NEWPORT BEACH : Term Limits Plan Spurs Heated Debate

A discussion over a ballot measure to limit City Council terms became heated this week when Councilwoman Evelyn R. Hart implied that Councilman John Hedges engineered the plan so he would be the only council member able to run again for office.

Hart said she hasn’t seen the petition that has been circulating for the past month or been told about its content.

“As far as I know, the only person who could run two years from now is John Hedges,” said Hart, who has been in office since 1978.

Hedges, a first-term council member, snapped: “What makes you think I’ll run in two years?”

If voters approve the measure this November, it would go into effect for the 1994 elections.

Hedges, whose wife, Maria, chaired the petition drive for the group Newport Residents to Limit City Council Terms, would be the only current council member eligible to run.

The remarks came while the council was debating whether to pay the county to verify all 8,500 petition signatures submitted last week or only the 6,500 needed to qualify the measure for the November ballot. They decided on the latter, which will cost the city between $7,000 and $10,000.

Hart later said her comments were not meant to attack Hedges’ motives, and that she simply wanted to clarify the effect of the initiative.

“I didn’t mean anything by it,” she said. “It was just a question.”

If approved by voters in the fall, the initiative would limit council members to two four-year terms, after which they would need to sit out a term before being eligible to again run.

Hart’s comments came after Councilman Clarence J. Turner said that since the early 1900s, voters have elected nearly 100 council members, only about a dozen of whom held posts for longer than eight years.

“It seems to me the system’s working here,” said Turner, who has been on the council since 1986.