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L.A. officials to consider ballot measures to change election years

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Can changing when Los Angeles votes reverse a long-term decline in turnout?

Los Angeles lawmakers Friday are set to consider letting voters decide whether city elections should be moved to even-numbered years.

The City Council has asked its lawyers to prepare two measures for the March 3 ballot aligning city and school board elections with state and federal contests. But some activists are warning that such a move could cause voter participation to decrease even more.

Hans Johnson, president of the East Area Progressive Democrats, pointed to results from the June primary, which showed slightly more than 16% of L.A. voters casting ballots. That’s down 7 percentage points from the May 2013 mayoral runoff, when around 23% of voters took part.

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“This process is being rushed forward with a lack of review of the implications,” Johnson said.

Council President Herb Wesson, who favors the change in election date, said the issue has been discussed for months by lawmakers and civic leaders. Elected officials have to be willing to try new things to address the lack of voter involvement, he said.

“If [the election date change] doesn’t do what people expect it to do, then we’ll have to make adjustments,” Wesson said.

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City and school board elections are currently held in March and May of odd-numbered years. Under the proposal, those contests would shift in 2020 to June and November of even-numbered years.

The council voted 12 to 1 last week to draft the ballot measure, saying passage could result in greater participation from black, Latino and Asian American voters. Those groups show up in much greater numbers for presidential races than they do for local contests, Councilman Gil Cedillo said.

“The status quo is simply untenable. It is not democratic,” he said.

The ballot proposal, if approved by voters, would also give L.A. elected officials the chance at an extra 18 months in office. For example, Wesson and Councilman Jose Huizar face term limits in June 2019. If they win reelection in March, they will be allowed to stay in office until December 2020.

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The decision to draft the ballot measures was opposed by Councilman Bernard C. Parks, who voiced doubts about turning the administration of city elections over to Los Angeles County.

Meanwhile, former school board member David Tokofsky said there has not been enough discussion about the ways the election change will affect the Los Angeles Unified School District, which also covers 25 cities outside of L.A.

In even-numbered years, school board candidates are likely to follow ballot measures and contests for Congress, the state Legislature and Superior Court judge, Tokofsky said. “When school board elections are at the bottom of a long ballot, there may be less engagement” in those races, he said.

Backers of the change say cities that hold their elections in even-numbered years have had better turnout even when “ballot fatigue” is factored in. Wesson said Los Angeles plans to move ahead with other efforts to boost participation.

“This is the beginning, not the end,” he said.

david.zahniser@latimes.com

Twitter: @DavidZahniser

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