Close but No Quorum, So Angry O’Connor Cancels Council Meeting

At San Diego City Hall, council members often speak of “not having the votes” for a particular proposal. On Tuesday afternoon, the City Council did not have the votes to do a nything .

With only four of the council’s nine members present, an angry and impatient Mayor Maureen O’Connor canceled the council’s scheduled afternoon meeting after waiting in vain for 40 minutes for a fifth member, needed for a quorum.

Though two council members were out of town on city business, two others were in City Hall at the time, but failed to respond to O’Connor’s repeated exhortations to come to the council chamber--pleas broadcast over speakers in their private offices. Another councilman was campaigning Tuesday afternoon.

“This is ridiculous,” O’Connor complained. “It’s extremely rude to the public.”

As a result of Tuesday’s non-meeting, the 12 items on the council’s agenda--including a water-rate measure that has already been delayed nearly a dozen times since March--were automatically postponed until next Monday. That, in turn, will mean an extra trip back to City Hall for citizens in the audience Tuesday, some of whom sat through two days of hearings this week waiting fruitlessly for the council to debate the matters of interest to them.

At the council’s scheduled 2 p.m. start time, only O’Connor, Councilman Tom Behr and Councilwoman Judy McCarty were in the council’s 12th-floor chamber. About 15 minutes later, Councilman Wes Pratt showed up, leaving the council one person short of a quorum.

Two other council members had valid reasons for their absences: Abbe Wolfsheimer, who was attending a California Coastal Commission meeting in Huntington Beach, and John Hartley, who was in Washington for meetings concerning community development funds.

After instructing city clerks to check on the three other councilmen’s whereabouts, O’Connor was informed that Ron Roberts was working in his office, Bruce Henderson had left City Hall and was not expected to return for the day, and Bob Filner’s status was unclear.

Apologizing for the delay, O’Connor told the audience: “Mr. Roberts is working on something in his office and hopes to clear it up shortly. If he hears my voice, I hope he clears it up now . Mr. Henderson they can’t find, and Mr. Filner, they don’t know.”

When that public scolding failed to produce results, O’Connor finally adjourned the meeting at 2:40 p.m.

“I’m embarrassed she canceled the meeting,” Roberts said about 15 minutes later as he prepared to leave his 10th-floor office for the meeting, only to be informed by reporters that his absence had contributed to its cancellation.

Roberts said he had been working on plans for a meeting today on his proposal for a binational airport straddling Otay Mesa and Tijuana. “But, if she had called and said I had to get up there, I would have dropped this,” he added.

Filner said later that he also was in his office dealing with a personal matter involving his children and reached the council chamber shortly after O’Connor canceled the meeting.

“I didn’t think there would be a problem with getting a quorum,” Filner said.

Henderson, meanwhile, explained that he was campaigning door-to-door in his district Tuesday afternoon.

“I’m sorry, but I told them when I left (after an unusually long morning session) that I couldn’t be there in the afternoon,” Henderson said.

Though O’Connor herself is sometimes absent from meetings, she was indignant over Tuesday’s embarrassing episode.

“Maybe some council members need to be reminded that their first priority when they’re in town is the council,” she said.