Here is the text of the charter changes being pushed by San Diegans for City Hall Reform. That’s the group that said it would gather signatures to put proposals closely mirroring Mayor Jerry Sanders’ on the ballot if the council didn’t.
San Diegans for City Hall Reform includes three members of the Charter Review Committee that studied changes to the city’s power structure for several months earlier this year. But those committee members are now signed onto a platform that more closely resembles the changes Sanders wants to make than the committee’s preferences.
Among the differences between the two proposals:
- San Diegans for City Hall Reform and Sanders want voters to have until 2010, when the five-year strong-mayor experiment is set to expire, to make it permanent. The strong-mayor experiment removed the mayor from the City Council and put the mayor in more of an executive role, in charge of operating the entire city bureaucracy. The Charter Review Committee wanted voters to make the strong-mayor structure permanent during the 2008 election.
- San Diegans for City Hall Reform and Sanders want nine council seats; the Charter Review Committee wanted 11.
- The Charter Review Committee wanted voters to clarify that the city attorney’s client is the city government and not the general public, a major issue during the tenure of City Attorney Mike Aguirre. The mayor said this debate deserves further review and shouldn’t be placed on the 2008 ballot. San Diegans for City Hall Reform doesn’t include this issue among its other proposals.
- The Charter Review Committee wanted the internal auditor to be hired for a 10-year term by the mayor and report to an Audit Committee comprised of two council members and three council-appointed citizens. San Diegans for City Hall Reform and Sanders like the reporting relationship between the auditor and the Audit Committee, but they want the panel to be comprised of one council member and two mayoral appointees. Under both sets of preferences, the auditor could only be fired by a supermajority of the committee and could appeal that decision with the two-thirds support of the City Council.