Culver City votes rejected a proposal to take away the City Council’s authority to hire and fire the city’s public safety chiefs and embraced a parcel tax that will pay for stormwater capture projects on Nov.8
The stormwater initiative, Measure CW and Measure CA, were the two high-profile ballot initiatives on the local ballot this year.
The latter was backed by three members of the council as well as several formers mayors, who sent a letter to their constituents last week imploring them to vote to give the city manager the power to hire and fire the police and fire chief. Instead, voters rejected that option by nearly 65%.
“Given everything that happened in the presidential election, I wasn’t really sure how the vote would go,” Councilwoman Meghan Sahli-Wells, who was against the measure, acknowledged. “But it seems that a lot of people took the position ‘If it isn’t broken, don’t fix it.’”
Mayor Jim Clarke backed the proposal and said it would have brought the City Council’s 2006 review and overhaul of the city’s charter full circle.
“I am disappointed that Measure CA was rejected. This was meant as a non-controversial issue to allow us to complete the full transition to a council-manager form of government. Since voters prefer that the council rather than the city manager supervise the police and fire department, we will need to determine how five independently elected part-time councilmembers do that,” Clarke said.
Sahli-Wells said those who wanted the change never seemed to offer a compelling argument for the change. “I never saw or heard any real, concrete reasons for taking the decision-making authority from the council and giving it to the city manager,” the councilwoman said.
The Clean Water, Clean Beaches measure, which will establish a parcel tax addition of $99 and generate $2 million for water quality improvement, passed with nearly 74% of the vote, exceeding the two-thirds hurdle that it needed to pass.
“I am pleased that three of our four Culver City ballot measures were approved by the voters, especially Measure CW, which will allow us to address the stormwater and urban runoff mitigation measures we are required to undertake. I very much appreciate the willingness of property owners to tax themselves to improve our environment,” Clarke said.
Sahli-Wells joined the mayor in her enthusiasm for CW passing. “I think it shows the priorities of Culver City residents and how they recognize the importance of our environment. It shows that no matter what the state does, here in Culver City we’re going to make our communities better,” she said.
The other two initiatives, Measures CB and CD, passed with 70% and 72% of the vote respectively. The former is a charter amendment that now makes anyone who resigns from the council ineligible to run again for the city’s governing body for two years.
The latter is also a charter amendment that allows the City Council to determine the dates of regular council meetings.
All charter amendments require a two-thirds vote.
Gary Walker contributed to this story.
