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Fullerton to consider adopting city charter; final say would be up to voters

March 11, 2025

Fullerton leaders are looking at whether the city would be better served having its own charter.

About one in four cities in California have charters. These legal documents, essentially city constitutions, enable municipalities to retain greater local control over some local concerns related to and among other elements: zoning, city elections, bidding processes for public contracts, city revenue and spending.

Charter cities sometimes also grapple with more complex governance structures and greater potential for legal conflicts.

The alternative, accepted by about three-quarters of California cities and the status quo in Fullerton, is to be governed by state general law.

A divided Fullerton City Council directed staff this month to organize a study session to go into greater detail about the consequences of moving forward with a city charter. A date for the study session has yet to be announced.

But Councilmember Ahmad Zahra argues opening the door to writing a city charter would also open the door to wealthy special interests seeking an outsized say in public affairs.

“They’re going to tell you this is about local control,” he said of proponents of the city charter. “It is not.”

Councilmember Shana Charles also voted against moving forward with the idea, although she said she was open to learning more.

“I’m willing to investigate,” she said. “If you ask me tonight would I vote for ‘let’s move to a charter city and let’s do it right now,’ I wouldn’t do that. I would be wanting to put on the brakes. But I think that starting the process of looking at it and directing our staff to really do a dive into what are the actual benefits, what are the costs, what tools would it give us for all of those issues — I would be open to exploring that more fully.”

Should the City Council eventually decide to pursue a charter, Fullerton voters would ultimately need to approve that course of action by a simple majority in a general election, the next one being in fall 2026.

Several Orange County cities operate under a charter including its largest three — Anaheim, Irvine and Santa Ana — as well as Buena Park, Cypress, Huntington Beach, Los Alamitos, Newport Beach, Placenta and Seal Beach.

Fullerton Mayor Fred Jung proposed the idea of his city joining that list in part, he said, to have more legal tools at the city’s disposal to challenge the state’s housing authority.

“I am over this state overreaching and demanding that local government do things at their beck and call,” Jung said.“We need to have opportunities to push back. This is one,” he added. “When we don’t agree with the state RHNA housing number — it’s overinflated, completely asinine, there’s no way for us to push back right now — going to a charter allows us to give back local control to all of you.”

However, Scott Porter, a city attorney for Fullerton, said that “as a general rule, housing laws are a matter of statewide concern rather than local control.”

“In other words,” Porter said, “charter cities, as a general rule, cannot get out of housing laws.”

Like many cities across California, Fullerton challenged the state’s Regional Housing Needs Allocation, a mandate for how many new and affordable units cities need to zone for this decade.

When the state’s current housing cycle began in 2021, Fullerton was asked to zone for at least 13,209 new housing units by 2029 — an increase of more than 30% of its current housing stock.

Yet, like most appealing cities, Fullerton lost its petition to the state to reduce its mandated housing allocation.

It also delayed the submission of a compliant housing plan.

This led the Department of Housing and Community Development to refer Fullerton to the state Attorney General’s Office for being more than two years late in having a compliant housing element.

In 2024, the city reached a settlement with the state in which Fullerton officials assured future compliance.

Only weeks ago, the City Council finally approved and submitted to Sacramento what should be a compliant housing plan.

At least one charter city in Orange County, Huntington Beach, has taken California to court to challenge whether it is beholden to the housing assessment. However, the courts have not been kind to Huntington Beach’s argument that certain state laws don’t apply to it because it is a charter city.

Huntington Beach has tried to sidestep complying with state laws related to immigration enforcement and housing planning by arguing it is exempt because of its charter city status. Last year, a federal appeals court panel of judges ruled against Huntington Beach in a housing lawsuit brought by the city, ruling that California cities remain subordinate to the state no matter if they are a charter city or not.

OC Register writer Michael Slaten contributed to this report.

Orange County Register

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Fullerton to consider adopting city charter; final say would be up to voters

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