Charter Assembly Completed and Reports to commission

The results of the Los Angeles civic assembly on the structure and election of city council were presented to the Los Angeles Charter Commission on March 10.

The report was presented to the commission, including the recommendations at a public meeting, with a verbal presentation by Linn Davis of Healthy Democracy with the recommendation details presented by the participants of the assembly.

Recommendations were:

1. Establish a permanent civic assembly, randomly selected to reflect LA demographics, to review, advise, and refer Council decisions back for consideration, with a minimum of two assemblies per year.

2. The City Council should be 25 single-member districts. The office of City Council president should randomly rotate between members with nonconsecutive terms ending at the end of each session, including special sessions.

3. As population increases per the U.S. Census, the size of the City Council should automatically increase. There should be no more than 170,000 people per district.

4. Council members must live in their respective district for at least one year prior to the election.

5. Council members and the Mayor will no longer have appointment powers to the Ethics Commission.

6. Create an independent, nonpartisan office of the Inspector General with the authority to investigate, audit, and refer for prosecution any City employee, whether they be elected or appointed. The Inspector General will lead the Ethics Commission.

7. Voting will be done by ranked choice.

8. One council size option should be presented for the vote, Language shall include that an increase in City Council membership is an increase in representation.

9. Hire a qualified COO and CFO independently, not appointed

by the mayor or City Council.

Assembly Delegates were selected from among respondents to a postcard mailed to 20,000 residential addresses equally distributed across each Council district in the City of Los Angeles – as well as to outreach in partnership with social service organizations to residents without addresses. Delegates were randomly selected from this respondent pool to reflect a microcosm of the city in terms of age, gender, race/ethnicity, location of residence, political party, housing status, and educational attainment. Healthy Democracy, which designed and coordinated both the selection process and the in-room deliberations, will release a final Demographic Profile of the Assembly soon. This Profile, as well as all further communication related to the Assembly, will be posted at healthydemocracy.org/LA.

Among the presenters were charter commission members Raymond Meza, James Thomas, and Justin Ramirez. Retired councilman Mike Woo and journalist Joe Matthews also presented.