SAN ANTONIO -- San Antonians said yes to two of three charter amendments on the ballot.

  • Prop A lowers threshold for referendum process
  • Prop B caps tenure and compensation for future city managers
  • Prop C allows fireighters to force binding arbirtation

The final results came in early Wednesday morning and the numbers were close for two of the three propositions.

Proposition A:

For: 163,799 - 45.78%

Against: 194,035 - 54.22%

Proposition B:

For:  215,845 - 59.19%

Against: 148,790 - 40.81%

Proposition C:

For: 183,732 - 50.78%

Against: 178,109 - 49.22%

Early on, it was clear that voters would say yes to proposition B. It caps the tenure and compensation for future city managers.

That proposition specifically calls for a city manager's tenure to be no longer than eight years and make no more than 10 times of the lowest paid city employee.

The other two propositions were harder to gauge. In the end, voters said no to proposition A.

Prop A lowers the threshold for the referendum process, possibly making it more difficult for the city to manage the budget.

San Antonians said yes to proposition C, which allows firefighters to force binding arbitration during labor contract negotiations.

San Antonio Fire Union president Chris Steele pushed strongly for this proposition. He campaigned for the charter amendments early on, then seemed to disappear and even refused to go to town halls about the amendments.

The "Go Vote No" campaign, which empsaized that the propositions would raise city taxes and damage community relationships, got some of what they hoped for.