
New members of the council include Wyche, Day-Achauer and Green.
Columbus resident Willis Brown said that he's glad council added two seats and is using a district map, but that he wants district-specific elections. Currently, while councilmembers serve the districts that they live in, the council is still elected at-large.
"That's a good step," Brown said. "Now the next step is to let's see how this works and see how they’re going to be engaged in the community, how we have access to them, and also get it to point where it can evolve into being elected from their district and not at-large."
He said that he hopes the changes will lead to better representation for citizens within each district.
"As far as representation, yes it's a good step to have the districts, number one," Brown said. "Number two, it's okay that you can have at least someone responsible for where you live that you can actually call.”