City Council district change, term limits will be put to voters

Menifee voters will have the opportunity to decide whether the City should remove the at-large status from the mayor's position, add a fifth City Council representative district, and repeal the current ordinance placing term limits on council members.

The current form of city government includes a City Council made up of four members representing each of four geographical districts in Menifee, plus a separately elected, at-large mayor. All council members serve four-year terms. The resolution passed by a 4-1 margin on Wednesday calls for a ballot measure asking voters to add a fifth district, eliminate the separate mayor's elected position and require council members to name a mayor from among them.

The mayor was not an at-large position until 2012, when a vote of the people led to a restructuring that resulted in Scott Mann being the first elected mayor. Mann lost a bid for re-election to Neil Winter in 2016. A yes vote on the November ballot would return the City to the previous form of mayor selection, which traditionally is done on a rotating basis among council members.

By adding a fifth geographical district, it would also minimize the chances of Menifee being sued for discrimination, council members said.

Citing the California Voting Rights Act, civil rights attorney Kevin Shenkman has successfully sued several cities with at-large voting systems, claiming such a system is discriminatory against minorities who run for election. In a move designed to avoid such an expensive lawsuit, the City of Murrieta voted last July to switch from an at-large voting system to five districts.

"I look at this as being proactive," said council member Matt Liesemeyer. "Once this guy (Shenkman) is done going after cities that are completely at large, he'll start going after cities like us. If we approve this, we can keep working on projects we want, without having to deal with this guy."

In addition to creating a fifth district, the resolution approved by the council proposes to "change the duration of the term of the mayor at-large from four years to two years, commencing in 2020; eliminate the office of the mayor at-large; and provide for the selection of the mayor from among the five City Council Members, commencing in 2022."

The lone no vote cast Wednesday night was that of Winter, whose four-year term expires in 2020.

"I don’t know if our census relates to making five districts," Winter said. "Do we really need to redraw the lines? Now please understand, I don’t take this personally. But we haven’t had enough continuity in our process, we’ve changed so much."

The second resolution approved as a November ballot measure would eliminate term limits applicable to all city council members. District 4 representative John Denver will leave office in November because of the current term limit.

"Term limits received 81 percent of the vote," resident John Smelser said in reference to the earlier voter approval. "Because this council wants to put this issue to a vote again indicates that they are out of touch with residents’ wants."

That resolution passed 3-2, with Winter and Liesemeyer voting no.