Where an amendment to the charter or a new charter may be proposed and submitted to the legal voters thereof by resolution or ordinance of the City Council without an initiative petition, the resolution or ordinance shall therein state the date of the regular municipal election or the date of the special election at which said charter amendment or new charter will be submitted to be voted on, and shall call and make provision for such election. When any resolution or ordinance of the City Council is filed with the City Recorder as provided in Section 1.12.010, the City Recorder shall forthwith transmit to the City Attorney a copy of such measure, who shall within two (2) days provide and return to the City Recorder a ballot title for such measure. The ballot title shall be printed with the number of the measure on the official ballot. In making such ballot title the attorney shall, to the best of his/her ability, give a true and impartial statement of the purpose of the measure and in such language that the ballot title shall not be an argument for, or liable to create prejudice against such measure. Any person who is dissatisfied with the ballot title provided by the attorney for any such measure may, within two (2) business days after said ballot title is returned to the City Recorder, appeal to the City Council asking for a different title and giving the reasons therefore, and stating why the title prepared by said attorney is improper and the City Council shall, by resolution, approve the ballot title prepared by said attorney, or shall, by resolution, prescribe another ballot title therefore, and the ballot title so approved or so prescribed by the City Council shall be the title placed upon the ballot. Such ballot title shall consist of a caption not exceeding six (6) words in length by which the measure is commonly referred to or spoken of, followed by an abbreviated statement not exceeding one hundred (100) words in length of the chief purpose of the measure, and shall not resemble insofar as possible any other ballot title filed for any measure. The City Recorder, or the County Clerk, as the case may be, shall number such measure and ballot title in the most convenient and consecutive manner. The first measure shall be numbered 51 in numerals. The succeeding measures shall be numbered 52, 53, 54, and so on, at each election.

It shall be the duty of the City Recorder, or County Clerk, as the case may be, to print said ballot titles and numbers upon the official ballot. Charter amendments or a new charter submitted by the City Council without initiative petition shall be designated “Charter Amendments Submitted to the Voters by the City Council”.

Provided, however, that when charter amendments or a new charter are to be submitted to the voters by resolution or ordinance of the City Council as in this chapter provided, the City Council may in said resolution or ordinance, as the case may be, provide for a ballot title for the measure to be submitted, and in the event of such provision being made by the City Council the herein above provision of this section relative to the filing of said measure with the City Attorney, the preparation by said attorney of a ballot title therefore, and the appeal to the City Council from the ballot title so prepared shall not apply. (Ord. 1741 § 2, amended, 1972)