The Birmingham age-herald., 1911-12-28
ATLANTA COUNCIL ID AMEND CHARTER Anticipated the Commission Government Advocates SUBMIT TO CHANGES Generally Conceded ThatsPresent City Administration Will Get What
 It Wants From the
 Legislature
SUBMIT TO CHANGES

l Atlanta, December 27.-(SpeciaD .-Antici- pating another effort on the part of
 leading Atlantans to secure commits
 sion government charter for the city at i the session of the general assembly next
 summer. members of the city council and city officials generally are now planning
 to reach the post first with bill remod-
 cling and revising the present charter,
 but making practically none of the radi-
 cal changes which the commission gov-
 ernment supporters have demanded. Although the matter has been taken
 up in a very quiet sort of way, it Is
 now anything but a secret that the mem ! bers of council. most of whom oppose commission government are planning to
 oircumvent it by a charter revision of
 their own which consists principally In
 reducing the membership of council and 1 the aldermanic board and of the various | departmental boards. each of which Is
 now about as large as the average city
 council found anywhere in the country | This is one step toward reform that
 the commission government people de-
 manded, but it falls far short of their 1 however, that the legislature shall give 1 first consideration to charter amendments
 which have the approval of the city coun-
 cil, and it is two to one shot that this
 is the only bill which will get it's ap- proval so far as changing the form of city government is concerned
 It is already apparent though, that
 the charter fight Is going to be renewed
 again next year, and it will doubtless
 come along early. Commission charter advocates are in no wise daunted by the
 defeat, chiefly to the fact that 1t was a
 compromise which entirely emasculated
 the commission form.
 | On the other hand, so well satls- fled were certain city officials with the result of that election which con- frmed them in the belief that the peo- pie of Atlanta do not want commis- sion government that they have become almost arrogant, especially in dealing with those who happened perhaps to be on the commission charter side. Eff forts have been made to oust out of their jobs two or three well known city employees for no other reason than that they were favora ble to the commission charter movement.
 A notable case in point Is that of General Manager Dan Carey of the city park department. whose resignation was requested by a majority of one vote of the park board members be- cause he wrote and published an ar
 ticle favoring commission government Of course that was not given as the reason for requesting MT. Carey's resig- nation, but no strenuous effort has ever been made to deny that that was what was back of 1t. MT. Carey, to the de- l light of his friends, told the park board
 that he did not propose to resign and intmated that the only way they could get rid of him was to fire him bodily and electing someone else, and that he would be there at the firing. He is still on the job.
 All this goes to show, however just what sort of situation the charter fight has brought about and it is anything but ended. There will be two bills for the amendment of Atlanta's charter be- fore the legislature next summer, one a commission charter bill and the other councils own measure. But there will not be, it may be said in all confi- dence, anything in the nature of a com promise
 It is going to be straightout fight for and against commission govern | ment in which politics will play the most important role, and the strongest crowd politically is going to win.