CAMARILLO : Council Restores Vote Abstentions

The Camarillo City Council has agreed that its members should have a right to abstain from a vote if they choose, and repealed an obscure rule that counted abstentions as affirmative votes.

In a 4-1 vote Wednesday, the council agreed to drop the seldom-used policy that was adopted by a divided council in the mid-1970s to break deadlocks.

Until Wednesday’s vote, Camarillo was the only city in Ventura County that barred abstentions except where a conflict of interest existed, City Atty. J. Robert Flandrick said. Some cities in Orange and Los Angeles counties have similar rules, he said.

Councilman Charles K. Gose raised the issue, saying he was upset when he abstained from endorsing a letter to the Ventura Regional Sanitation District last month, only to be informed that his abstention counted as a yes vote.

“A vote is a vote, and calling an abstention an affirmative vote should be illegal and unconstitutional,” Gose said.

Opposing the motion was Councilwoman Charlotte Craven, who defended the abstention policy as necessary to force reluctant politicians to state their views.

“This policy doesn’t allow us to straddle the fence or cop out when the going gets tough,” she said. Instead, she suggested, council members could leave the council chamber rather than abstain from a vote.

The rule was initially adopted when the council often found itself deadlocked on significant issues because one member abstained frequently, former Councilwoman Mary Gayle said. She served on the council from 1974 to 1983.

“It was probably passed in the heat of something that was considered important at the time,” Gayle said.

Flandrick said the council was within its rights when it adopted the rule, but that it could create problems. “It can have some unfortunate effects if followed to the letter,” he said.