Judge Rules Out Vote on Term Limits for County Supervisors

A Superior Court judge rejected an effort Tuesday to place a measure limiting the terms of Los Angeles County supervisors on November’s general election ballot.

The proposal’s backers said they are weighing an appeal.

Earlier this month, county officials declined to place the measure, which also would deprive supervisors of the power to draw their own district boundaries, on the ballot. Officials said proponents of the initiative had fallen 1,000 signatures short of the number legally required to put such a proposal before the county’s voters.

As it turns out, the county miscounted and the measure’s backers had collected enough signatures. Officials, however, said the measure, which is opposed by all five sitting supervisors, still could not go on the ballot because the deadline for qualifying had passed.

Term limit proponents sued Tuesday, but their case was quickly rejected by a judge, who sided with county lawyers, who argued that adding the initiative to the ballot now could wreak havoc with the November elections.

If they fail to overturn Tuesday’s decision, the next chance term-limit advocates will have to put their measure before the voters will be in March 2002.

“I was rather shocked by this whole process,” said Christopher Skinnell, 23, a spokesman for Voters Organized for Trustworthy Elections. “Things like this contribute to people’s perception that their government is not working for them, and that’s why they’re voting for term limits.”

County counsel Lloyd W. Pellman, who was in court Tuesday morning to observe the case, said that placing the measure on the November ballot now would complicate legally required efforts to write ballot arguments and would open the door to other court challenges. Pellman said the county might have mounted such legal challenges if the measure had been placed on the November ballot.

Superior Court Judge Dzintra Janavs agreed with the county, issuing a terse order rejecting the proponents’ petition. The organization is considering whether to appeal.

Tuesday’s developments were the latest twist in the months-long effort to subject county supervisors to term limits and deprive them of the power to draw their own districts.

The effort is supported by former county Supervisor Pete Schabarum, the architect of the 1992 ballot initiative subjecting state legislators to term limits and a convert to the term-limit cause after his many years on the Board of Supervisors.

The initiative would limit supervisors to two four-year terms. Proponents argue that supervisors have virtual lifetime jobs because of the size of their districts--which contain nearly 2 million residents apiece. No incumbent supervisor has lost an election in 20 years.

The less publicized provision of the initiative would create a panel of officials from the county’s 88 cities to draw the boundaries of supervisors’ districts. Currently, the board draws those lines.

The measure’s supporters turned in 300,000 signatures on its petitions, with about 197,000 needed to qualify for the ballot. But earlier this month, County Registrar-Recorder Conny McCormack, who is employed by the supervisors, said that so many signatures appeared to be invalid that the measure did not qualify for the ballot.

The initiative’s supporters did their own review and found that they did have enough valid signatures, and the county agreed it had erred.

But, county officials said, it was too late to put the issue on the November ballot.

Pellman, the county counsel, dismissed suggestions that officials had tried to derail the initiative.