SAN DIEGO: Last week, the San Diego City Attorney’s Office cleared up confusion surrounding the process for recalling elected officials. There had been concern that two separate, declared campaigns to recall Mayor Filner may nullify each other’s efforts. After review, it became clear that once one of the campaigns has gathered enough signatures, only then would subsequent measures be banned. If an election is held and the recall measure is rejected by voters, organizers must wait six months before starting the process over again.
Should one of the efforts garner enough support, San Diegans may vote on the recall as early as November of this year.
But the City Attorney’s opinion may be all for naught as the old proverb, “the enemy of my enemy is my friend” apparently rings true in San Diego. As of Friday, the formerly-antagonistic relationship between recall effort leaders Stampp Corbin and Michael Pallmary has been mended and the two have decided to combine efforts to oust the embattled Mayor.
Even with unified forces, the recall effort will not be easy. The group has 39 days to collect at least 101,597 signatures. Leaders of the Gray Davis recall estimate that Corbin and Pallmary will have to raise $700,000 to hire professional signature gathers, a necessity if they hope to clear the 100,000 signature threshold.
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SAN BERNARDINO: Rallied by an effort to “recall them all,” a group in San Bernardino has succeeded in collecting enough signatures to put to vote the political careers of three Council members and the City Attorney. The remaining four Council members are up for re-election in November. The leaders of the recall effort, a group by the name of San Bernardino Residents for Responsible Government, blame the Council for the economic decline of their city and its impending bankruptcy.
The City Clerk rejected the three of the four petitions on the grounds that the signatures were collected before the official initiation of the recall process. Organizers of the recall have filed a writ of mandate in an effort to get the judicial system to force the City Clerk to count the signatures, regardless of her interpretation that they were collected in error.
So far they have spent $154,870 in their efforts.
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MORENO VALLEY: Efforts to recall Mayor Tom Owings have been stalled for a second time. Organizers will have to once again resubmit paperwork to initiate the process. Petitions to recall the other four councilmembers are currently pending.
The group’s Facebook page lists their reasons behind the recall; key among them is the pending investigation of the City Council for corruption, allegations of political favors to developers and a mismanagement of city funds.
Political signs in support of the Mayor have appeared around Moreno Valley, and have caused a clash between the City’s political sign ordinance and the First Amendment.