None of the legislative powers of the city shall be abridged
or impaired by this charter, but all such legislative powers shall
be possessed and exercised by the city council.
All official bonds, recognizances, obligations, contracts and
other instruments entered into or executed by or to the city before
the adoption of this charter, and all taxes, special assessments,
fines, penalties, forfeitures incurred or due or owing to the city,
shall be enforced and collected, and all writs, imposed, prosecutions,
actions and causes of action, except as herein otherwise provided,
shall continue without abatement and remain unaffected by this charter;
and no legal act done by or in favor of the city shall be rendered
invalid by its adoption of this charter.
Ordinances, resolutions, orders or other regulations of the
city, existing at the time of adoption of this charter, shall continue
in full force and effect until repealed, modified or superseded.
Until superseded under this charter, the organization of the
executive and administrative departments, and the powers and duties
of the officers and employees of the City of Waltham Charter, and
the fiscal year of the city shall remain as constituted at the time
of the adoption of this charter; but the city council may, at any
time by ordinance consistent with general laws, reorganize consolidate
or abolish departments, in whole or in part, transfer the duties,
powers and appropriations of one department to another, in whole or
in part, establish new departments, and increase, reduce, establish
or abolish salaries of heads of departments or members of boards.
This section shall not authorize any action which is in conflict with
chapter thirty-one of the General Laws.
The mayor, the city council, and the city clerk in office when
any plan set forth in this charter has been adopted, or is proposed
for adoption, shall comply with all requirements of this charter relating
to such proposed adoption and to the election of the officials specified
in said plan, in order that all things necessary for the nomination
and election of the officials first to be elected under the provisions
of this charter and of the plan so adopted may be done.