Qualified voters of the city shall have power to propose any ordinance except an ordinance appropriating money, authorizing the levy of taxes, zoning, issuing of bonds or notes, salaries, or in any instance where a court of proper jurisdiction has determined that the initiated ordinance has been removed from the field of initiation. Valid petitions shall be subject to adoption or rejection at the polls, such power being known as the initiative. Any initiative ordinance may be submitted to the council by a petition signed by qualified voters of the city equal in number to at least 25 percent of the number of votes cast in the cumulative seven districts in the last contested general election for each district.
(Resolution 2007-055 adopted 5/21/07, Prop. 53; Ordinance 2022-090, ex. B, adopted 12/12/2022)
The voters shall have power to approve or reject at the polls any ordinance passed by the council, or submitted by the council to a vote of the voters, such powers being known as the referendum, except in cases of bond ordinances, ordinances making the annual tax levy, zoning, annexation, utility rates, personnel and administrative matters, or in any instance where a court of appropriate jurisdiction has determined that the referred ordinance has been removed from the field of referendum. Ordinances submitted to the council by initiative petition and passed by the council without change shall be subject to the referendum in the same manner as other ordinances. Within 20 days after the enactment by the council of any ordinance that is subject to a referendum, a petition signed by qualified voters of the city equal in number to at least 25 percent of the number of votes cast in the cumulative seven districts in the last contested general election for each district may be filed with the city clerk requesting that any such ordinance be either repealed or submitted to a vote of the voters.
(Resolution 2007-055 adopted 5/21/07, Prop. 54; Ordinance 2022-090, ex. B, adopted 12/12/2022)
Initiative petition papers shall contain the full text of the proposed ordinance. The signatures to initiative or referendum petitions need not all be appended to one paper, but to each separate petition there shall be attached a statement of the circulator thereof as provided by this section. Each signer of any petition paper shall sign his or her name in ink or indelible pencil and shall indicate after his or her name his or her place of residence, by street and number or other description sufficient to identify the place. There shall appear on each petition the names and addresses of five voters, who, as a committee of the petitioners, shall be regarded as responsible for the circulation and filing of the petition. Attached to each separate petition paper there shall be an affidavit of the circulator thereof that he or she, and he or she only, personally circulated the foregoing paper, that it bears a stated number of signatures, that all signatures appended thereto were made in his or her presence, and that he or she believes them to be the genuine signatures of the persons whose names they purport to be.
(Resolution 2007-055 adopted 5/21/07, Prop. 1; Ordinance 2022-090, ex. B, adopted 12/12/2022)
All petition papers comprising an initiative or referendum petition shall be assembled and filed with the city clerk as one instrument. Within ten days after the petition is filed, the city clerk shall determine whether each paper of the petition has a proper statement of the circulator and whether the petition is signed by a sufficient number of qualified voters. The city clerk shall declare any petition paper entirely invalid which does not have attached thereto an affidavit signed by the circulator thereof. If a petition paper is found to be signed by more persons than the number of signatures certified by the circulator, the last signatures in excess of the number certified shall be disregarded. If a petition paper is found to be signed by fewer persons than the number certified, the signature shall be accepted unless void on other grounds. After completing his or her examination of the petition, the city clerk shall certify the result thereof to the council at its next regular meeting. If he or she shall certify that the petition is insufficient he or she shall set forth in his certificate the particulars in which it is defective and shall at once notify the committee of the petitioners of his findings.
(Resolution 2007-055 adopted 5/21/07, Prop. 1; Ordinance 2022-090, ex. B, adopted 12/12/2022)
An initiative or referendum petition may be amended at any time within ten days after the notification of insufficiency has been sent by the city clerk, by filing a supplementary petition upon additional papers signed and filed as provided in case of an original petition. The city clerk shall, within five days after such an amendment is filed, make examination of the amended petition and, if the petition be still insufficient, he or she shall file a certificate to that effect in his or her office and notify the committee of petitioners of his or her findings and no further action shall be had on such insufficient petition. The finding of the insufficiency of a petition shall not prejudice the filing of a new petition for the same purpose.
