Community Corner

The Creek Beat: Government By Initiative

Councilman Justin Wedel's campaign to put two local measures on the ballot brings up some larger political issues

Walnut Creek City Councilman Justin Wedel this past week decided to go it alone, at least on two high-profile issues in the city.

Wedel has started two petition-signing campaigns to overturn actions by the City Council on which he was outvoted 4-1.

One of them is to repeal part of the anti-smoking ordinance approved by the council on Oct. 1. Those laws took effect on Friday.

The other is to block a proposed ordinance that would ban carry-out plastic bags from local businesses.

Wedel hopes to get both items on the June ballot. He feels both issues should be voted on by the people.

These two initiatives will be discussed by the council on Tuesday night.

Now, Wedel is certainly within his rights to launch these petition campaigns. He also has his supporters, some of whom have backed him publicly with comments on the Patch story on the issue.

The campaign, however, does bring up some larger political issues.

One of them is government by initiative.

There is a school of thought that we elect government representatives who study issues and make informed decisions on behalf of the public.

On the other side, there are those who feel elected representatives should handle the more day-to-day issues and let the people decide the larger questions.

In California, it isn't that difficult to get something on the ballot. You need 504,000 signatures to qualify an initiative for the ballot. You need 807,000 to put a constitutional amendment up for a vote.

In a state with more than 18 million registered voters, that's not exactly a high bar to achieve.

In Walnut Creek, you need 10 percent of registered voters. The city has about 42,000 people signed up to vote, so 4,200 signatures are needed. Again, not necessarily a difficult level to reach.

The other issue the petition drives bring up is the power of the minority in government.

We've seen it the past two decades in Congress where the filibuster allows 40 percent of the Senate to block legislation or nominees that the majority of that elected body favor.

This rule, once used rarely, has become a common political tool the past two decades.

The California Legislature had a similar barrier when it came to the state budget. It needed a two-thirds vote for approval.

That meant one-third of the Assembly or Senate could hold up an annual spending plan.

Republicans did that for a number of years until Californians passed an initiative in 2010 that permitted a simple majority to approve the budget.

Some political analysts lament the loss of the days when elected representatives who came up on the short end of the vote would simply move on to the next issue.

It also has hurt the art of compromise. If a minority in an elected body can simply block something or put something on the ballot, why should they bother to talk things out?

That's not to say Wedel falls into any of these categories. His argument is both city laws are violation of private property rights.

He feels strongly about these issues and, again, has his supporters.

But the campaigns and the current state of American politics does give Walnut Creek voters something to think about before they sign their name onto a petition.


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