Gang of 9 starts initiative effort.

Byline: SUSAN PALMER The Register-Guard

The Gang of 9 took its first steps from political commentary to direct activism Monday, launching a petition drive to change how Eugene elects city councilors.

The political action group's petition calls for amending the city charter to allow for citywide election of councilors, a voting method that a citizen review committee rejected last summer.

Now, residents of the city's eight wards choose their own council representatives.

The Gang of 9, a collection of area business people, wants to adopt the election method used in Springfield, where councilors live in particular districts but are chosen by all of the city's voters.

The gang first attracted attention in June with a series of cartoons in daily newspaper ads that lampooned progressive Eugene City Council members. During the fall elections, the group fought against preference voting and supported the West Eugene Parkway.

Public feedback to its advertisements prompted the group's latest campaign, said members Susan Selig and Jennifer Solomon.

"We heard from waitresses, upholstery people and mechanics that we need citywide elections," said Selig, an artist who owns commercial properties in Eugene. "The number of people who feel we really have got to change things in this town is really quite large."

The group contends that council members representing minority viewpoints are holding the city hostage to a narrow agenda.

Eugene's wards range in size from 7,748 voters in Ward 3 to 16,193 voters in Ward 5. Selig said it's not right that a councilor such as Bonny Bettman, with a majority of less than 4,000 votes in Ward 3, helps create policy for a city of 139,000 people.

The group has singled out councilors Bettman, David Kelly and Betty Taylor for criticism.

But the Citizen Charter Review Committee, a group of conservatives and liberals appointed by the council, examined the issue last spring and voted unanimously against it, said committee member Jon Belcher.

In a report to the City Council, the committee noted possible advantages of citywide elections - increased influence of individual voters who select more than one councilor and the potential for less parochial perspectives on the council.

But the committee members saw more disadvantages, including increased campaign costs and the possibility that councilors wouldn't have much in common with their ward constituents, said Belcher and committee member Bern Johnson.

The ward system promotes door-to-door campaigning, allowing candidates strapped for cash to talk with their constituents and meet them face to face, Johnson said.

City Councilor Nancy Nathanson said representation problems on the council might be better solved by the city's redistricting effort.

Right now, the city is top-heavy with councilors representing people who live on the south side of the river. Only David Kelly and Gary Pape represent districts substantially north of the Willamette River.

"I wish the initiative petition had awaited completion of ward boundaries," Nathanson said.

The Gang of 9 hopes to gather the necessary 6,400 signatures by Feb. 1, 2002, to put the initiative on the May 2002 ballot.