With a repeat of the all-too-close 2000 election across the
country hovering before election officials, City Council wants to
decide beforehand how it would settle a tie vote. But a vacancy
after the new council is seated is another matter.
With a repeat of the all-too-close 2000 election across the country hovering before election officials, City Council wants to decide beforehand how it would settle a tie vote. But a vacancy after the new council is seated is another matter.
Allan Abrams, who has been campaigning for council himself almost entirely through e-mails, wants a pre-election decision on how council would fill Greg Sellers’ seat if the incumbent council member defeats Dennis Kennedy in the race for mayor.
“(In this event), how are you planning to fill this seat?” Abrams said in an e-mail to council members Friday. “Your decision will effect how voters potentially cast their votes come Nov. 2.”
City Manager Ed Tewes, who was also copied on the e-mail, explained.
“The vacancy would not occur until Dec. 1,” Tewes said. “It is the duty of the new council to make the decision, not the old one.”
The Registrar of Voters has 28 days after the election to certify the results – or a deadline of Nov. 30.
If there are no glitches, the new council would be seated at the Dec. 1 meeting. A vacancy does not occur until the new council is sworn into office; Sellers would still be a councilman until sworn in as mayor.
City Clerk Irma Torrez, the city’s election official, consulted state election rules and confirmed Tewes’ statement that the new council must choose if Sellers defeats Kennedy. The position must be filled within 30 days after the election but it is up to the new council to decide how.
They could choose to hold a special election – which the Registrar estimates would cost $117,860 – appoint an interim member to fill the remaining two years of Sellers’ term. They could interview and appoint a member of the public or they could take the candidate with the next highest number of voters.
A special election would cost less if combined with another election.
In the case of a tie vote in the Nov. 2 balloting, the current council would have to decide who won. With Councilman Steve Tate dissenting, Sellers, Kennedy and Carr last week asked the city attorney to prepare a resolution providing, instead of drawing straws, for a special election.
“The people should decide,” Sellers said.
Tate said he will ask for the tie-vote item to be discussed, in case his colleagues change their minds on a costly special election.
Two council seats are currently on the Nov. 2 ballot: Larry Carr is seeking a second term and Hedy Chang decided not to run for a third.
Abrams was not appeased with Tewes’ answer.
“Your response is unacceptable and a blatant attempt by the city to avoid making a critical decision,” he said to Tewes.
Council members have an obligation to answer, he said. Abrams said he would forward Tewes’ answer to the “Stop the Auto Mall” citizens group of which he is a member, and to a library citizens’ group with which the anti-auto people are working to decide for whom to vote for mayor and council.
Both groups resorted to petitions when they did not approve of the direction council was headed in their respective issues.
Abrams said the fact that, if he didn’t win, he could be the third highest vote getter, plays no part in his insistence on this method of filling a vacancy.
“It makes the most sense,” he said, “considering this is what the people voted for.”
Sellers, whose hypothetical win would open up this situation would prefer a new direction.
“I don’t agree with the notion of considering the next highest vote getter,” Sellers said Friday.
He wants, instead, to do what the school board just did: ask interested residents to apply for the position and have the new council interview them and choose.
“This would encourage ‘new blood’ and new points of view,” he said. “(Non-winning candidates) could apply for the post or run in a special election.”
Sellers agrees with the election code that the new council, whomever it includes, should be the ones to decide.
Tate, who ran unopposed for a second term in 2002 said he would prefer appointing after interviews.
“But I’m open to other people’s suggestions,” Tate said.
Kennedy, said it was the new council’s decision but did not know what the best way to proceed was.
“We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it,” Kennedy said.
Carr also agreed with Tewes.
“It’s not really appropriate for me to comment,” Carr said. “I might not even have the opportunity to decide.
Tewes suggested that Abrams and other council candidates could announce before the election how they would want to settle any vacancy that occurred after Dec. 1 but, if the current council were to do so publicly, it could be a non-noticed meeting and fall afoul of the Brown Act, which requires such notice.
Chang, who is recovering from surgery, declined to comment.
Carol Holzgrafe covers City Hall for The Times. She can be reached by e-mail at ch********@*************es.com or phoning 779-4106
