UPDATE: The Boston City Council approved the new marriage ordinance on Wednesday.

The Boston City Council is preparing to restrict when the city clerk can marry people during work hours and to tap newlyweds for a new $15 fee.

Statewide, city clerks who become justices of the piece are legally allowed to marry people on municipal property during work hours and charge up to $100. City councilors in Boston began looking into the practice after press reports last fall suggested the clerk was making tens of thousands of dollars performing weddings.

Boston City Clerk Maureen Feeney currently charges $60 to marry a couple if they show up on time, $100 if they’re late. Feeney only takes cash, according to someone who answered the phone at her office. That person also said that the weddings take place in Feeney’s office and last about 20 minutes.

Feeney, a former city councilor, recently took over the clerk’s job from Rosaria Salerno, who prior to taking the job was also a city councilor. Salerno earned an estimated $70,000 a year performing weddings in her office in addition to her clerk’s salary of $102,000.

The Boston City Council’s Committee on Government Operations approved a proposed ordinance Tuesday stating that the clerk can generally marry people only on Mondays, Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Fridays between the hours of 10 a.m. and 11:30 a.m. and 2 p.m. and 3:30 p.m. Those tying the knot at City Hall would also have to pay a “service fee” of $15 to the city separate from any fees paid to the clerk.

Several councilors originally called for the wedding fees to go into the city’s general fund when the clerk married people during normal business hours, but city attorney Maribeth Cusick told the committee state law prevents the city from pocketing the money. She said the committee could restrict the hours when weddings can be performed.

City Councilor Michael Ross, who, along with City Council President Stephen Murphy, proposed the ordinance, said the council could have filed a home rule petition with the Legislature to change the existing law but decided against it.

“We cannot take the money the clerk makes unless the Legislature approves a home rule petition,” he said at the committee meeting today. “Practically speaking, though, if we were to do that, it would not pass. The political will does not exist. What we propose is the best we can do.”

State Rep. Marty Walz of Boston has introduced legislation that would ban all public employees in municipal, county, and state government from keeping fees from weddings performed at any government property except a park. The bill is stalled in the House Rules Committee and is unlikely to pass this session.