2:30pm | The recent City Council difficulty in reaching an initial decision on Vice-Mayor for the new Council term placed a spotlight on how the absence of even one Councilmember can have possible long-term ramifications.
Long Beach City Councilmembers and Mayor Bob Foster posted attendance rates between 78.9 percent and 98.7 percent during the last Council term, according to a review of the official minutes from 76 City Council meetings held from July, 2008 to July, 2010.
The review also revealed that a Council meeting including all the sitting Councilmembers and the Mayor only occurred 30 times, or 39.5 percent of the time. Even without considering the attendance of the Mayor, the Council only met in full for 32 meetings, or just 42.1 percent of the time.
During the 13 meetings in late 2008 and early 2009 when the 1st District seat was vacant, a full council was considered as occurring when the sitting eight members were present. This only happened five times during that period. Also, attendance was based on each meetings’ opening roll call. Councilmembers (or the Mayor) who arrived late were considered absent.
Individually, most of the Councilmembers turned in fairly impressive attendance records during the term.
The best attendance was turned in by 9th District Councilmember and the term’s Vice-Mayor Val Lerch who only missed one meeting (on Oct. 7, 2008) for an overall 98.7 percent attendance rate.
On the low side, 8th District Councilmember Rae Gabelich appeared at the start of 60 meetings for an overall 78.9 percent attendance rate.
The other Councilmembers were spread out between these two bookends:
- Bonnie Lowenthal, 1st District – 85.7 percent (based on 14 meetings before stepping down on Nov. 14, 2008)
- Robert Garcia, 1st District – 85.7 percent (based on 49 meetings after taking office April 7, 2009)
- Suja Lowenthal, 2nd District – 80.3 percent
- Gary DeLong, 3rd District – 89.5 percent
- Patrick O’Donnell, 4th District – 92.1 percent
- Gerrie Schipske, 5th District – 86.8 percent
- Dee Andrews, 6th District – 94.7 percent
- Tonia Reyes-Uranga, 7th District – 89.5 percent
The average attendance rate for a City Councilmember during the two-year term was 88.2 percent. By comparison, an average full-time worker that uses 10 sick days a year would have an attendance rate of just under 96 percent.
Mayor Foster had an 84.2 percent attendance rate, missing 12 of the 76 meetings during the term. Val Lerch, as Vice-Mayor, presided over each of the 12 meetings missed by Mayor Foster.
In total, there were 28 meetings during the term where nine Councilmembers were in attendance, 25 meetings where eight members were present, 10 meetings with only seven members present, seven meetings with only six members present and six meetings with just five members present. Under law, a meeting requires a minimum of five Councilmembers for a quorum.
This works out to roughly 37 percent of the 76 meetings during the term were conducted with nine members present, 32 percent with eight members, 13 percent with seven members, 9 percent with six members, and 8 percent with five members.
Click here to read our policy on covering the Long Beach City Council.