The qualified voters of the city shall have power to propose any ordinance except an ordinance appropriating money or levying taxes or an ordinance repealing or amending such an ordinance, and to adopt or reject the same at the polls, such power being known as the initiative.
The qualified voters of the city 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 qualified voters, except ordinances appropriating money, levying taxes, authorizing the issuance of tax or revenue bonds which have already been approved by the qualified voters, whether original or refunding, and ordinances repealing or amending such ordinances, such power being known as the 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 passed by the council.
The qualified voters of the city shall have power to remove the mayor or any other councilman by recall.
For every initiative, referendum, or recall petition, there shall be a committee of petitioners, which shall be composed of five qualified voters of the city. The committee shall be regarded as responsible for the circulation and filing of the petition. The names and addresses of the committee members shall appear on the petition.
(a) 
An initiative petition shall contain the full text of the proposed ordinance and a request that the council either pass the ordinance or refer it to a vote of the qualified voters of the city.
(b) 
A referendum petition shall contain at least the full descriptive caption or title of the ordinance and its date of passage by the council or the full text of the ordinance, and a request that the council either repeal the ordinance or refer it to a vote of the qualified voters of the city.
(c) 
A recall petition shall contain the name of the officer whose recall is sought and a demand that he be recalled from office, and a statement of the reasons for recall.
(d) 
The signatures to an initiative, referendum, or recall petition need not all be appended to one paper. Each signer of a petition paper shall sign his name in ink or indelible pencil and shall indicate after his name his place of residence by street and number or other description sufficient to identify the place.
(e) 
Every circulator of a petition paper shall be a qualified voter of the city. There shall be attached to each separate petition paper an affidavit of the circulator thereof that he personally circulated the foregoing paper, that it bears a stated number of signatures, that all signatures appended thereto were made in his presence, and that he believes them to be the genuine signatures of the persons whose names they purport to be.
(a) 
Before any initiative, referendum, or recall petition is circulated for signatures, one of the petition papers shall be filed with the city secretary by the committee of petitioners. Before the paper is filed, the five members of the committee must have signed the paper somewhere on the margin thereof to indicate their responsibility as a committee of petitioners.
(b) 
Every initiative or recall petition must be circulated and filed with the city secretary with the required number of signatures within thirty days after the filing of the petition paper with the city secretary; and every referendum petition must be circulated and filed with the city secretary with the required number of signatures within thirty days after final passage of the ordinance sought to be referred.
(c) 
All petition papers comprising an initiative, referendum, or recall petition shall be assembled and filed with the city secretary as one instrument.
(d) 
Every initiative or referendum petition must be signed by qualified voters of the city equal in number to at least twenty-five (25) percent of the total number of votes cast at the last regular municipal election or 250, whichever is greater.
(e) 
Every recall petition must be signed by qualified voters of the city equal in number to at least thirty-five (35) percent of the total number of votes cast at the last regular municipal election or 300, whichever is greater.
(a) 
Within thirty days after an initiative, referendum, or recall petition is filed with the city secretary, the city secretary shall examine it and determine whether the petition is sufficient. A petition shall be sufficient if it has been duly signed by the required number of qualified voters of the city and is otherwise in compliance with this charter and any ordinances relating to the initiative, referendum, or recall, as the case may be. The city secretary shall declare any petition paper entirely invalid which does not have attached thereto the required 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 signatures shall be accepted unless void on other grounds.
(b) 
After completing his examination of the petition, the city secretary shall certify the result thereof to the council at its next regular meeting. If he certifies that the petition is insufficient, he shall set forth in his certificate the particulars in which it is defective, and shall immediately by mail notify the committee of petitioners of his findings.
An initiative, referendum, or recall petition may be amended at any time within ten days after the notification of insufficiency has been sent by the city secretary to the committee of petitioners, by filing a supplementary petition upon additional papers signed and filed as provided in case of the original petition. The city secretary shall, within ten days after such an amendment is filed, examine the amended petition and determine whether it is sufficient, and certify the result thereof to the council at its next regular meeting. If the petition is still insufficient, he shall by mail notify the committee of petitioners of his 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.
When a referendum petition has been certified as sufficient by the city secretary, the ordinance specified in the petition shall not go into effect, or, if it has already gone into effect, further action thereunder shall be suspended until and unless approved by the qualified voters as hereinafter provided.
(a) 
Whenever the council receives an initiative or referendum petition certified by the city secretary to be sufficient, it shall proceed at once to consider such petition.
(b) 
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 secretary.
(c) 
A referendum ordinance shall be reconsidered by the council, and its final vote upon such reconsideration shall be upon the question whether the ordinance specified in the referendum petition shall be repealed.
(d) 
If the council fails to pass an ordinance proposed by initiative petition, or passes it in a form different from that set forth in the petition therefor, or if the council fails to repeal a referendum ordinance, then the council shall submit the initiative or referendum ordinance to the qualified voters at an election not less than thirty days nor more than sixty days from the date the council takes its final vote thereon. The council may, in its discretion, and if no regular municipal election is to be held within such period, shall, call a special election for the purpose to be held within such period.
Ordinances submitted to vote of the qualified 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 such initiative or referendum ordinance, and shall be a clear, concise statement, without argument or prejudice, descriptive of the substance of such ordinance. Below the ballot title, the following propositions shall appear 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. The voter shall be given an opportunity to vote for either of the two propositions and thereby to vote for or against the ordinance.
If a majority of the qualified voters voting on a proposed initiative ordinance vote in favor thereof, it shall thereupon be adopted and be an ordinance of the city. A referendum ordinance which is not approved by a majority of the qualified voters voting thereon, shall thereupon be repealed. If conflicting ordinances are adopted or 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.
Initiative and referendum ordinances adopted or approved by the qualified voters shall be published, and may be amended or repealed by the council, as in the case of other ordinances.
In the case of a recall petition certified to the council as sufficient by the city secretary, if the officer whose removal is sought does not resign within five days after the council receives the petition and certificate of the city secretary, the council shall thereupon submit the question of removing the officer to the qualified voters at an election not less than thirty days nor more than sixty days after the council received the petition and certificate. The council shall submit the question at a regular municipal election if one is to be held during such period, but, if not, the council shall call a special election for the purpose to be held within such period. If the officer sought to be recalled resigns at any time before the day of the recall election, the council by ordinance may cancel the recall election.
Ballots used at recall elections shall conform to the following requirements:
(1) 
With respect to each officer whose removal is sought, the question shall be submitted “Shall (name of person) be removed from the office of (mayor or councilman) by recall?”
(2) 
Immediately below each such question, the following propositions shall be printed in the order indicated: “FOR THE RECALL OF (NAME OF PERSON)” and “AGAINST THE RECALL OF (NAME OF PERSON).”
(a) 
If a majority of the votes cast on the question of recall are for the recall of the officer named on the ballot, he shall, regardless of any technical defects in the recall petition, be removed from office, and the vacancy shall be filled as other such vacancies are filled. Otherwise, the officer named on the ballot shall continue in office for the remainder of his term.
(b) 
A person thus removed from office by recall or who has resigned from such office while recall proceedings were pending against him, shall not hold any office or position of employment in the city government for a period of two years after his removal or resignation.
Recall proceedings shall not be begun against an officer within six months after he takes office. No officer shall be subjected to more than one recall election during a term of office. No recall election shall be held if the term of office of the officer sought to be recalled will expire within ninety (90) days after the petition with signatures is filed with the city secretary.