PASADENA : Term-Limit Backers Threaten Suit Over Invalid Petitions

Supporters of a term-limit ballot initiative in Pasadena are accusing the city clerk of wrongly deciding they had too few signatures to qualify for an April special election and say they may sue the city to get the measure on a later ballot.

Leaders of Pasadena Citizens for Term Limits said City Clerk Maria Stewart used the wrong number of registered Pasadena voters when she invalidated their petition Dec. 27. Recall petitions must gather signatures of 15% of the voters who are registered on the day the recall is launched, the petitioners say. Stewart, they say, used the number of registered voters on the day the petitions were handed in.

“This is a deliberate attempt to block the will of the people by a city attorney who knew council members didn’t want this on the ballot,” said Nicholas Conway, the group’s leader.

In December, Stewart had the county registrar-recorder do a random sampling of the 14,355 signatures, using a formula approved by the secretary of state, and the number of valid signatures was found to be short.

Daniel Shepard, an attorney for the initiative backers, said that under state law the clerk should have used the latest available voter registration list before the petition was initiated on April 20 of last year, not the roll from October, 1994, just before the signatures were presented to her. The April roll listed 4,000 fewer voters, requiring fewer signatures on the petitions.

Shirley Washington of the secretary of state’s office said attorneys there told Pasadena’s interim city attorney, Cristina Sierra, that it was “better public policy to use the date at the beginning of the process (April), but it was strictly her call.”

“Frankly, that would make sense to me, as you can’t have a moving target,” said Councilman William E. Thomson Jr., a self-acknowledged term-limits opponent. “It seems unfair to say the number can keep changing.”

Sierra is sticking by her opinion. She said a specific section of the state elections code requires using the latest voter roll because the initiative involves a charter amendment.

Mayor Kathryn Nack said the issue will come before the council Monday. “Personally I am against term limits,” she said, “but I don’t see any reason to keep this from a vote of the people.”