Pass: 27775 / 75.62% Yes votes ...... 8955 / 24.38% No votes

See Also: Index of all Propositions

Summary:

This City Council-proposed measure would amend the City Charter in two primary ways: First, it would give the Council the option to fill a vacant Council seat with a remaining term between 12 and 25 months by either Council appointment or special election. Second, it would eliminate the mandatory runoff requirement for any special election held to fill a vacancy. Other clarifying changes are also proposed, as further described below.

Existing Rules

Section 303 of the Charter sets forth the rules for filling City Council vacancies. This Section currently provides that the City Council can fill a Council vacancy by appointment only where one year or less remains in the vacant seat's term. If more than one year remains, the vacant seat must be filled by special election. If an appointment is not made within 45 days of the declared vacancy, the Council's power to appoint terminates and the seat remains vacant. When a vacant seat is filled by special election and three or more candidates run, even if one candidate receives more than 50% of the votes, a runoff election must be held between the top two candidates.

Proposed Rules

The proposition would revise the Charter procedures for filling a Council vacancy where a vacant seat has a remaining term between 12 and 25 months. In such case, the City Council would be given the option to fill the vacancy either by City Council appointment or by special election. If the Council decides to fill the vacancy by appointment but fails to appoint within 45 days, a special election would become mandatory.

The proposition would revise the Charter to eliminate the Council's ability to fill a vacancy by appointment if a vacancy occurred at a time when two or more sitting members of the Council had been appointed to the Council. Instead, if one year or less remained in the term, the seat would remain vacant. If more than one year remained, a special election would be held to fill the seat. This would avoid having a majority of the Council members appointed rather than elected.

The proposition would add language confirming that any appointee to the Council would be prohibited from seeking nomination or election to the Council until at least one year had passed from the termination of the appointed term.

The proposition would clarify that if a Council member is elected to another position requiring the surrender of his or her Council seat, that Council seat becomes vacant.

Whenever a special election is held to fill a vacancy, this proposition would also eliminate the requirement for a mandatory runoff. Instead, if one candidate receives more than 50% of the votes in a special election, that candidate would be declared the winner, with no runoff election required.

No change is proposed to the mandatory runoff requirement for the City's general elections (the top two candidates in the June election participate in a runoff election in November). This mandatory runoff requirement would remain in place.