McKinney voters will decide on whether to give council members a pay raise and extend their term limits after an ordinance passed Tuesday to put four charter amendments on the Nov. 5 ballot.
The four proposed city charter amendments include a measure to increase council members’ term limits from two consecutive four-year terms to three. Another would increase council members’ pay to a monthly stipend of $750 and the mayor’s pay to a $1,000 a month if passed.
The other two propositions would amend the charter to comply with new state laws that have been passed since the last charter amendment election in 2019 and remove provisions and policies the city no longer follows.
The vote to add these proposed amendments to the ballot passed 4-1, with only council member Justin Beller voting no.
The measure passed without discussion from council members.
Only one member of the public spoke about the proposed amendments. Debbie Lindstrom said she believed term limits promote new ideas and protect democracy, and that the charter election would waste time and resources.
“Your primary duty is to act in the best interest of the public, the very people who elected you to these positions of trust and responsibility,” Lindstrom said. “This proposed amendment, however, seems to prioritize the interests of those in power over those of the general public.”
Lindstrom, a frequent speaker and critic of election integrity at Collin County Commissioners’ Court, spoke on behalf of the Collin County chapter of Citizens Defending Freedom, a group that regularly repeats misinformation about the 2020 election at commissioners court meetings.
Right now, McKinney council members are paid $50 per meeting. The mayor is paid $100 per meeting.
If passed, the proposition would only apply to newly elected council members, not current elected officials.
The vote comes two weeks after the citizen charter review committee — which the council appointed in May to review the city charter — made their recommendations for the city charter election in November. One of their recommendations was to increase pay for council members and the mayor.
But the 21 charter committee members didn’t reach a consensus on term limits. A majority were in favor of keeping some form of term limits, with 11 saying they were in favor of the proposed increase from two consecutive terms to three. Only seven committee members said they were in favor of removing term limits.
Under current city charter rules, council members and the mayor can serve up to 16 nonconsecutive years in office. They can serve two consecutive terms in two positions, with a one-year waiting period before running for a second seat.
If the charter amendment passes, elected city officials in McKinney could serve as many as 24 nonconsecutive years.
McKinney voters elected Mayor George Fuller to his second term in 2021. Bridgette Wallis, who writes the McKinney Citizen to Citizen blog, criticized the proposal in a previous interview with KERA News.
“It is very self-serving to extend your own terms while you’re in office when no one in the public has said anything about wanting that,” Wallis said.
Fuller has denied ambitions to run for another term as mayor, although he has said he doesn't agree with term limits because he thinks voters should decide.
Under the current charter rules, he could still run for an at-large or district position a year after he finishes his second term. But he said at a February city council meeting he isn’t interested.
“I’ve stated repeatedly that I don’t think I want to run again,” Fuller said.
Council members considered calling for a charter amendment election during a Feb. 6 meeting and having the vote on the ballot May 4 during the city bond election, but instead decided to wait to call for a charter amendment vote until the November election, which has a higher voter turnout.
The last day to register to vote in the Nov. 5 election is Oct. 7. The deadline to apply for a mail-in ballot is Oct. 25.
Got a tip? Email Caroline Love at clove@kera.org.
Caroline Love is a Report For America corps member for KERA News.
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