Mandan's attempt to repeal and revise an initiated ordinance requiring electric doors on all buildings that benefited from public funds failed Tuesday.

The Mandan City Commission fell short of the four votes from five board members needed for first reading approval of its new draft. State law allows the amendment/repeal process if there is the four-fifths majority.

In its restatement, the new ordinance said: "Every building open to the public use that has received the benefit of public funds from the city of Mandan shall provide for the installation of an automatic door for at least one main entrance of the building."

"When you look at this ordinance (the Nov. 4 initiated measure), it doesn't say anything about city of Mandan. It says public funding," said Susan Beehler, a co-sponsor of the first initiated ordinance. "That is what we intended. … As a city, you have the right to deny a permit or grant a permit."

Commissioners reminded Beehler the original initiative would be too difficult to enforce if it included monitoring all public funding, including federal.

Commissioner Tom Jackson agreed the original ordinance was too ambiguous. "We have to set a definition at some point." Jackson said the commission made an admiral compromise with its new draft, created by City Attorney Malcolm Brown.

Brown later said he would be willing to draft an enforcement clause of some type for local funding, or a noncompliance issue after the core of the new draft passed.

Francis Herauf, another co-sponsor at one point, said he didn't completely agree with the Nov. 4 ordinance or the one presented. He said he would have liked all public areas to have electronic doors, whether they received public funds or not.

Mayor Tim Helbling reminded him that the city was dealing only with the ordinance the voters approved, which did specify the clause about public funds.

After the city's new draft was motioned and seconded, Commissioner Jerome Gangl had asked the city attorney to amend it to specifically exclude warehouses, or to better eliminate certain uses from the new draft. Serhienko seconded it. Three out of five commissioners rejected Gangl's amendment.

When the core amendment returned to the table, Gangl and Serhienko gave the opposing votes. The three remaining commissioners favored the vote, but it was not enough to repeal the current elecric door initiative and replace it with the new one.

The denial means the city must now follow the original initiated ordinance approved Nov. 4 that states: "Installation of electric handicapped accessible entrance doors are required on every building open to the public that has received public funds in any form whatsoever; failure to do so may result in denial of public funding and declare it an emergency."

After the new ordinance failed, Serhienko asked that the issue be "hammered out" in a private setting between a non-quorum of the board, the city attorney and the sponsors of the original initiated measure. Serhienko said it could then be be debated in a public setting.

Helbling said he would not consider that since a recent attempt to hold such a meeting resulted in co-sponsor Susan Beehler calling for an Attorney General's opinion about open meeting laws.

"I will not meet until we get a response from the attorney general's office," Helbling said.

"The reason we have meetings and public hearings is to hammer out these issues," Commissioner Sandra Tibke said.

"I am tempted to table the whole thing," Serhienko said.

"Commissioner Serhienko, you cannot table it. It is done now. … That's why you come here in a public meeting and hammer it through," Tibke said. "That's what we're here for. You signed up for this position. You were elected. Maybe it's not always fun, but that's why we are here."

"The compromises are out the window,"Heibling said. "Now, we left our city staff, as short as they are, to deal with this. It's not going to be a pleasant experience."

After the meeting, Helbling said the initiative approved Nov. 4 is too ambiguous. "The way it is present will cause problems for our staff and for people trying to build in our community," he said. "They are going to have to define public funds. … I feel sorry for our staff, and I feel sorry for people who need to build or have a project in the works."

Helbling said he felt Brown's draft was a good compromise. "Not every side got what they wanted, but it was something the staff and commission could deal with, get our hands around and work from there."

He added the failed draft would also would have been good for the businesses in the community.

(Reach reporter LeAnn Eckroth at 250-8264 or leann.eckroth@;bismarcktribune.com.)