Torrance's Measure TC would reform the city's charter and increase council pay

The Tuesday, Nov. 5 general election is swiftly approaching — and with it, the deadline for Torrance voters to determine whether they want to support a sweeping reform of the city’s charter, alongside some changes to how many councilmembers are compensated.

Measure TC was placed on the ballot by the City Council in July, after Torrance conducted four public hearings and held a slew of other meetings to determine what would be included in the measure throughout this year.

The measure, which will require a simple majority to pass, is largely focused on updating the Torrance City Charter — the living document that governs the city’s operations and can only be amended with voter approval.

Torrance’s original charter was established in 1946, and has been updated on various occasions since then through 2020, according to a February city staff report.

“The primary reason for this request is to update the charter,” Third District Councilmember Asam Sheikh said during a Tuesday, July 16, council session. “There is some verbiage in the charter which are literally illegal. It’s time to make a change to reflect where we stand now.”

A bulk of Measure TC would permit Torrance to update outdated language and implement provisions aimed at good government reform — including lobbying disclosure, ethics training for city officials, updated transparency about public fund spending, and more.

The measure, for example, would update references to members of the City Council, the city clerk and other positions to use gender-neutral language, rather than using he/him pronouns.

“Under our current charter, some of our councilmembers would not be actually allowed to be councilmembers because they’re females,” City Attorney Patrick Sullivan said during a Tuesday, July 2, session. “So we cleaned that up, made (it) gender neutral.”

Other outdated language in the current charter includes a provision that requires the city clerk to notify the council by “telegraphic communication” if a meeting is cancelled, for example.

“I don’t think (the city clerk) has a telegraph in her office, so we took that out and changed it to email, text message or other electronic communication would suffice,” Sullivan said.

But besides language updates, Measure TC would also implement more modern governing standards for Torrance to follow.

A new section would be added into the charter, according to a staff report, that would give the City Council additional control over local elections. In other words, the council would be able to determine whether Torrance should conduct mail ballot, ranked choice or instant runoff voting, or other election methods.

The measure, though, wouldn’t change when Torrance holds its elections. As it stands, local general elections align with the statewide primary. During presidential elections, local elections are held in March; during non-presidential elections, they’re held in June.

Measure TC would also add new grounds to determine whether a councilmember has vacated their office, including felony conviction, “a crime involving moral turpitude,” a crime involving the person’s official duties, and failure to attend council meetings.

Other good government reforms housed within Measure TC include provisions to increase public meeting transparency and ensure that the public is able to participate in the local government process, the staff report said.

Measure TC would also require lobbyists to disclose their activities to the city clerk and implement revolving door restrictions for elected officials once they leave office.

Measure TC would also:

Implement anti-nepotism provisions to prevent council members or city department heads from hiring their family members for salaried jobs.
Require council members, board members, commissions and committees to complete ethics training every two years.
Require Torrance to adopt its annual budget by June 30 and post a copy of the budget on the city’s website.
Clarify when independent audits of city finances should be done and that they should be on file with the city clerk and posted to the city’s website.
Clarify the powers of the City Council, boards, committees and commissions.
Prevent sitting elected and high-level city officials from negotiating future employment/business opportunities with an entity who has an item pending a vote from a body they are a voting member of.
Prevent former city officials from engaging in direct communication with their former department, board, commission or committee in an attempt to influence a decision.
Implement conflict-of-interest and illegal contract prevention provisions for elected officials and city employees.
Removes outdated references to the Torrance Unified School District from the charter; TUSD is already an independent entity with its own elected board, budget and state law governance in place.

A complete copy of the proposed reforms to the City Charter is available on elections page of the city clerk’s website.

By far the most controversial item included within Measure TC, though, is a proposed increase to compensation rates for members of the City Council.

As it stands, Torrance councilmembers make $100 per month — or $1,200 a year — a payrate that’s remained unchanged since 1956.

Measure TC, if approved, would increase — and also restrict — the councilmember’s compensation to align with state minimum wage, which currently sits at $16 an hour, or $33,280 per year.

“For the avoidance of doubt, the monthly compensation for council members will be calculated by taking the minimum wage of the State of California and multiplying it by 2,080 hours to get the annual amount and dividing the annual amount by 12 to get the monthly compensation,” according to the proposed revisions to the charter.

The change wouldn’t impact councilmembers’ job classification. In other words, it wouldn’t make them city employees or hourly workers, and wouldn’t entitle them to any overtime pay.

While the majority of the City Council voted in favor of wrapping the compensation item into the entirety of Measure TC, two dissenting members argued against the potential pay increase altogether — while others argued that one component of the measure could jeopardize Measure TC’s passage.

“I don’t want this one issue to sink all of the other recommendations that need to move forward,” District 2 Councilmember Bridgett Lewis said during the July 16 meeting. “I still have that concern (that this) that could be the reason the entire measure fails.”

But it would cost the city a little more than $390,000 to place two ballot measures on the November ballot, according to the city clerk, rather than just bundling all charter changes into one ballot measure.

Fourth District Councilmember Sharon Kalani, one of two councilmembers who voted against including the proposed pay increase in Measure TC, argued that the proposal came too soon after the passage of Measure SST — a 0.5% local sales tax used to fund city services, which was voter approved in 2022.

“Very recently, we went to the public and we said, the city’s in dire need of income. We passed (Measure) SST — our residents believed us,” Kalani said. “I think it’s just too soon to compensate each and every one of us, $33,000, over a quarter of a million dollars. I am just not comfortable about that.”

District 6 Councilmember Jeremy Gerson, also a dissenter, said he believes that compensation shouldn’t be what draws people to seek out public office.

“When I ran for school board, people asked me why I decided to take a $92,000 pay cut. It was a higher calling, the same thing when I came here — I came here to serve,” Gerson said. “Compensation should not be the thing that drives people towards this position; it should be the desire to serve the community.”

But the remainder of the council’s five members and the majority in favor of the proposed pay increase argued that it was less about their own financial take home — and more about helping to open the aisles of public service to a wider array of people.

“I actually am the councilmember that would least benefit from this since I’m termed out in two years,” Fifth District representative Aurelio Mattucci said, “yet I’m pushing for it because in order to attract younger, working class people, we need to at least alleviate some of their financial burden.”

A position on the City Council, Mattucci and other council members said, is a full-time commitment. Though the majority of the councilmembers have jobs outside of the city to support themselves, it may not be a feasible position to pursue for people who aren’t independently wealthy.

“I can afford to be here, and that’s why I’m here — I’ve been here for six years,” Mattucci said. “But the next person that’s going to take my spot may not be in the same position. It’s not really about money — it’s about what’s fair.”

Vote-by-mail ballots were sent out to Los Angeles County residents earlier this month, and vote centers opened on Saturday, Oct. 26.

The election will get underway on Tuesday, Nov. 5. Polls close at 8 pm on Election Day. For more information about the election, visit lavote.gov or the Torrance City Clerks website.