Williamsport City Council has created a Committee of the Whole, an original idea brought up by Councilman Jon Mackey about a year ago.

It’s a way to have a singular committee comprising council people with various backgrounds and expertise on council and administrative personnel meet ahead of the council meetings to discuss pending business, according to council President Eric Beiter.

The council has kept committees such as public safety, public works, economic revitalization, etc., but forming a Committee of the Whole aims to cut down on committee meetings, making things more efficient. It’s early on and the council is working through the details of the schedule.

Council decided to add to the committee structure rather than eliminate the committees because that would have done a number of the ordinance, Beiter added.

Mackey said he brought this item up last year because on any given week before council there may be one or two items from a committee that require more clarity.

He said he wanted a way to make sure that the council got through some of those things and the Committee of a Whole could do that and not defeat the purpose of its creation by continuing to hold finance, housing needs, public safety, public works, economic revitalization committee meetings etc.

“This will allow us to meet whether it be all of us at once or a minimum of three and have discussions that would normally be held at a committee meeting,” Beiter said.

The Committee of the Whole is considered to be much more efficient when getting council members together that have areas of expertise when it comes to particular items on the agenda. It also makes it so members of the administration can use their time more efficiently and not attend two or three or four committee meetings.

Mackey said he understood that by ordinance the city wanted to keep the other committees, but this Committee as a Whole is kind of taking their place.

“That’s correct and should there be an issue where you have to spend a little bit more time on a specific issue we can always use that specific committee, but for the most part much of the discussion will happen at the Committee of the Whole, Beiter said.

“For example, if somebody feels they have to do some intellectual leg work and present it to that committee and then to the Committee of the Whole, we can certainly do that,” he said. We would have that option, if we’d like, to keep the other committees in the ordinance.

“Again, I see no reason to have that, but maybe when we get into the Home Rule discussions we might have it might be advantageous to have those discussions at a particular finance, public safety committee but . . . the Committee of the Whole will take over those needs,” Beiter said.

Solicitor Nicholas Grimes said the committees are administrative functions of city council, so council has control of how committees operate.

“This is not unusual in that there are communities such as Lancaster and Hazleton that use a similar method as this for their committees,” Grimes said.

Council also placed an ordinance putting a Government Study Commission question on the 2026 primary election ballot designating the number of people to serve on the commission reviewing the aspects of Home Rule form of government.

The Home Rule concept went before the Williamsport voters eight years ago and was defeated.

Council is hoping that more flexible taxing options under Home Rule could assist in reducing or keeping property taxes lower in favor of increasing earned income tax on workers.

Other benefits and detractions exist with Home Rule such as changing the structure of the government to include a manager and many other ideas that will be presented to prospective voters in the months leading up to the primary on May 19.

Public Financial Management, PFM, a Philadelphia-based financial management consultant working with the city on its five-year strategic management plan, highly recommended the city move toward this form of government.