Lawrence mayor sues council over spending
Kevin Corcoran of the Indianapolis Star reports the following:
Lawrence Mayor Deborah Cantwell sued her city council today in an effort to get the Marion Superior Court’s 32 judges to crack down on council spending.
The suit alleges the council is treading on executive turf by increasing its own budget line items and hiring outside consultants and advisors without legal authority.
Politically charged cases requiring the participation of the entire county judiciary are rare, said Marion Superior Court Judge Cale Bradford, the court’s presiding judge. He said the last such trial was in 2003 over redistricting the City-County Council.
“It’s a logistically difficult task,” Bradford said.
The lawsuit challenges the council’s actions regarding the 2005 and 2006 municipal budgets. The separation-of-powers lawsuit was filed under a state law that requires the entire Marion Superior Court to convene to hear arguments.
Marion Superior Court Judge Patrick McCarty will handle motions in the lawsuit until it is ready for trial.
Cantwell wants the county’s judges to rein in the council, which her administration says has a budget of $416,000 — or, three times greater than councils in similarly sized cities such as Marion and Richmond require.
