CHAPTER 339

An Act to amend and reenact §§ $2, $8 and 85 of Chapter 84 of the Acts
of Assembly of 1918, approved February 7, 1918, as amended, which
chapter provided a charter and special form of government for the
city of Norfolk, and whieh sections relate, respectively, to petition
for initiative election, ballots and methods of voting, and petition for
referendum.

[H 567]
Approved March 12, 1956

Be it enacted by the General Assembly of Virginia:

1. That §§ 82, 38 and 35 of Chapter 34 of the Acts of Assembly of 1918,
approved February 7, 1918, as amended, be amended and reenacted as
lows:

§ 32. The council shall at once proceed to consider such petition and
shall take final action thereon within thirty days from the date of the
submission thereof. If the council rejects the proposed ordinance, or
passes it in a form different from that set forth in the petition, or fails
to act finally upon it within the time stated, the committee of the peti-
tioners may require that it be submitted to a vote of the electors in its
original form, or that it be submitted to a vote of the electors with any
proposed change, addition or amendment, by the following procedure:

aid committee shall present to the clerk of the corporation court of said
city a petition for such election, addressed to said court and signed by
qualified voters equal in number to twenty-five per cent of the number of
electors who cast their votes at the last preceding regular municipal
election for the election of councilmen, but in no case signed by less than
four thousand qualified voters of the city. Said petition shall contain the
proposed ordinance in full in the form in which it is proposed to submit
the same to the electors. The said petition and all copies thereof shall be
filed with the clerk of said court as one instrument. Within ten days after
the filing thereof the said clerk shall ascertain and certify thereon whether
CHS. 339, 340] ACTS OF ASSEMBLY 395

the required number of qualified voters have signed the same. If it be
found that the required number of qualified voters have signed the said
petition, then the said petition, with the certificate of the said clerk
thereon, shall be presented by said committee to the corporation court
of said city, or to the judge thereof in vacation, and thereupon the said
court, or the judge thereof in vacation, shall forthwith enter an order
calling and fixing a date for holding an election for the purpose of sub-
mitting the proposed ordinance to the electors of the said city. Any such
election shall be held not Jess than thirty nor more than sixty days after
the date of the entering of said order. If any other election is to be held
within the said period said court or the judge thereof shall direct that
such proposed ordinance shall be submitted to a vote of the electors at
such election. At least ten days before any such election the clerk of the
said court shall cause such proposed ordinance to be published once in
one or more newspapers of general circulation published in said city. _

§ 38. The ballots used when voting upon any such proposed ordi-
nance shall state the title of the ordinance to be voted on, * and the ballots
and method of voting shall conform to the provisions of § 24-141 of the
Code of Virginia. :

If a majority of the electors voting on such proposed ordinance shall
vote in favor thereof, it shall, upon the ascertainment and certification
of the results of such election by the commissioners of election, become
an ordinance of the city.

§ 35. No ordinance passed by the council, unless it be an emergency
measure, as hereinbefore defined, or the annual appropriation ordinance,
shall go into effect until the expiration of thirty days after its final
passage. If at any time within said thirty days a petition, signed by
qualified voters equal in number to twenty-five per cent of the number of
electors who case their votes at the last preceding regular municipal
election for the election of councilmen, but in no case signed by less than
four thousand qualified voters of the city, be filed with the city clerk,
requesting that any such ordinance be repealed, or amended, as stated
in the petition, such ordinance shall not become operative until the steps
indicated herein shall have been taken or the time allowed for taking
such step shall have elapsed without action. Such petition shall state
therein the names and addresses of at least five electors, who shall con-
stitute a committee to represent the petitioners, who shall be officially
regarded as filing the petition, and shall constitute a committee of the
petitioners for the purposes hereinafter stated. Referendum petitions need
not contain the text of the ordinance or ordinances, the amendment or
repeal of which is sought, but shall contain the proposed amendment, if
an amendment is demanded.