PORT ANGELES — Following considerable testimony and consultation with attorneys, the City Council unanimously approved a resolution Tuesday night saying it will adopt initiative and referendum powers for residents.
However, backers who collected enough signatures to force the City Council to adopt the measure are not happy with the wording of the adopted resolution.
Paul Lamoureux, of Concerned Citizens for Port Angeles, said he was distrustful of the council’s version, which he fears will eventually draw a narrower list of items a referendum or initiative can affect than those listed in state law.
Concerned Citizens for Port Angeles offered its own proposed draft resolution, written by Olympia attorney Gerald Steel.
“The difference is that our resolution says the city may use what the law says at the state level,” Lamoureux said Wednesday.
“Locally, the City Council may create ordinances that you can’t do this or you can’t do that.”
Lamoureux said that since the initiative and referendum proposal was created by his citizens’ group, those citizens are “entitled to the broadest limits” of the laws governing initiatives and referendums.
“The citizens are allowed to write their own language,” he said.
The resolution approved by the council on Tuesday night says it “declares its intention to adopt for the citizens of the city the powers of initiative and referendum in accordance with the provisions of state law.”
The resolution also says “nothing” in the resolution should be interpreted that the City Council will place in the ordinance “any limitations on the full and unrestricted exercise of those powers of initiative and referendum consistent with state law.”
Concerned Citizens for Port Angeles’ proposed resolution said that the city of Port Angeles “declares its intention that the sole restrictions to be placed on the exercise of these powers shall be those enacted through the state legislative process for statewide applications.”
Resolution ‘fairly typical’
City Attorney Bill Bloor on Wednesday said the resolution adopted by the City Council is a “fairly typical” resolution adopted by other Washington cities.
Bloor said the proposed resolution from Concerned Citizens for Port Angeles included additional language that few people understood, which created ambiguity and possible legal problems.
“There is a fairly simple way to adopt initiative and referendum powers,” Bloor said. “Why muck it up?
“They were either trying to expand the [initiative and referendum] powers beyond what the courts have established for cities or to limit the restrictions placed on I and R powers by state law.”
Bloor said initiative and referendum powers are not only outlined by state law, but also affected by court decisions.