An amendment proposed to the City of St. Ignace charter to remove the requirements of publishing the city's annual audit and manager's report in the newspaper will come before city voters on the Tuesday, November 3 ballot.

Voters will decide if the charter should be amended by taking out the publication requirement and putting in its place a rule that the city must notify residents through a newspaper that copies of the audit and report will be available for public inspection at City Hall.

The proposal is an effort to save money, City Manager Eric Dodson said. Publishing the notification that documents are available for public inspection would be less costly than publishing the full reports.

"If we do that, it's going to be an enormous amount of money," Mr. Dodson said of publishing the reports in their entirety. "Another part of the charter says we have to be fiscally responsible."

Last year, the city published a notice that the audit would be available at the clerk's office, Mr. Dodson said.

Amending the charter would bring the council's action in line with the charter, provide an opportunity for the community to examine the documents, and not burden taxpayers, he added.

The move to change the language was spurred by a review of the city charter conducted by the city council over the past eight months. Council wanted to determine if anything in the charter, which was adopted in 1969 and became effective in 1970, needed to be updated. The review was sparked by citizen complaints that the council was not properly following the charter.

If the ballot proposal does not pass, the council will review other options, Mr. Dodson said.

The ballot proposal reads as follows:

“Shall Section 8.7 of the Home Rule Charter of the City of St. Ignace be amended by deleting the requirement for newspaper publication of the City's annual independent audit and City Manager's annual report, and substituting in its place a requirement for annual newspaper publication of a notice that copies of the annual audit and the City Manager's report shall be available for public inspection in the office of the City Clerk?”

City polls will be open from 7 a.m. to 8 a.m. November 3.