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Now that the election was over, Russianoff wanted to know what had come of the Bloomberg administration’s promise to form a 2010 charter review commission—a promise that paved the way for a third Bloomberg term.

Over a month later, Russianoff has still not received a reply.

He is not the only one who is in the dark about the mayor’s plans.

Howard Rubenstein, the political spokesman for cosmetics fortune heir and term-limits proponent Ron Lauder, was in the room when the two billionaires agreed to have term limits extended in exchange for convening a charter commission next year–and urging them to go back to a twoterm limit.

But Rubenstein has heard nothing from his client, Lauder, about the formation of the commission that would perform that task.

“I presume that Mr. Lauder would have called me if he had heard anything about it,” Rubenstein said.

Lauder himself could not be reached for comment. The mayor’s press office also declined to comment on the administration’s plans.

Given the still simmering anger over the term-limits extension, most observers believe that Bloomberg will not break his promise to put a measure on the 2010 ballot, which would settle— perhaps once and for all—whether the city’s term limits should be set at two terms or three.

But many, from borough presidents to good government groups, are hoping for more. During the 2008 State of the City address, Bloomberg promised a comprehensive, 18-month commission to look at the whole city charter. This never happened, and instead, the only change to the charter came through the mayor prompting the Council to make the termlimits extension legislatively.

If there is to be a commission, Bloomberg would have to be the one to call it, and as mayor, he has exclusive authority over how many people—up to 15—to appoint, as well as who those people are. The mayor also picks the chair of the commission and sets the agenda.

In charter reviews, the recommendations of the commission may be voted upon by the public as one single measure. If topics not germane to term limits were put up in addition to that issue, there are fears that this could muddy the debate and ultimate vote over term limits.

Alternatively, the commission could only put the term-limits question to a vote next year, or put different questions on the ballot separately.

For those favoring a broader look at city government sooner rather than later, the apparent lack of movement on the commission is a cause for concern: a comprehensive charter review takes time and planning. In the 1989 sweeping charter review, the process took three years, employed 52 full-time staffers and held 141 public hearings.

With less than a year before the 2010 elections and no clear plan in the works, Russianoff speculated that this could lead to what he derisively called a “quick and dirty” review, like those Bloomberg conducted before the 2002 and 2003 elections to get favored causes, such as establishing non-partisan elections and limiting the public advocate’s power, on to the ballot.

In his 2008 State of the City speech, Bloomberg suggested that a commission could help make some of his signature initiatives, like the 311 line, permanent through writing them into the charter. And as he sought the Independence Party line this spring, Bloomberg told party leaders he was open to again looking at non-partisan elections, which is also a pet cause of party activists.

Then in October, at a Staten Island Advance editorial board interview, Bloomberg said that eliminating the public advocate’s office could be on the table. He also said that while he might be open to giving borough presidents a different role, he was not prepared to give them more power by taking it away from the Council.

Any move to get rid of the advocate’s office would likely meet strong resistance from Public Advocate-elect Bill de Blasio and a backlash at the polls from the Working Families Party.

Meanwhile, Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz has continued making the case to give borough presidents independent budgets and more power over land use.

Though some of the interests of the borough presidents and the public advocate intersect—such as the effort to obtain an independent budget— Markowitz said he expects that these battles will be waged separately.

“The public advocate will fight for what he believes is right and I will fight for what I think is right,” he said.

If a sweeping review does occur, the model would be the 1989 commission formed by Mayor Ed Koch. The commission was formed after the Supreme Court found the Board of Estimate unconstitutional, creating the need for sweeping changes in the power distribution of city government.

That 15-member panel was appointed by the mayor, but its members were suggested by the Council and borough presidents. Many of their recommendations ended up contradicting Koch’s positions.

Good-government advocates say that if Bloomberg is indeed serious about a sweeping charter review, appointing a chair who is seen as independent from the mayor would be a critical first step. (The chair of a 2005 commission, Ester Fuchs, had been serving as a senior advisor to Bloomberg.) The three commissions Bloomberg has formed during his tenure have largely consisted of close allies. One person already promised a seat on a commission is Lauder, in the deal made for his support of the term-limits extension, according to Rubenstein.

Eric Lane, who from 1986 to 1989 served as executive director of the Koch commission, said a broad-based review was possible then because the crisis in city government gave clear purpose to the commission’s work—and because Koch stayed out of their way.

Lane said he was pessimistic such conditions would exist in 2010, however, and predicted that any charter review commission would just nibble around the edges of reform.

“There has to be a good reason and you really have to have an independent committee,” Lane said. “You also have to have staffing that isn’t just made up of the mayor’s people.”