This post was updated Nov. 3 at 11:58 p.m.

Voters will get to vote on changes to city administration in November.

If passed, Measure II will make adjustments to the Los Angeles City Charter to codify administration policies set by the city, including the powers of airport commissioners to set fees and for city-owned venues to sell merchandise. The measure also reaffirms that the city cannot discriminate on the basis of gender in employment decisions and adjusts regulations that apply to city parks.

Paul Krekorian – who represents the second district on the Los Angeles City Council – said many of the changes in Measure II come out of an interdepartmental review of the city charter to find areas where additional clarity could be provided. He added that many of the changes in the measure are to remove outdated bureaucratic rules.

No official arguments against the measure were submitted.

Krekorian said Measure II would allow the Los Angeles Unified School District to use public park space, adding that the change could contribute to a more efficient use of taxpayer funds. The change would allow children to use park space during academic time – which is currently prohibited – and community stakeholders to use school facilities during weekends and holidays, he said.

“I can think of two schools … where there’s a park literally right adjacent to the school, abutting the school,” Krekorian said. “If we can make it easier for those students to be able to use the park space as part of their educational program, it uplifts those schools and their experience as well.”

The measure would also codify the Los Angeles Airport Board of Commissioners’ power to set fees at LAX and Van Nuys Airport.

Krekorian said airport fees are necessary to raise funds to improve the quality of LAX ahead of the 2028 Olympic Games in Los Angeles. He added that he hopes investing in the airport will help increase travel to have a positive net impact on the wider LA community.

Victor Narro, a Board of Airport Commissioner, said Los Angeles World Airports – a proprietary department of the Los Angeles city government – already has powers to set fees for commercial activity at LAX. He added that the airport does not use tax revenue and instead raises all the money for its operating costs through fees.

“Since we’re proprietary departments, we don’t get any resources from the city of LA, not like other departments,” he said. “The taxpayers don’t fund the operation of the airport so we rely on establishing fees as one of the major sources of revenue.”

If passed, Measure II will codify and protect those powers so the airport can continue to charge fees to airlines, commercial bus companies and rideshare services like Lyft and Uber, Narro said. Although LAWA also wanted to place other measures on the ballot, they were not accepted by City Hall, he said.

Measure II also includes a number of changes to city operations, including allowing the city to sell merchandise – including at the Greek Theater, which is owned by the city. The Greek Theater did not respond in time to the Daily Bruin’s request for comment.

Although the change does not require any funding, there may be some investment costs for the city to sell merchandise, according to a financial impact statement by City Administrative Officer Matthew Szabo.

Measure II would also confirm that the Los Angeles Zoo and El Pueblo monument are Department of Recreation and Parks property. Hugh Esten, Krekorian’s director of communications, said that although both properties already belong to the parks system, the measure aims to clean up ambiguous language in the current city charter.

In an emailed statement, a Los Angeles Zoo spokesperson said the charter amendment is necessary to delineate in the charter, rather than by a city ordinance, that the Zoo is owned by the parks system but separately managed.

“The Zoo is now and has always been park property,” the spokesperson said in the statement. “However, the power to operate, control and manage the Zoo was transferred from the Department of Recreation and Parks to the Department of the Zoo by ordinance.”

The measure also states that the city cannot discriminate in employment decisions on grounds of gender or gender identity, Krekorian said. Although gender discrimination is already illegal under federal and state law, he said the city wanted to add gender discrimination alongside other existing types of prohibited discrimination in the city’s charter.

“We’re simply updating that to reflect our current broader interpretation of what it means to discriminate and to try to ensure that no one feels excluded or discriminated against,” Krekorian said.

Krekorian said overall, it is important that voters ensure that they are informed before the election on local ballot measures, even if some of them might seem mundane.

“The work that local government (does) actually has a more direct and immediate impact on people’s lives than anything that’s done in Washington in terms of quality of life, economic opportunity (and) the public infrastructure that people rely on,” he said.