(Ordinance 2022-090, ex. B, adopted 12/12/2022)
When a referendum petition, or amended petition as defined in section 88 of this article, has been certified as sufficient by the city clerk, the ordinance specified in the petition shall not go into effect, or further action thereunder shall be suspended if it shall have gone into effect, until and unless approved by the voters, as hereinafter provided.
(Resolution 2007-055 adopted 5/21/07, Prop. 1; Ordinance 2022-090, ex. B, adopted 12/12/2022)
Whenever the council receives a certified initiative or referendum petition from the city clerk, it shall proceed at once to consider such petition. A proposed initiative ordinance shall be read and provision shall be made for a public hearing upon the proposed ordinance. The council shall take final action on the ordinance not later than sixty days after the date on which such ordinance was submitted to the council by the city clerk. A referred ordinance shall be reconsidered by the council and its final vote upon such reconsideration shall be upon the question, “Shall the ordinance specified in the referendum petition be repealed?”
(Ordinance 2022-090, ex. B, adopted 12/12/2022)
If the council shall fail to pass an ordinance proposed by the initiative process, or shall pass it in a form different from that set forth in the petition therefor, or if the council fails to repeal a referred ordinance, the proposed or referred ordinance shall be submitted to the voters at the next available uniform election date from the date the council takes its final vote thereon.
(Resolution 2007-055 adopted 5/21/07, Props 1, 55; Ordinance 2022-090, ex. B, adopted 12/12/2022)
Ordinances submitted to vote of the voters in accordance with the initiative and referendum provisions of this Charter shall be submitted by ballot title, which shall be prepared in all cases by the city attorney. The ballot title may be different from the legal title of any such initiated or referred ordinance and shall be a clear, concise statement, without argument or prejudice, descriptive of the substance of such ordinance, [and] if a paper ballot, shall have below the ballot title the following propositions, one above the other in the order indicated: “FOR THE ORDINANCE” and “AGAINST THE ORDINANCE”. Any number of ordinances may be voted on at the same election and may be submitted on the same ballot, but any paper ballot used for voting thereon shall be for that purpose only. If voting machines are used, the ballot title of any ordinance shall have below it the same two propositions, one above the other or one preceding the other in the order indicated, and the elector [voter] shall be given an opportunity to vote for either of the two propositions and thereby to vote for or against the ordinance.
(Resolution 2007-055 adopted 5/21/07, Prop. 1; Ordinance 2022-090, ex. B, adopted 12/12/2022)
If a majority of the voters voting on a proposed initiative ordinance shall vote in favor thereof, it shall thereupon be an ordinance of the city. A referred ordinance which is not approved by a majority of the voters voting thereon shall thereupon be deemed repealed. If conflicting ordinances are approved by the voters at the same election, the one receiving the greatest number of affirmative votes shall prevail to the extent of such conflict.
(Resolution 2007-055 adopted 5/21/07, Prop. 1; Ordinance 2022-090, ex. B, adopted 12/12/2022)
Initiative and referendum ordinances adopted or approved by the voters shall be published, and may be amended or repealed by the council, as in the case of other ordinances. However, no ordinance adopted by the council or approved by the voters in response to an initiative petition shall be amended or repealed by the council within two years of the adoption, and no ordinance repealed by the council or rejected by the voters in response to a referendum petition shall be re-enacted by the council within two years of the repeal.
(Resolution 2007-055 adopted 5/21/07; Prop. 56; Ordinance 2022-090, ex. B, adopted 12/12/2022)
Any member of the city council, including the mayor, may be removed from office by recall.
