The Common Council defined:
The Common Council (a.k.a. City Council)
is both the city's legislative body and its fiscal body.
Members of the common council (often referred to as the city council) are
part-time elected officials who serve for a term of four years; they are not
subject to term limits and may run for re-election as often as they wish. As
individual council members, they do not possess significant statutory
powers.
As the city's legislative body, however, the council exercises many of the
powers
given cities through the passage of ordinances and appropriation of monies
(IC 36-4-6-12). The council fixes the annual salaries of all elected
officials of
the city, which may not be changed in the year for which they are fixed, or
reduced below the previous year's level (IC 36-4-7-2). The council also
establishes
the annual salaries of members of the city's police and fire departments
(IC 36-8-3-3). It has authority to reduce, but not to increase, any other
items
in the city budget as submitted by the mayor for its approval (Ic 36-4-7-7).
A council member must have been a resident of the
district from which he
or she is elected, if any, for at least six months before election, and must
have
been a resident of the city for at least one year before the election,
(IC 3-8-1-27). If the council member ceases to be a resident of the city or
a
resident of the district from which the council member was elected, the
council member forfeits his or her office (IC 36-4-6-2).