The Ross Valley is experiencing a level of political tumult unequaled elsewhere in Marin.

Earlier this month at the regularly scheduled Fairfax Town Council session, two members of Fairfax’s five-member council were personally served with formal “Notices of Intention to Recall” to remove them from office. The targets are Mayor Lisel Blash and Vice Mayor Stephanie Hellman.

Many thought that Fairfax’s divisive politics came to a head in last year’s Town Council election. That’s when the three incumbents, Bruce Ackerman, Chance Cutrano and Barbara Coler, ran for reelection. Ackerman and Cutrano were defeated. Coler was reelected. Winning seats with a large majority and replacing the defeated incumbents were two past Fairfax mayors: Frank Egger and Mike Ghiringhelli.

To say that the election was bitter is an understatement.

The prime issue was a local rent-control measure advocated by the Marin chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America. It was subsequently defeated at the polls. There were claims that the three incumbents were too progressive even for liberal Fairfax. Of Fairfax’s voters, 4,222 are registered as Democrats and 325 are Republicans. The 2024 election showed that more of them are traditional liberals rather than progressives.

Fairfax politics is volatile and, like much of America’s discourse today, unfiltered. Council meetings are unruly compared to those in other Marin cities. It’s due to Fairfax’s town culture where a substantial number of townspeople are intensely involved in local affairs. This is usually a virtue, but not so when passions become inflamed.

A recall effort is generally not the ideal method for the public to assert themselves, especially when the next election isn’t far off. It’s appropriate when the issue is malfeasance, or an office holder is so personally offensive that the community consensus is that they have got to go. That’s what happened in Sonoma County’s Windsor when the recall of their mayor Dominic Foppoli qualified following accusations of sexual assault. He wisely resigned before the recall election could be held.

The electoral process is the best way to change a town’s course. Many in Fairfax thought that change was happening as a result of the decisive 2024 election results. That didn’t come about since three members of what some derisively call “the old guard” retained the council’s majority.

The next election for two council seats, that of Hellman and Blash, is just 19 months away in November 2026. Recalls were a necessary component of California’s early 1900s reform movement, but should be deployed sparingly. Look at the tax dollars and energy now being wasted by Republicans’ second doomed effort to recall soon-to-be-termed-out Gov. Gavin Newsom.

It would be much better for Fairfax if Blash, Hellman and Coler, along with Egger and Ghiringhelli and their supporters, turn the heat down and devise compromises in a spirit of collegiality. That’s how most Marin cities and our county Board of Supervisors operate. It’s also basic political common sense. If voters believe that Hellman and Blash aren’t responding to the electorate’s concerns, then they can be defeated in 2026 just as were two incumbents in 2024.

Most voters aren’t interested in insider personality clashes or council members driven by the righteousness of their own ideology.

If those mounting the recall petition collect about 1,500 valid signatures, a special election will be scheduled sometime in 2025. The only question on that ballot will be whether Hellman and Blash should be removed from office.

Section 11382 of the Elections Code spells out the replacement process if the recall succeeds. It provides, “If a majority of the votes on a recall proposal for a local officer are ‘Yes,’ the officer is removed, and the office shall be vacant until it is filled according to the law.” Further, if the recall is successful, a vacancy is created. Then within 60 days, the remaining three council members fill that vacancy by appointment or call a special election to fill it.