1 THESE MINUTES ARE NOT OFFICIAL
UNTIL APPROVED BY THE
CULVER CITY
STANDING GOVERNANCE SUBCOMMITTEE
OF THE CITY COUNCIL
REGULAR MEETING OF THE April 1, 2026
CULVER CITY STANDING GOVERNANCE 3:00 p.m.
SUBCOMMITTEE OF THE CITY COUNCIL
CULVER CITY, CALIFORNIA
Call to Order & Roll Call
Vice Mayor Fish called the regular meeting of the Standing Governance Subcommittee of the City Council to order at 3:04 p.m. in the Patacchia Room at City Hall.
Present: Bubba Fish, Vice Mayor
Yasmine-Imani McMorrin, Council Member
Staff Present: Shelly Wolfberg, Assistant to the City
Manager
Christina Burrows, Deputy City Attorney
Jeremy Bocchino, City Clerk
T’Ana Allen, Deputy City Clerk
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Pledge of Allegiance
Vice Mayor Fish led the Pledge of Allegiance.
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Recess/Reconvene
Vice Chair Fish called a brief recess from 3:04 p.m. to 3:08 p.m. to allow staff to address sound issues.
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Standing Governance Subcommittee
of the City Council
April 1, 2026
2 Public Comment – Items NOT On The Agenda
Vice Mayor Fish invited public comment.
Shelly Wolfberg, Assistant to the City Manager, reported that no requests to speak had been received.
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Receipt of Correspondence
Shelly Wolfberg, Assistant to the City Manager, indicated that no correspondence had been received.
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Consent Calendar Items
Item C-1
Approval of Minutes of the Standing Governance Subcommittee Meeting Held on December 3, 2025
MOVED BY COUNCIL MEMBER MCMORRIN, SECONDED BY VICE MAYOR FISH
AND UNANIMOUSLY CARRIED, THAT THE STANDING GOVERNANCE
SUBCOMMITTEE APPROVE MINUTES OF THE STANDING GOVERNANCE SUBCOMMITTEE MEETING HELD ON DECEMBER 3, 2025.
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Order of the Agenda
No changes were made.
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Recess/Reconvene
Vice Chair Fish called a brief recess from 3:08 p.m. to 3:11 p.m. to allow staff to address sound issues.
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Standing Governance Subcommittee
of the City Council
April 1, 2026
3 Action Items
Item A-1
(1) Discussion of a Democracy Voucher Program and a Public Matching Funds Program and, if desired, (2) Provide a
Recommendation to Staff as Appropriate
Shelly Wolfberg, Assistant to the City Manager, discussed a possible Culver City democracy voucher program; requirements of the Seattle voucher program; city responsibility of
verifying the vouchers and converting them into campaign funds; relatively low participation rates; the status of unused funds in Seattle; qualifying thresholds; the voter approved property tax to fund the program; she provided an overview of the public financing funds in Berkeley; discussed key features and goals of the matching funds program;
democracy vouchers vs. matching funds; cost control and legal defensibility; state enabling authority and voter approval necessary to use either system; and the need for direction from the City Council to move forward with more in-depth research.
Discussion ensued between staff and Subcommittee Members regarding timing to put an item on the ballot for voter approval; constraint of public financing of campaigns by state law and an FPPC (Fair Political Practices Commission) framework; the charter city framework; the current charter reform process being done in Los Angeles; charter reform vs. charter amendments; the work of the Charter Review Committee in 2006; other charter-related items; the mayoral rotation; a written reference to the need to review the charter every 10 years; including citizen input in the charter review process; and staff agreement to bring back a general
discussion on charter reform at the next meeting.
Additional discussion ensued between staff and Subcommittee Members regarding administration costs for matching funds as being less expensive than democracy vouchers; the Los Angeles City program; outreach; comments from the LA City Controller about the importance of matching funds to his being elected; a suggestion to handle the changes under the charter review; and staff agreement to research and provide more information about the Seattle program and return with an agenda item on a charter reform process at a future Subcommittee meeting.
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Standing Governance Subcommittee
of the City Council
April 1, 2026
4 Item A-2
Update on Recommendations to City Council to Make City Council Meetings More Efficient
Jeremy Bocchino, City Clerk, provided background and an update on recommendations to the City Council on how to make City Council meetings more efficient; discussed the pilot program; actions implemented to date; including subject matter when signing up to make public comment; written
correspondence; allowing for people to have their say while allowing the meeting to continue in order to accomplish goals of the City Council and of the public; ensuring that meeting presentations are attached to staff reports when agendas are published; potential need to update presentations closer to the meeting dates; ensuring clarity for any changes;
discrepancies between what is online and what is in the packet; the ability for anyone to request updated
attachments; disallowing speakers from ceding their time; including recognition language with the agenda to allow Council Member discretion as to whether the full item should be read; limiting Council Member comments to ten minutes per item; and certain items that take a long time.
