A September poll from UTSA’s Center for Public Opinion Research found that more than 80% of San Antonio voters had never heard of the six charter amendments that will be on their ballots in November.
A majority of the San Antonio City Council approved each of these items to go before voters after the months-long Charter Review Commission process.
This is the exact language voters will see for each of the propositions and what they’ll need to know about them before they cast their votes.
Proposition A: Ethics Revisions
- Shall Article XIII, entitled Ethics Review Board, of the City Charter be amended to add a definition of “conflicts of interest”; require sufficient funding to the Ethics Review Board so it may perform all its assigned duties, and authorize the Ethics Review Board to accept or decline complaints that have been resolved by an entity other than the Ethics Review Board?
Prop A makes some minor changes to the way the city’s Ethics Review Board functions. The Ethics Review Board is an 11-member citizen board with authority to enforce and sanction violations of City Code relating to ethics, lobbying, and municipal campaign finance, and which has its members appointed by the San Antonio City Council and the mayor.
Proposition B: Language Modernization
- Shall the following sections of the City Charter be amended to revise or eliminate provisions which have been superseded by state law and to update archaic language to current usage: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, 9, 11, 13, 15, 16, 17, 18, 20, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, 41, 43, 45, 46, 47, 49, 51, 52, 53, 53a, 54, 55, 56, 58, 67, 68, Article V.A., 69, 70, 71, 72, 75, 76, 77, 78, 80, 81, 82, 83, 84, 85, 87, 89, 91, 93, 95, 96, 98, 99, 100, 101, 102, 103, 104, 105, 106, 107, Article VIII, 112, 117, 119, 121, 122, 123, 123A, 124, 125, 127, 128, 129, 130, 131, 132, 133, 134, 135, and 136?
Prop B amends multiple sections of the San Antonio City Charter to update or remove outdated language but makes no substantive changes to how the city functions. This includes the addition of gender neutral language and changing language to reflect the current practices of city departments.
Proposition C: City Manager Tenure and Compensation
- Shall the Charter of the City of San Antonio be amended to grant to City Council the authority to set the full terms of the City Manager’s employment including tenure and compensation?
Prop C would remove the salary and tenure limits San Antonio voters placed on the city manager position in 2018. The current salary cap is no more than 10 times the lowest-paid salaried city employee, which is currently around a $370,000 salary for the city manager. The current tenure cap is eight years.
Voters approved these limits for the city manager by a wide margin after the San Antonio Professional Firefighters Association pushed the proposals during a contract negotiation fight with then-City Manager Sheryl Sculley.
Proponents in the city council have said that because they appoint and remove city managers, they need the authority to decide how much they should be paid and how long they can work for the city. Several have also suggested that it will be difficult to hire a new city manager after City Manager Erik Walsh terms out in 2027 if candidates know they only have a job for eight years.
Opponents in the community have said the city manager — the most powerful figure in the city’s administrative system — should have term limits just like elected representatives and that if the city wants to boost the position’s pay, they can do so through raises for the lowest-paid city employees.
Proposition D: City Employee Political Activity
- Shall the Charter of the City of San Antonio be amended to allow City employees to participate in local political activity consistent with State and Federal law while protecting employees against political retribution and maintaining a general prohibition on participation in local political activity for the city leadership team?
Prop D would eliminate a 72-year ban on city employees from engaging in city politics, even while they are not at work. Currently, these employees cannot do things such as canvass for or donate to municipal political candidates. If voters approve Prop D, city employees would still not be allowed to engage in city politics while on the job or in uniform.
This charter amendment was placed on the ballot after a successful lobbying effort by the American Federation for State, County, and Municipal Employees (AFSCME).
Proposition E: City Council Compensation
- Shall the Charter of the City of San Antonio be amended to set and limit the compensation for City Council members and the Mayor at $70,200 and $87,800 annually with annual future adjustments to correlate to the United States Housing and Urban Development 4-member household median income for San Antonio, and authorize a Council member or the Mayor to decline any or all of the established compensation?
Prop E would give city council members and the mayor roughly $25,000 raises from their current $45,722 and $61,725 salaries, respectively. The current salaries were established in 2015 and were selected based on the average median income of the San Antonio area at that time.
The proposed salaries, like the prop language states, would be indexed and therefore change as the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development 4-member household median income for San Antonio changes.
Proponents of the change at city council have said if council pay doesn’t improve, it will ensure that the city’s legislative body is dominated by wealthy residents who can afford it.
Opponents, including the three lawyers on council, have said they believe it’s a poor use of city tax dollars.
Proposition F: City Council Terms
- Shall the Charter of the City of San Antonio be amended to extend the terms of all elected members of City Council, including the Mayor, from two (2) years to four (4) years and changing the term limits from four (4) full terms to two (2) full terms while keeping the terms concurrent?
Prop F would keep the total term length limit for council members and the mayor at eight years but extend the terms from two years to four years. Special elections would be required for certain districts through the early 2030s to ensure no member currently on council served more than their eight-year maximum. Under this new system, voters could still remove their council members early through a recall vote.
Proponents said longer terms would give newly elected council members more time to learn the job and properly represent their constituents, and that they would reduce the amount of time campaigning takes from a member’s time in office. They also said it would offer more continuity for district representation and reduce the cost burden holding elections has on the city.
Opponents said because city council is the most local form of governance, residents should have the authority to change their representatives more quickly, and that it’s not necessarily a bad thing that elected representatives are always in campaign mode ensuring their voters’ needs are met.
Early voting begins on Oct. 21, and Election Day is Nov. 5.
