City of Ventura
About Ventura
Ventura City Hall.
The City of Ventura is one of Ventura County’s ten incorporated cities and two charter cities. As a charter city, Ventura can choose its model for conducting elections provided it complies with the California Voting Rights Act, or CVRA.
In 2018, Ventura transitioned from using plurality at-large elections to elect its city council to a plurality by single-winner district model to comply with the CVRA.
Ventura’s city government operates under a council-manger format consisting of seven city council members serving seven city council districts elected to four-year terms using a winner-by-plurality model.
Every two years, the city council chooses one of its members to serve a two-year term as mayor. The mayor will carry out the obligations of the mayor’s office and their obligations as a city council member until a new mayor is chosen.
All other positions within the city government (e.g., City Attorney, City Clerk) are appointed by the City Council or managed under the city manager, not elected.
Our Proposal
Our Petition calls upon the city council of Ventura to adopt ranked choice voting to replace its current system of plurality elections and to implement a proportional representation system using either multi-member districts or a proportional at-large model.
Ventura’s city charter allows the city council to change its elections by ordinance (Article 5, Section 506.) This means that the city council could implement these changes with a simple majority vote among its seven members. However, this is not our recommendation.
We believe that changes of this importance should be a joint decision between the voters and their elected officials. As such, our petition will ask the city council to place ballot measures on the November ballot and allow the voters to choose.