Ex-Councilman Woo Challenging Charter to Seek Third Term

Former Los Angeles Councilman Michael Woo on Thursday filed a lawsuit challenging the city clerk’s interpretation of the new city charter, alleging that the document was erroneously amended to restrict all former council members from serving more than two terms.

Seeking to run again for his old council seat, Woo contends that one line was mistakenly extracted from the document, which takes effect Saturday. That line made clear that city term limits, imposed in 1993, limited future council members to two terms, but did not count terms prior to that date against anyone then holding office.

Because of that omission in the new charter, Woo, who served two terms before 1993, cannot serve again as a City Council member, according to City Clerk J. Michael Carey and the city attorney’s office.

“This is contrary to fundamental law, that you do not enact a law retroactively,” said attorney Fredric D. Woocher, who is representing Woo in his case against the city. “It’s unfortunate that we have to go to court to get it resolved.”

Woo, who unsuccessfully ran for mayor in 1993, said he plans to ask the authors of the charter reforms to testify that they did not intend to make term limits retroactive when they wrote the new city constitution. The lawsuit filed by the former city councilman is the first legal challenge to the voter-approved charter.

“The charter constitutes a change that nobody knew about,” Woo said.

Indeed, George Kieffer, who was chairman of the city’s Appointed Charter Reform Commission, said it was the elected and appointed charter commissions’ plan to leave the 1993 term limit law intact.

“It is fair to say that our intention was to maintain the term limits that were in the previous charter,” Kieffer said. “There was no discussion either way of that particular line being removed.”

Kieffer said he was unsure why the line was taken out of the new charter. He said he is seeking an explanation.

Woo attempted about two months ago to take out papers to become a candidate in the 2001 primary. Carey responded with a letter stating that, based on the advice of the city attorney, Woo was no longer qualified to seek election to the council.

“Section 206 of the charter that will become operative on July 1, 2000, provides that ‘no person may serve more than two terms of office as a member of the City Council,’ ” Carey wrote in a letter to Woo’s attorney. “Mr. Woo has already served two full terms on the City Council. . . . He is not eligible to seek election to the council or to hold that office.”