Term limits item leading

A ballot measure to relax term limits for the Los Angeles City Council was gaining voter approval while a $1-billion affordable housing bond was falling short in incomplete election returns Tuesday night.

The two measures were among scores of local races and ballot proposals around Los Angeles County on Tuesday, including a contest for mayor in Inglewood, marijuana use in Santa Monica and a National Football League gambit in Pasadena. Several school districts were asking voters to authorize construction and renovation bond measures.

In Los Angeles, Measure R called for allowing the 15 council members to serve three terms instead of two and prohibiting lobbyists from donating to campaigns in the city, among other new ethics rules.

The measure has been controversial for weeks as opponents -- which included about 30 of the city’s 86 neighborhood councils -- and supporters argued over the proposal, including whether it was clear to voters that the measure could give politicians more time in office, not less.

Joseph Riser of Hermon, in northeast Los Angeles, said he voted for Measure R because was tired of the revolving door of council members in his 14th District that has included three members in the last seven years.

“If you look at any business, the thing that kills you in productivity is turnover, and we have high turnover in government,” Riser said. “And then we wonder why nothing gets done.”

Council President Eric Garcetti, who is termed out in 2009, said he didn’t know if he would run for a third term then.

“This was not a personal campaign,” he said. “This was a campaign about structural change in city government, and I’m happy that if this passes that voters will have the choice to have a decade of experience in their elected officials.”

The most immediate impact of the measure is that it will allow council members to be termed out in 2009 -- Garcetti, Janice Hahn, Jan Perry, Ed Reyes, Jack Weiss and Dennis Zine -- to seek a third term.

Both Perry and Reyes on Tuesday night indicated that they plan to do so. Weiss is running for city attorney in 2009.

About 30 neighborhood councils opposed the measure, in addition to city Controller Laura Chick and City Atty. Rocky Delgadillo.

Dan Pasley, a board member of the Central San Pedro Neighborhood Council, said he was disappointed that the council raised money for what he considered a dirty campaign. “When politicians think they are invincible, it’s time for them to go,” Pasley said.

Measure H, to authorize $1 billion in bonds for affordable housing, was believed to be the largest of its type for a municipality. Supporters said it would build 10,000 units of housing for low-income earners and the homeless, in addition to creating a loan program to help workers buy their first homes.

It was backed widely by housing activists, elected officials, developers and unions, who together poured more than $2.5 million into the campaign. But the measure needed two-thirds of the vote to pass. It would add about $14 for each $100,000 of assessed value to property tax bills.

Garcetti said that he was disappointed that the bond issue was losing, but noted that a majority of voters had supported it. “This gives us a strong mandate for continued action on affordable housing,” he said.

In other closely watched local races across the county, Inglewood Mayor Roosevelt Dorn, in incomplete returns, was leading two challengers in his bid for a third term since being elected in 1997.

Challengers Judy Dunlap, a councilwoman, and Daniel Tabor, a former councilman, both attacked Dorn, a former judge, for his ethics and relationships with developers.

In Santa Monica, three incumbent council members -- Bob Holbrook, Pam O’Connor and Kevin McKeown -- had the three highest vote totals among the 10 candidates.

Santa Monica’s ballot also listed two controversial ballot items. Measure Y, which was leading in incomplete returns, would make the personal use of marijuana on private property by adults the city’s lowest police enforcement priority.

The City Council-backed Measure W was trailing; it called for rolling back some restrictions on contributions by city contractors to council campaigns.

In Pasadena, Measure A was faring poorly. It proposed allowing the National Football League to enter into a years-long contract with the Rose Bowl.

Critics of the measure said it would allow the NFL to destroy most of the historic stadium in a renovation and would allow too many events.

School improvement bonds were leading in several school districts, including Arcadia Unified, Baldwin Park Unified, Bassett Unified, Paramount Unified and Santa Monica-Malibu Unified.

In local Superior Court races, Deborah Sanchez, Daviann Mitchell, Zacky Hayden and David Stuart were leading in the four contested races. Bobbi Tillmon was unopposed.

In Diamond Bar, a $13.1-million library bond measure was trailing, while in Claremont a $12.5-million bond issue to buy 180 acres to add to the city’s wilderness park in the San Gabriel Mountains foothills was too close to call. It required a two-thirds yes vote.

Around the nation, term limits generally have stuck once imposed by voters, and several attempts to undo or relax the limits for the California Legislature have gone nowhere.

However, there have been notable exceptions. In Colorado, one of the first states to implement term limits, more than 100 cities and 51 of 64 counties have repealed or relaxed limits in recent years.

The issue has long been a divisive one. Voters in many states like the fact that such laws ensure some degree of turnover among elected officials, while those in government frequently complain that they lead to a revolving door for officeholders and cost government valuable experience in solving complex problems.

In Los Angeles, voters imposed term limits on the council and the three citywide elected offices in 1993 after being urged to do so by then-mayoral candidate Richard Riordan.

*

steve.hymon@latimes.com