Ron Nirenberg will go down in the history books as the first mayor of San Antonio to serve four consecutive terms since Henry Cisneros accomplished the feat from 1981 to 1989. While Nirenberg’s name will not be on the ballot next November, the outcome of that election could prove central to his legacy.
Nirenberg called for sweeping changes to the San Antonio City Charter last week as he appointed a 15-member blue-ribbon commission to study a number of significant changes to municipal government, including better City Council and city manager pay, longer term limits, higher ethics standards for officeholders, and, potentially, an increased number of council districts in one of the nation’s fastest-growing major cities.
Nirenberg’s Tuesday letter to City Council members announcing the commission, which only the mayor can seat, includes the individual names of those who will serve. They range from a prominent retired banker and San Antonio Spurs executive to a former San Antonio Express-News journalist now working in public relations and a UTSA dean. Scroll down this San Antonio Report article to learn more about the commission members and their professional affiliations.
Bonnie Prosser Elder and David Zammiello will co-chair the commission. Elder chaired the 2022 redistricting committee and serves as general counsel and senior vice president for VIA Metropolitan Transit. Zammiello previously ran a workforce training nonprofit and is the president of DAZA Consulting Services.
Nirenberg’s call for charter reform looks at a number of key issues that many of us who closely follow municipal government believe must be addressed to improve local governance and to attract more qualified candidates to elected office.
The mayor and City Council members currently run for office every two years in May elections, which typically draw a dismal 10-15% of registered voters, yet county elections officials are required to staff citywide polling stations for both the early voting period and Election Day at considerable taxpayer expense. Officeholders, meanwhile, must engage in year-round fundraising to finance campaigns that most citizens ignore. A change from four two-year terms to two four-year terms and a move from the May to the November ballot would reduce the expenditure of public funds on poorly attended elections. It also would dramatically increase citizen participation, since 50% or more of registered voters typically vote in state and national elections.
Mayoral and council salaries were only paid for the first time in 2009, thanks to charter reform efforts led by Mayor Phil Hardberger, who served from 2005 to 2009, when city officials were term-limited to two two-year terms and the mayor was paid $50 per meeting and council members were paid $20 per meeting. Since 2015, council member salaries have been set at $45,722 per year, the equivalent at the time of median household income in the city, and $61,725 per year for the mayor.
In contrast to low City Council pay, Bexar County Commissioners earlier this year voted to give themselves a 5% raise, a move that does not require voter approval. County Judge Peter Sakai now makes just under $200,000 and a $14,000-per-year vehicle allowance, while commissioners earn around $150,000 plus the auto allowance. In Austin, for example, voters approved a 40% increase in city officeholder salaries last year. The mayor now earns $134,191 a year while council members earn $116,688.
The lack of a cost-of-living index attached to Hardberger’s charter reform initiative in 2009 has kept salaries at a level so low many would-be candidates say they and their families cannot afford to serve. Many council members pursue outside income-earning opportunities, even as they view their elected offices as full-time jobs.
Another key target in Nirenberg’s charter reform effort is reversing a 2018 charter amendment conceived and promoted by firefighter union leaders that imposed pay and tenure limits on the city manager, an act of revenge politics aimed at then-City Manager Sheryl Sculley. Her lengthy term as the city’s top executive from 2005 to 2018 included her successful, highly contentious effort to contain skyrocketing police and fire union pay and benefits at the collective bargaining table. Ironically, the reform only applied to future city managers, so Erik Walsh, who succeeded Sculley five years ago, now earns about the same pay as his peers in Texas cities a fraction the size of San Antonio.
Each individual change to the city charter will require its own item on the ballot, which if placed on the November ballot, will task voters with deciding everything from a U.S. presidential contest to state elections to down-ballot county races and the multiple city charter initiatives.
Hardberger has long served as a mentor to Nirenberg, dating to the current mayor’s previous service as the District 8 councilman. Hardberger’s successful efforts to amend the city charter were rightly seen as transformative, and Nirenberg will now seek the same legacy even as voters go to the polls in November. Charter reform elections typically require a well-funded campaign led by recognized political and private sector leaders, although the coming campaign is not expected to be challenged by police and firefighter unions or other well-funded, well-organized entities.
A successful charter reform campaign will attract more candidates to run for municipal office, stabilize the city manager’s office and strengthen ethics standards at City Hall, important steps as San Antonio continues to grow at a record pace. And it will give Nirenberg one more accomplishment to tout as he eyes his own political future after his fourth term as mayor ends in 2025.
(A side note for fellow city history buffs: Lila Cockrell, the first female mayor of a city with a population of more than 1 million people, also served four terms in that office, the first three from 1975 to 1981 before choosing not to seek re-election, and then a fourth term when she reversed course and was elected in 1989 to a final two-year term following the Cisneros era).