Discussion ensued between staff and Subcommittee Members regarding acknowledging an issue when it is brought up and agendizing a discussion; support for civic engagement;
encouraging regular meeting attendance; agreeing on an amount of time allocated for a discussion and making a motion to continue the discussion past the allocated time; average amount of time spent on items; helping Council Members
understand how much time they have used; Council Member requests to speak; learning how to be concise; awareness of time that has begun to shorten meetings; a suggestion to provide transparency with a quarterly review of length of time Council Members spoke, amount of time that public comment took, and length of time taken per agenda item;
accountability; changing habits; support for phased changes; measuring impacts of changes to Council speaking procedures and then implementing changes to public comment; and the goal to end meetings earlier to allow for public participation.
Additional discussion ensued between staff and Council
Members regarding the process to agendize items; a suggestion to bring up items to be agendized during Items from Members at the start of the meeting with a vote not taken until the Standing Governance Subcommittee
of the City Council
April 1, 2026
5 end of the meeting; certain items that are complicated to explain on the dais; items not vetted by staff; motions without any input from staff; concern with exceptions;
feedback on the practices of West Hollywood; allowing
research to determine whether items should be agendized; items outside of regular Council business; progress being made on items that have been agreed to be agendized; focusing on the work done; public requests to agendize items; the need to say yes to understand what the item is; allowing for a consistent and public process; City Council review of an item before deciding to spend resources on it; allowing for more consideration; staff time; having an item on the agenda that no one is prepared to talk about; allowing everyone to be on the same level; finding another mechanism to get the
information across rather than agendizing the item; memos sent from the City Manager’s Office; concern with taking away from the agenda at hand; and staff agreement to keep the Subcommittee posted on progress.
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Item A-3
Update on Potential Culver City Campaign Finance Reform and Introduction to Campaign Rules Webpage
T’Ana Allen, Deputy City Clerk, provided an update on progress made in campaign finance reform; discussed previous
consideration of the item; campaign advertisements;
disclosure of top donors; educating the public; providing information on campaign contributions and expenses for each candidate; public access to the Campaign Disclosure portal; availability of campaign forms filed; providing a better way for people to digest information; providing overall
information on campaign rules; creation of a webpage
containing a Guide to Campaign Rules; FPPC Rules; support of ballot measures; illustrating the campaign process; campaign reporting activity and ad disclosure; violations; and
enforcement.
Discussion ensued between staff and Subcommittee Members regarding appreciation for the work of staff; staff agreement to share the unpublished website to Subcommittee Members for their review; helping people understand where to find
information; providing a short statement acknowledging the amount of work involved and providing contact information for those with questions; managing expectations; providing
Standing Governance Subcommittee
of the City Council
April 1, 2026
6 guardrails and education; allowing places to go to find additional information; providing searchability of the
webpage; a suggestion to create a small City Clerk video directing people to existing resources; violations; providing a visual for what is acceptable and what is not with Dos and Don’ts; continued work; and staff agreed to provide an update before the website goes live.
Vice Mayor Fish noted that no public comment had been received on the item.
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Public Comment - Items NOT on the Agenda (Continued)
Vicr Mayor Fish invited public comment.
The following member of the public addressed the
Subcommittee:
Jeannine Wisnosky Stehlin asked that the Subcommittee address the lobby registry; discussed benefits to having a lobby registry; noted that Culver City is one of the only cities in the area without a lobby registry; expressed frustration that the item has not been brought forward; and concern with discouraging public participation by holding the meeting during the afternoon.
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Items from Members/Staff
Discussion ensued between staff and Subcommittee Members regarding regular meeting time; full City Council approval to begin the lobbyist registry conversation; the date for the next meeting; agreement to change the meeting time to 4:00 p.m.; items for discussion at the next meeting including charter review; final review of the website; sharing new meeting policies with the public; implementation of the new 10 minute speaking limit for Council Members; reminders to everyone about being concise; and looking at how to involve the public in the charter reform process.
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Standing Governance Subcommittee
of the City Council
April 1, 2026
7 Adjournment
There being no further business, at 4:24 p.m., the Standing Governance Subcommittee of the City Council adjourned to a meeting to be held on June 3, 2026.
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___________________________________________________________ Jeremy Bocchino
SECRETARY of the Culver City Standing Governance
Subcommittee of the City Council, Culver City, California
APPROVED
___________________________________________________________ Bubba Fish
VICE MAYOR, Standing Governance Subcommittee of the City Council, Culver City, California