After four hours of discussion Monday night, city councilors finally voted on a series of proposed changes to the city charter, including how many votes a candidate needs to win an election. The meeting — the last until Aug. 5 — wrapped up after 1 a.m.

Three of the four amendments were approved and will most likely be sent to voters in November. 

City Councilors Dan Lewis, Klarissa Peña and Renée Grout had introduced amendments proposing changing the city’s majority rules for voting and the process for appointing and removing key officials. 

“I am happy to present these proposals to Albuquerque voters,” Lewis said in a press release following the vote. “They should decide how they want the government to run. I trust the voters.”

However, Mayor Tim Keller criticized the proposal for allowing candidates to win without getting the majority of the vote. He said he intends to veto the proposal.

“What city wants its leaders serving with a 10% mandate?” Keller said in a press release. “Our city has no term limits, so I’m very concerned — above and beyond my own self-interest — that this would make it nearly impossible for an incumbent to lose.” 

Resident, Rosemary Blanchard, took issue with councilors debating the charter changes late at night. Blanchard said via Zoom only “stay-at-home retirees” like herself can stay up so late to testify.

“I am asking you to put together a reasonable, competent, governmental and professional and private citizen group to look at our charter,” Blanchard said at almost 1:30 a.m. “It shouldn’t happen in the dead of night.” 

Election changes

The initial proposal was to change the city’s voting rules to allow a candidate for mayor or city council to be elected with at least 40% of the total vote but after an hour of discussion councilors approved allowing anyone with the majority to win. 

Currently, to be elected a mayor or city councilor must have at least 50% of the vote or be subject to a run-off election. 

The dozens of speakers Monday and at the council’s June 3 meeting who criticized the proposal as “antidemocratic” did not stop councilors from approving the change on a 6-3 vote. Residents also blasted Lewis for an op-ed published in the Albuquerque Journal, titled “Runoff elections are rooted in racist strategies in the South.” 

Carter Bundy, a political action representative for the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, said Lewis’ op-ed alleges that runoff elections are racist because racists in the south wanted to keep African Americans from winning and used runoff elections to do so.

“If a councilor truly believes runoffs are racist with a 50% threshold, it’s no less racist at 40%,” Bundy said. 

In response to Lewis’ op-ed, Peña said “this is history folks.” 

She said “everyone keeps saying it is undemocratic,” to change the majority ruling, but she quoted Rock the Vote, which says runoff elections are “undemocratic by design.” 

Kevin Morrow, the council’s attorney, said there is no City Council election in 2026, so it would not go into effect until 2027.

Other approved charter changes

Councilors also passed a proposal to change the process to remove the chiefs of the Albuquerque Police Department and Albuquerque Fire Rescue on a 6-3 vote. 

The proposal would allow the mayor to terminate the employment agreement at any time and allow the council to terminate the agreement at any time with a two-thirds plus one vote of the council. 

And councilors approved a proposal to create a process for filling vacancies on a three-member conference committee that resolves disputes between the mayor and the council. That passed on a 7-2 vote.

All but one 

While most of the charter amendments were approved, councilors voted down a proposal to adopt a committee composed of mayoral and City Council appointees to recommend candidates for possible appointment as city clerk and city attorney. Currently, the mayor appoints the city clerk and city attorney with “advice and consent” from two-thirds of the council. 

After more than an hour of debate regarding the proposal, Fiebelkorn said the discussion was “as clear as mud” with multiple questions and confusion. She said the proposal to create a city charter task force would be a better alternative to answer questions and clear any confusion. 

Given that the proposal to create a task force was not discussed until after 1 a.m., councilors deferred it again until Aug. 5. 

The proposal to adopt the committee failed on a 5-4 vote.

Other deferred items

Peña introduced two new charter amendments that would change the City Council election cycles, which were also deferred until Aug. 5. 

These two amendments would allow all councilors to be elected in the same year and not coincide with the mayoral elections.