Not an 'Only Mayor' Form of Government

On Monday, the San Diego City Council voted 5-3 to require the mayor (at the moment, the increasingly autocratic Jerry Sanders) to get City Council approval before making cuts to the budget which would affect the level of service provided to residents.

Councilwoman (and two-time almost mayor) Donna Frye laid into Mayor Sanders, reminding people "'It wasn't because there was too much public process' that the city got into its current financial problems, ... 'It was because there was too little public input.'"

Jerry Sanders, for his part, is a bit nonplussed about the whole sharing of power thing, and demonstrated that he isn't above claiming to be the only useful elected official or throwing around allegations of impropriety as long as it never turns out that the recipient is rubber and he is, in fact, glue:

I will ask voters a relatively straightforward question: Which do you prefer, a mayor intent on implementing reforms and maximizing tax dollars, or a city government that fights reforms and is controlled by special interests?

For a bit of context, San Diego has Proposition F on the books, also known as the "strong mayor" prop. This was passed in 2004 in response to the pension funding crisis, and mostly because Jerry Sanders came in promising to fix everyone's problems if everyone would just stay out of his way. With ethics scandals, the pension crisis, and the resignation of Mayor Dick Murphy, people were happy to give up 70 years of the mayor as more of a manager. So Jerry Sanders got his way, and is, as a result, pretty used to getting his way since.

But now, even those who voted against this measure aren't too pleased with how things are working out. Two of the 'no' votes came from Council President Scott Peters and Councilman Kevin Faulconer, who like the idea but not the specific measure. "'One of the things Prop. F did create was a strong-mayor form of government, not an 'only-mayor' form of government,' Peters said."

Now, this is going to likely end up being a protracted and ugly fight. Sanders won't sign this legislation, and the 5-3 vote isn't enough to override him. If the City Council were to override, the mayor has already started talking about putting it on the ballot if he doesn't get his way. On the other hand, if Peters and Faulconer get language that they like, there would be seven votes in favor of dialing back mayoral power.

Sanders, for his part, is rolling out all sorts of straight-from-the-home-office scare tactics, admonishing those who would deign to have an actual public process that the fire department wouldn't be able to respond to big fires without council approval, because service would be impacted too greatly. Quite frankly, if that's the best he's got, I look forward to him talking about more. Lots more. In the meantime, at least the city council is starting to stand up for functional, participatory government.

Update: I almost forgot, hat tip to the Center on Policy Initiatives for reminding me in their email that I wanted to write about this.