Irvine City Council Certifies June 5 Vote in Move to Clarify Succession : Government: Mayor-elect and two council members to take office July 20. Status of Mary Ann Gaido remains muddled.

The City Council Tuesday unanimously certified the June 5 election results, enabling Mayor-elect Sally Anne Sheridan and Councilmen-elect Art Bloomer and Barry Hammond to take office July 20.

However, it was unclear who will remain on the council between now and July 20. The next scheduled council meeting is July 24.

“Under one interpretation, this council is history,” said outgoing Mayor Larry Agran.

Tuesday’s meeting was the last for Agran and retiring council member Edward A. Dornan. Councilman Cameron Cosgrove, who was defeated in the June 5 election, was absent.

The council has been in a quandary because of two legal reports, one by the city attorney and one by a pair of private attorneys hired by the council, to review when newly elected officials can take their posts.

Attorneys Stephen Coontz and Franklin J. Lunding concluded that the four-year terms of council members elected in 1986 ended on June 30 under city laws effective in 1986. However, their report said, the two-year mayoral term ends July 12 based on city laws that were revised in 1988.

Under their interpretation, the city would be left without a mayor and two council members until the new council is sworn in.

City Atty. Roger Grable challenged this interpretation, calling it “unduly narrow and technical.” Grable contended in his report that the council and mayoral terms are automatically extended until their successors are sworn in July 20.

It remained unclear whether certifying the election results would automatically qualify the third highest vote-getter in the June 5 council election, Mary Ann Gaido, to serve two years remaining on Sheridan’s council term. In its vote to certify election results, the council left open the fate of Sheridan’s term for the next council to decide.

Questions over whether Gaido would fill Sheridan’s unexpired term arose over interpretations of a June, 1988, voter initiative known as Measure D.

Although city election law states the third-highest vote-getter in the council race would normally finish the unexpired term of a council member who is elected mayor, Measure D allows that seat to be voted on in a special election if 7% of the city’s registered voters sign a petition by Monday.

On Tuesday, petitions bearing 4,736 signatures were filed with City Clerk Nancy Lacey, who has until July 24 to verify them with the county registrar of voters office. At least 3,862 valid signatures are required.

According to the Coontz-Lunding report, if Gaido is automatically seated through certification of election results, those petitions may be rendered invalid.

Grable said that if the petitions are deemed valid and force a special election in November, he recommends that Sheridan’s council seat remain open until that time.

Sheridan has asked Grable to prepare a ballot measure for November that would repeal Measure D.

Grable said the confusion over Gaido’s status could leave the city open to lawsuits.

“The council is required to hold a meeting shortly after the election to certify the results,” he said. “Someone could bring a lawsuit saying we didn’t do that.”

The petitions asking for a special election to fill Sheridan’s council seat were presented by Michael Shea and Dale Peotter, both activists in a voter initiative last November, called Measure N, that repealed portions of a city human-rights ordinance.

“Give the people opportunity they asked for,” Shea said.