Sonoma City Clerk Certifies Hotel Limitation Signatures, City Council Next Step

City Clerk Gay Johann announced today that she had received verification from the Sonoma County Elections Department that the Hotel Limitation Measure had sufficient valid signatures to qualify for a special election.  

The petitions from Preserving Sonoma were submitted to her office on Monday.  

According to the Registrar of Voters office, the petitions submitted contained 1673 signatures of which 1312 were valid, 341 were insufficient and 20 were duplicate signatures.  

The number of signatures required for the initiative to qualify for the ballot was 1,017.  

Pursuant to CA Election Code Section 9115, the Registrar of Voters office conducted a random sample of 500 signatures to make the determination.

"Well, that was fast," said Larry Barnett, head of the Preserving Sonoma committee behind the Hotel Limitation Measure. 

Said Ken Brown, mayor of the City of Sonoma, "A valid [citizen's] initiative is part of the political process in the State of California." When asked about the next steps, Brown said, "It will go on the City Council agenda for a vote, and then we'll see."  He did not speculate on the outcome of the Council discussion or vote.

Johann stated that these results would be presented to the City Council at their next meeting, Monday July 15. At that time the Council will have the options of 1)  Adopting the ordinance submitted by the initiative proponents; 2) Requesting an impact report; or 3) Calling a special election.  

Should the Council decide to request an impact report, it would have to be prepared and presented to the City council within thirty days.  At that time the Council would have the option of 1) adopting the ordinance submitted by the initiative proponents; or 2) calling a special election. 

Calls and email to the Protect Sonoma organization opposed to the Hotel Limitation Measure were not answered as we publish this article; it will be updated when and if they respond.