(Ordinance 2022-090, ex. B, adopted 12/12/2022)
Any qualified voter living within a council district of the City of Paris may make and file with the city clerk an affidavit containing the name of the council member from that district whose removal is sought, which affidavit shall contain a statement, not to exceed 200 words, of the grounds for removal. Promptly after receipt of a recall petition, the city clerk shall serve, personally or by certified mail, a copy of the affidavit on the council member sought to be recalled. Within 10 days of service of the affidavit, the council member sought to be recalled may file a statement with the city clerk, not to exceed 200 words, in response. Recall petitions shall contain the name and title of the council member, the statement of grounds for the recall, and the response of the official, if any. If no response was filed, the petition shall so state. The clerk shall thereupon deliver to the voter making such affidavit copies of petition blanks demanding such removal. The city clerk shall keep a sufficient number of such printed petition blanks on hand for distribution. Such blanks, when issued by the city clerk, shall bear the signature of that officer and be addressed to the city council, and shall be numbered, dated, and indicate the name of the person to whom issued. The petition blanks, when issued, shall also indicate the number of such blanks issued and the name of the officer whose removal is sought. The city clerk shall enter in a record to be kept in his office the name of the voter to whom the petition blanks were issued and the number issued to said person.
(Resolution 2007-055 adopted 5/21/07, Props. 57, 58; Ordinance 2022-090, ex. B, adopted 12/12/2022)
The recall petition, to be effective, must be returned and filed with the city clerk within 30 days after the filing of the affidavit required in section 112 of this Charter and it must be signed by qualified voters of the district of the city represented by the council member whose recall is sought. The number of signatures on the petition blanks shall be in an amount equal in number to at least 51 percent of the total number of votes cast at the last contested municipal election at which a council member was elected from that district, or the signatures of at least 200 qualified voters of that district, whichever is greater, and shall conform to the provisions of section 86 of the Charter.
(Resolution 2007-055 adopted 5/21/07, Prop. 59; Ordinance 2022-090, ex. B, adopted 12/12/2022)
After the recall petition is filed with the city clerk, he or she shall at once examine it and, if he or she finds it sufficient and in compliance with the provisions of the Charter, he or she shall within five days submit it to the city council with a certificate to that effect and notify the officer sought to be recalled of such action. If the officer whose removal is sought does not resign within five days after such notice, the city council shall thereupon order and fix a date for holding a recall election in the district on the next available uniform election date.
(Resolution 2007-055 adopted 5/21/07, Prop. 60; Ordinance 2022-090, ex. B, adopted 12/12/2022)
Ballots used at recall elections shall conform to the following requirements:
(1) 
With respect to each person whose removal is sought, the question shall be submitted “Shall (name of person) be removed from the office of councilmember by recall?”
(2) 
Immediately below each such question there shall be printed the two following propositions, one above the other, in the order indicated:
“For the recall of (name of person)”
“Against the recall of (name of person)”
(Ordinance 2022-090, ex. B, adopted 12/12/2022)
If a majority of the votes cast at a recall election shall be against the recall of the officer named on the ballot, he or she shall continue in office for the remainder of his or her unexpired term, subject to recall as before. If a majority of the votes cast at such an election be for the recall of the officer named on the ballot, he or she shall, regardless of any technical defects in the recall petition, be deemed removed from office and the vacancy shall be filled by the city council as in other vacancies.
(Ordinance 2022-090, ex. B, adopted 12/12/2022)
No recall petition shall be filed against a councilmember within six months after he or she takes office nor in respect to an officer subjected to a recall election and not removed thereby, until at least six months after such election.
(Ordinance 2022-090, ex. B, adopted 12/12/2022)
Should the city council fail or refuse to order any of the elections as provided for in this article, when all the requirements for such election have been complied with by the petitioning voters in conformity with this article of the Charter, then it shall be the duty of any one of the district judges of Lamar County, Texas, upon proper application being made therefor, to order such elections and to enforce the carrying into effect of the provisions of this article of the Charter.
(Resolution 2007-055 adopted 5/21/07, Prop. 1; Ordinance 2022-090, ex. B, adopted 12/12/2022)