THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, April 28, 1996 TAG: 9604280054
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Decision '96
SOURCE: BY KAREN WEINTRAUB, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: VIRGINIA BEACH LENGTH: Long : 119 lines
As if next week's elections weren't confusing enough - with 55 names on the ballot - voters also will be asked whether they want to scrap their system of electing local leaders.
Two years ago, a majority of Beach voters said they wanted to change to a partial ward system. But the council wasn't convinced. The state legislature struck a compromise that upset almost everyone, and now the issue is back on the ballot.
Each step in the process, rather than bringing the debate closer to a resolution, seems to have added yet another layer of confusion.
Voters will be asked May 7 whether they want to trade the current system, in which all residents can vote for all 22 members of the City Council and School Board, for a new one in which seven of the officials on each body would be elected only by people in their district and the others would remain at-large.
The most concrete difference between the two systems is the number of people each voter would select. Now, every voter must pick 22 representatives - 11 on the council and 11 for the School Board. If the change is approved, each voter would vote for only 10 candidates - five on each group.
Supporters of this change say it will make Virginia Beach's government more accountable to its residents. Ward representatives, they argue, would be more responsive to the needs of residents in their voting district.
Supporters of the current system say nothing could be more accountable than having all voters in the city select all leaders.
Del Carlson, a resident of the Thalia area and a political science professor at Virginia Wesleyan College, said he's not sure yet how he'll vote.
``The advantage (of a change),'' he said, ``is that you would link most of the representatives to their specific boroughs and people might have the sense that they're being more directly represented. . . . The potential difficulty would be further fragmenting the city.''
As if the concept of at-large vs. a modified ward system weren't confusing enough, the state doesn't like the question voters will consider at the polls next week.
Two years ago, 52.7 percent of Beach voters said they wanted a new system. But many people later said they didn't understand the question, which was in two parts and was written so that a ``yes'' vote favored the change.
The City Council was given legal authority to write this year's question, and council members - most of whom don't want a change - phrased the ballot language so that people who want a new system will have to vote ``no.''
They also added a second sentence that seems to support keeping the system the same: ``If you wish to vote for all 11 council seats, vote YES! If you prefer to vote for only 5 of the 11 council seats, vote NO!''
The state Board of Elections took issue with the question - largely because there wasn't a question mark at the end - but lost after several months of legal appeals because the General Assembly had said the council could word the question however it liked.
The referendum's roots stretch back five years and across two local elections.
Two years ago, when the voters supported the switch to a modified ward system, they also decided to change the way Virginia Beach voting districts were drawn.
The 1990 census had shown that Virginia Beach's seven boroughs ranged in population from fewer than 1,000 in Blackwater to nearly 150,000 in Kempsville. Many people thought it unfair to have one council member responsible for a quarter of the city's population and another council member responsible for an area with more pigs than people.
The U.S. Supreme Court had decided in the late 1960s that the city's system of government was fair, despite what was already a big population gap; but more and more citizens thought the disparity had grown too large.
Advocates for a change tried to get the council to voluntarily equalize the number of citizens in each borough. The council voted 6-5 one week to make things more even and then 6-5 a week or two later to go back to the old system.
In frustration, a group of civic activists started a petition drive, which put it on the ballot two years ago.
The General Assembly last year agreed that the borough populations should be evened out. The council finished drafting new lines in February, but last week agreed to consider making more changes because residents of one Lynnhaven area were upset that the line split their neighborhood.
(The General Assembly forgot to mention whether the electoral lines should be the same for School Board elections, but passed another bill this year to make all the rules the same.)
The Assembly also mandated another vote on the ward system - the one on May 7 - which upset those who had lobbied so long for a change.
In addition to wanting equally populated boroughs, those advocates were upset that one of their friends - Al Balko - kept losing his bids for the Lynnhaven seat on the City Council.
Balko had been elected to the seat in 1986, but he couldn't win it again. He garnered the majority of votes in the Lynnhaven Borough in the 1990 and 1994 elections, but lost to James Brazier in 1990 and William W. Harrison in 1994 when each won more votes citywide.
Balko's supporters say the current system is unfair if the voters of one borough can be overruled by voters in the rest.
Under the modified ward system they support, only three council members and the mayor will be elected citywide, and the Lynnhaven seat will be held by whoever has the most support in the Lynnhaven district.
To further confuse matters, two years from now the new district lines will be in place and voters could find themselves in different precincts, connected by voting lines to different parts of town.
And two years after that, when the next census is completed, the district lines might have to be redrawn all over again. ILLUSTRATION: [Side Bar]
If you Vote Yes:
If you Vote No:
For complete text, see microfilm
KEYWORDS: REFERENDUM VIRGINIA BEACH'S ELECTION SYSTEM VIRGINIA BEACH
SCHOOL BOARD VIRGINIA BEACH CITY COUNCIL ELECTION CANDIDATES
by CNB