Three years after voters approve it, Donna ratifies term length extensions

Donna City Hall in an undated photo.

Three years after Donna voters narrowly approved a proposal to extend the terms of office for the mayor, city council and municipal judge from three years to four, city officials have at last ratified voters’ wishes.

The Donna City Council officially updated the charter to include those term length changes during a Dec. 3 council meeting.

But the vote wasn’t unanimous, with Donna Mayor David Moreno and his brother, newly elected Place 4 Councilman Manuel “Manny” Moreno, voting against the ratification.

Thus came to an end — for now — a months-long dispute over the charter amendments that began this summer and ultimately led to the city holding a court-ordered election last month.

A bit of as-yet unresolved civil litigation spurred by the dispute also remains pending.

But as for the vote that the council took last Tuesday, interim City Attorney Dennis Ramirez said that city leaders never officially moved to update the Donna City Charter after the November 2021 election.

“I can’t speak to the who, … when, why that wasn’t done, but I can tell you that in looking at it now and reviewing that issue, I felt it was my obligation as the city’s attorney to bring it to your attention,” Ramirez said.

“It had not been confirmed. It was voted on … and it was passed, as required by the city charter, by a majority of the voters; however, it was never confirmed by the commission,” he added.

In 2021, Donna voters approved of two charter amendment propositions to extend the amount of time that elected officials can serve in office.

Proposition A, which passed by just under 2.6 percentage points, or 733 votes to 695, extended the terms of the mayor and city council from three years to four.

Four-year terms are the longest terms allowed under state law.

Similarly, Proposition B, which passed by an even narrower margin of less than 1.5 percentage points, extended the term of office of municipal judge from three years to four.

A voter-approved charter amendment does not take effect until a governing body — in this case, the Donna City Council — “enters an order in the records of the municipality declaring that the … amendment is adopted,” according to Title 2, Chapter 9 of the Texas Local Government Code.

Further, the city must then certify the amendment by sending “an authenticated copy” of the amendment to the Texas Secretary of State, the statute further states.

But somehow, for more than three years — and under the supervision of several different city attorneys — the measures went without being formalized by the city council.

The issue may have continued with Ramirez, the current city attorney, none the wiser had someone not tipped him off.

“It was brought to my attention to look into this issue,” Ramirez said, before mentioning how the issue factored into recent litigation.

Over the summer, after a split council voted 4-to-1 against holding a November election, Manny Moreno took the matter to the 13th Court of Appeals, in part, because the cancelled election meant he couldn’t file an application to run for office.

David Moreno, the mayor, had cast the sole vote against canceling the election.

Manuel “Manny” Moreno, second from right, takes the oath of office as the Place 4 Donna Councilman during a swearing in ceremony held at the Donna Recreation Center on Monday, Nov. 18, 2024. (Dina Arévalo | darevalo@themonitor.com)

Ultimately, the appellate court sided with Manny Moreno’s petition and ordered Donna to hold an election for the Place 2 and 4 seats on the council.

But now, after fighting for the city to hold the November election, the two Morenos sat in opposition to ratifying the charter amendment that Donna voters approved long before either of them took the oath of office.

The mayor began by asking Ramirez how the amendment applied to officials who were elected in 2023, like him, or in 2024, like his brother.

The city attorney affirmed that such elected officials should serve four-year terms because the charter amendment is prospective — meaning applicable to elections that occur after its passage — regardless of whether city officials have certified it.

Ramirez’s response echoed the legal opinion of former city attorney Robert Salinas, whom the opposing faction of the council fired last month, and who remains embroiled — along with the mayor — in a civil lawsuit.

Still, the Moreno brothers wondered if Ramirez should have sought a third-party legal opinion from the Texas Municipal League first, and whether it might be too late to certify it.

“If we don’t confirm it today, or in the future, then I believe it’s going to leave everything in limbo,” Ramirez responded to their questions.

The statute does not offer guidelines for how soon after an election a charter amendment must be ratified; however, the long delay in certifying them may open Donna up to legal challenges in the future, Ramirez said.

Nonetheless, he felt “that now is as good a time as any to try to confirm” the amendments.

“I really felt that the commission, (that) we should confirm the popular vote passed in 2021, three years ago. And then that gives me the ability to go back to the state and ask for further guidance,” Ramirez said.

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