Josh Kleinbaum
Pasadena Mayor Bill Bogaard spoke the longest at the Charter Review
Study Committee meeting, but words from some familiar faces might
have had the most influence.
Bogaard, the special guest at Wednesday night's meeting, talked
for 45 minutes about the advantages of Pasadena's form of government,
which features both an elected mayor and a city manager and has
council members elected by district, not citywide.
But seven current and former elected officials from Glendale spoke
after Bogaard, all voicing the same message: What's wrong with the
current system?
"It's a historic event that we had so many past, present and
possibly future elected officials in completely unanimous agreement,"
said Rob Sharkey, the committee's vice chairman. "That's just short
of 75 years of electoral service speaking."
The committee is charged with making recommendations to the City
Council for changes to the city's charter, and has been looking at
elected mayors and districting. But by the time the speakers, who
included former mayors Larry Zarian, Carl Raggio, Ginger Bremberg and
Eileen Givens, had finished, some committee members already were
discussing abandoning the idea of electing council members to
represent certain districts.
"The most important issue is, is the system broken?" Zarian said.
"No, it is not broken. It works, it has worked since 1906, and I'm
not sure change needs to be made for the sake of change."
Councilmen Bob Yousefian and Dave Weaver also attended the
meeting.
"The process, the system we have in this city, it has worked well
for this city," Yousefian said.
During Bogaard's speech, committee members clearly were impressed
with the success Pasadena has had with its elected mayor, a form of
government the city adopted in 1999. But Bogaard, serving his second
four-year term, is the only mayor to serve under that system, and
during his presentation he stressed how his personality and ability
to interact with other council members worked for the system.
"When you hang your hat on personality instead of a system, you're
in trouble," said Bremberg, who is on the committee.
After the speakers finished, Sharkey asked the committee if anyone
was still interested in discussing the form of government. Few hands
were raised from the 15-member committee, but several committee
members said the question was out of order.
Givens, the committee chair, said they would try to conclude the
discussion at the next meeting, which starts at 6:30 p.m. Oct. 15 in
Room 105 of the Municipal Services Building, 613 E. Broadway.
