The Danger of Appeasement

Sonoma’s City Council recently decided to begin the process of switching from At-Large council elections to By-District. The reason for this decision is not because the City of Sonoma’s electoral process violates any voting rights law, but because an attorney has figured out a way to blackmail small cities into paying him money to avoid litigation.

Although no complaint or legal action has been initiated towards the City of Sonoma about its At-Large electoral process, the city has nonetheless decided to avoid any chance of such future litigation by converting elections into a By-District method. This effort, should it be completed, will still cost a considerable sum; the council has authorized an expenditure of up to $50,000 for a demographic study to determine the boundaries of each district.

The city has always used an At-Large system. Only two-and-a-half square miles in size, the City of Sonoma is small enough that those who run for office can knock on every voter door in town. Going to the supermarket is not just about buying melons, it’s a “press the flesh” experience of meeting and talking with voters.

The At-Large system conveys a message, namely that the people we elect to make the big decisions about our city represent the entire community, not simply the interests of their neighborhood. The By-District approach, on the other hand, emphasizes regionalism and conveys the message that a council member represents the needs of a district first and foremost. From there, district conflicts emerge, i.e. competition: who and where gets what?

Under the threat of litigation – and we must again note that no formal threat or accusation has been made – the City of Sonoma has buckled. The City Attorney advised that if a letter of demand is received, that act alone will cost the city $30,000 to resolve, and the council decided it’s too big a risk to take. On that basis, the electoral system that’s been in place essentially forever will be replaced, not because it isn’t working, but because the city might get sued.

Letters of demand sent to towns as small as Sonoma, over an inapplicable voting rights law intended to improve the political representation of minority neighborhoods in large cities, is nothing short of legal bullying. And, unfortunately, it’s working. In order to appease the bully, city after city has buckled. Of the 482 incorporated cities in California, 185 now use By-District elections. A recent example is the City of Healdsburg, a town roughly the size of the City of Sonoma. No wonder the City Attorney is worried; he knows what’s coming now that the first small-town domino has fallen in the County of Sonoma. The bully is winning.

We think there’s a danger in appeasement, however. The first mistake in opposing bullies is to voluntarily give in. From there the door is open to continued intimidation as legal bullies use the threats on issue after issue, even when there is no legitimate basis. The Americans With Disabilities Act (ADA) is a bitter case in point. That admirable federal law, adopted in 1990, empowers citizens to file lawsuits against businesses that fail to meet all the requirements of the Act. One unintended consequence has been a flood of predatory lawsuits targeting small businesses found to be in violation of various, often minor, details of the law. Of 3,850 ADA lawsuits filed in California in 2021, 92 percent were filed by just five law firms, which reaped tens of millions of dollars in fees. Small businesses are targeted because they can seldom afford the cost of a lawsuit and settle out of court. District elections are headed down the same path.

But rather than giving in without a fight, the cities in California should band together and resist. It’s better to forge and finance a powerful common strategy than for each small city to have to fight on its own. We wonder why the California League of Cities isn’t heading up this effort.

Sonoma Valley Sun Editorial Board