Long Beach, CA. Big Box Ban Still Up In The Air

Council votes no on ballot measures: Big-box grocery ban will be revisited; hotel labor ordinance will be repealed. [Long Beach Press-Telegram]

The City Council voted Tuesday not to spend $510,000 to put two controversial measures on the Feb. 5 presidential primary ballot, but will reconsider one of them next month.

The council voted 5-4 against a motion by Vice Mayor Bonnie Lowenthal to have voters decide whether the city should ban big-box superstores that sell groceries.

The council then voted unanimously to consider again on Nov. 6 putting the issue on the Feb. 5 ballot after city staff members research how much it would cost if combined with a possible bond measure by Long Beach City College.

The council also voted unanimously against creating a ballot measure that would require a Labor Peace Agreement at hotels on city-owned property, which likely would force the creation of unions in exchange for no-strike guarantees.

The council already had approved both laws over the past year, but opponents gathered enough signatures to require voter approval of the ordinances. The council now must vote at an upcoming meeting to repeal its previous passage of the hotel union ordinance.

In addition to Lowenthal, councilmembers Patrick O’Donnell, Tonia Reyes Uranga and Suja Lowenthal voted in favor of creating the superstore ballot measure.

“The is an ordinance that protects middle-class workers that happen to be in the grocery business,” Bonnie Lowenthal said.

Supporters of the measure said Wal-Mart, which opposed the big-box ordinance and organized the petition drive to force a ballot measure, is to blame for the costly special election.

However, Councilman Val Lerch said unions that influence some members of the council are at fault.

“Special interest groups, the unions, caused us to be here today,” Lerch said.

Councilwoman Gerrie Schipske suggested the city could still get the ballot measure at a lower cost by adding it to a possible LBCC bond measure, and Councilwoman Rae Gabelich said she thought it might cost the city only $25,000.

The cost of the city’s two ballot measures had been determined to be $490,000 for a single ballot measure and $20,000 for the second one.

The council has until Nov. 9 to place a measure on the ballot.

Money was the issue for Councilman Gary DeLong.

“I don’t mind seeing it on the ballot as long as it doesn’t cost half a million dollars,” he said. “Although personally I still think (the big-box measure is) a bad idea, I would much rather spend ($20,000) or $25,000 on a bad idea than $500,000 on a bad idea.”

While the big-box measure created much heated discussion, the council rejected the hotel union measure with nary a word in a surprising unanimous vote.

The embattled ordinance was vetoed by Mayor Bob Foster last year in its original form before the council finally approved a new version 6-3.

Lerch, Gabelich and DeLong initially had voted against the ordinance the first time, but Uranga and Schipske announced last week they had changed their position.

Schipske said at the time that the law was badly worded, which would make convincing voters to support it difficult.

Uranga said she had changed her mind because the Unite Hotel Employees and Restaurant Employees Union, or Unite HERE, had told her that it wouldn’t be able to financially support efforts to persuade voters to approve the law.