THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, March 5, 1995 TAG: 9503050068
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY KAREN WEINTRAUB, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: VIRGINIA BEACH LENGTH: Long : 187 lines
City Council members were shocked last Tuesday when they learned that the General Assembly had changed their system of government without their permission.
They quickly passed a resolution asking the governor to refrain from signing the bill into law until they could hold a public hearing and consider the measure.
Most members have since changed their minds, deciding they can live with the compromise bill.
Mayor Meyera E. Oberndorf wrote to the governor, saying she hoped he would sign the bill.
In a public hearing Tuesday afternoon, the council hopes to get the opinions of residents, who have not yet had an opportunity to comment on the compromise bill. Then, the council will decide what to do.
There are three basic options:
Ask the governor to veto the bill, leaving the system as it is, with an at-large mayor, three at-large council members and seven council members who must live in each of the seven boroughs, but who are elected at-large, or citywide.
Accept the legislation, which will create seven equally populated boroughs by 1998, but continue to require district council members to be elected citywide. The mayor and three at-large council members would continue to be elected by all voters.
Accept the legislation and later ask the General Assembly to require that the boroughs' council members be elected only by the residents of that borough, in what is commonly called a ward system.
The General Assembly bill also provides for an advisory referendum in May 1996 to help the council and the legislature decide whether to install a ward system.
The Council of Civic Organizations, an umbrella group of Virginia Beach civic leagues, has battled for wards for five years; but is willing to accept the compromise for now. The Chamber of Commerce, which has opposed wards, seems poised to accept the bill.
As of late last week, four of the city council members still disliked the state bill; four, including the mayor, preferred a ward system, although they said they would accept the compromise; and three were willing to accept the compromise because it didn't mandate wards.
The History: Efforts to change the city's form of government are nearly as old as the Beach itself. Early residents were so concerned about the council's structure that they challenged it all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court.
Its justices decided in 1967 that although the boroughs ranged then in population from Blackwater's 733 people to Bayside's 29,048, the district representation made good sense.
The court said the boroughs, which corresponded to the old resort town and Princess Anne County's six districts, gave a voice to rural, suburban and tourist aspects of the diverse city.
When the Supreme Court ruled, the biggest borough was only 40 times the size of the smallest; today, Kempsville's councilman has nearly 150 times the constituents of Blackwater's, where there are about 1,000 residents.
To many people, that is a formula for inequality.
``We represent people, not property,'' outgoing Councilman John D. Moss said, explaining why he doesn't like the current system. Moss, an at-large councilman who lives in Kempsville, is leaving the council to move to Tennessee.
Although the representation issue never truly went away, there wasn't much talk of reapportionment between 1967 and 1990. Then, Albert W. Balko, a former council member and civic leader, lost his bid for re-election to the City Council.
Balko garnered the most votes in the Lynnhaven Borough he sought to represent, but James Brazier beat him citywide. Balko's supporters, who didn't think that was fair, began agitating for change.
When the U.S. Census came out in 1990, and people began to realize how large the disparity between districts had grown, the General Assembly suggested that the council equalize its districts. The council didn't act.
A panel appointed by the mayor said the council's structure should be changed, but the council didn't act on those findings either.
Balko's supporters asked the council to make changes, and several months later asked the body to allow voters to decide whether the system should be changed. The council ignored both requests.
But Balko's supporters, many of whom were heavily involved in the Council of Civic Organizations, gathered nearly 28,000 signatures and got the courts to order a referendum in May 1994.
By a margin of 53 percent to 47 percent, voters favored seven equally populated wards. For several months, the council again did nothing.
When pressed to a vote in September, the council finally agreed by just one vote to forward the issue to the General Assembly, which must approve any such change to the city's charter.
Two council members who voted for the measure said they didn't like it but had promised to follow the referendum's results. Five others said their personal concerns about the ward system, equal-sized districts and the close results of the election convinced them to oppose the measure.
Most, evidently, thought the measure would die in the General Assembly. But the Council of Civic Organizations was not about to let that happen.
The organization lobbied heavily, bringing busloads of supporters to Richmond, and carefully shepherded the bill through a House committee, the full House and a Senate committee, all of which signed on.
Two local senators derailed the measure when it came before the Senate, with Sen. Kenneth W. Stolle, R-Virginia Beach, submitting a substitute motion that passed the Senate but failed in the House.
Finally, on the last afternoon of the General Assembly's annual session, a conference committee of local legislators came up with the compromise bill, which was approved.
The City Council didn't learn of the bill until three days later, because the staff member who kept track of legislative issues had been called away by a family tragedy.
That's why the council was so shocked, Oberndorf said, when it heard the legislators had passed a completely new bill.
When the mayor realized that the civic leagues were willing to accept the compromise, she said, she changed her mind about the bill and began drafting her letter to Gov. Allen.
Polled last week, four council members said they hoped the governor would veto it. Seven others said they could live with it.
Michael J. Barrett, the chairman of the board of the Hampton Roads Chamber of Commerce, which had fought the ward plan, said he also could support the compromise bill.
The Impact: No one is sure what the compromise will actually do.
For starters, any change in voting patterns has to be approved by the U.S. Justice Department.
If it is adopted, though, Kempsville could wind up with nearly three of the seven district seats, turning what is often referred to as one of the state's largest cities into a true political powerhouse.
And it is clear that changing to districts of about 59,000 residents will reduce the council power of rural voters who now have members from the Pungo and Blackwater boroughs to represent them.
Council member Linwood O. Branch III, whose tiny Beach Borough also would have its power diluted drastically by the change, said he thinks the city is well-served by having two rural representatives.
A single council member with a larger district would not be likely to devote the time or clout to help farmers and avoid development costs for the rest of the city, Branch said.
Lynnhaven Borough council member W.W. Harrison Jr. said he has changed his mind about the borough system since he joined the council last summer. His area, with more than 94,000 residents, is easily big enough to retain its representative. But Harrison, who also defeated Balko, now thinks the present system should remain because it gives the city a chance to ``preserve its rural heritage'' and guarantees a voice to the Beach Borough, which ``becomes the playground of 2.5 million tourists every year.''
``I'm not saying that we couldn't make some changes,'' he said, ``but I'm of the opinion that the system isn't broke, so I don't see why we should be changing it.''
Harrison said he would not have devoted the hundreds of hours he has spent negotiating the plan for an amphitheater in Princess Anne Borough if he had been responsible only to residents of his own borough.
The Council of Civic Organizations, though, intends to keep fighting for the ward system, and will push to win that second referendum, scheduled for May 1996, if the legislation is signed by Gov. Allen.
They say ward elections will encourage more people to run for council and open those races up to people with little money but lots of energy to help the city.
Maurice B. Jackson, a C.C.O. member and one of the staunchest allies of the ward system, said Harrison's experience proves the current setup needs to be changed. Harrison was elected to council, although he, too, lost to Balko in his home borough. He spent about $100,000 to get elected.
``I don't feel that he represents me, because he was elected by the Kempsville Borough,'' said Jackson, a resident of Lynnhaven.
The future of the General Assembly's compromise now lies with the governor, who is expected to make a decision by March 27. If he vetoes the bill, the House and Senate will get one more shot at it this year in a special veto session.
If he signs it, the council will have to draw up the new districts by March 1996.
To Del. Leo C. Wardrup Jr., R-Virginia Beach, all that is just a start. Wardrup, who supports the compromise although he dislikes wards, said the council structure needs more fine-tuning to represent the state's largest city.
``I think this is the first step to bringing more realism into the way city council members are elected in the city of Virginia Beach,'' he said. ILLUSTRATION: Map
STAFF
by CNB