Kim Carr won’t have to worry about being recalled from her current job, as a member of the Huntington Beach Council, as she runs for election to the California State Senate.

Likewise, two other members of the Huntington Beach council, Mike Posey and Dan Kalmick, also won’t face a recall.

That’s because the group trying to oust all three, Save Surf City, didn’t find enough locals to agree that they should be booted from office. The Orange County Registrar of Voters told city officials on Wednesday, April 6, that all three recall petitions fell short of the required 10% of city voters — which in Huntington Beach would be 13,352 verified signatures — to force a special election later this year.

In February, recall supporters presented City Clerk Robin Estanislau with three petitions that each had about 14,000 signatures. However, for all recall campaigns, election officials recommend more wiggle room to compensate for signatures that typically are found to be invalid due to errors and duplicates.

Carr’s petition tallied 14,295 signatures, of which 1,989 were invalidated by the Registrar. For Kalmick, recall proponents turned in 14,010 signatures, but 1,809 did not survive scrutiny. Posey’s petition listed 13,966 signatures, with 1,809 ultimately voided.

The Registrar’s office billed the city $143,708 for the verification process.  A stand-alone recall election would have cost Huntington Beach taxpayers another $1 million.

“It was well within their right to try to recall us, but it was also a waste of money,” Kalmick said.

Carr labeled the effort a “political stunt.”

“We will pay for this out of the city’s general fund, and for what?” Carr said. “We have elections every two years. We’ll have four open seats this November.”

Carr is hoping for a second job in politics. Carr, a Democrat, and Republican Assemblywoman Janet Nguyen, are the only two candidates for the newly drawn District 36 in the state Senate, so they’ll face each other for the job in the November election.

Carr said she never considered a recall likely.

“We’ve remained focused on doing good work for Huntington Beach, but it’s nice to put this distraction behind us,” Carr said. “If I really thought this recall was a serious threat, I probably wouldn’t have embarked on my Senate campaign.”

Organizers for Save Surf City did not return requests for a comment.

When it launched its effort last August, the group also named Mayor Barbara Delgleize and Councilwoman Natalie Moser. But in those two cases, activists didn’t drum up enough signatures under by deadline to qualify for the next step – certification by the Registrar’s office.

Recall supporters argue that the five council members should push to have the city fight the state’s affordable housing mandate. They also expressed frustration that the council appointed Rhonda Bolton, who some view as “deeply progressive,” to replace Tito Ortiz, a conservative former mixed martial arts star who retired from the council last June.

Erik Peterson is the only council member endorsed by Save Surf City.

“We tried to hold these city council members responsible for not supporting all efforts to stop the influx of high density development in our community after they each claimed they would during their campaigns,” said Huntington Beach resident Larry McNeely who supported the recall.

As can be expected with initiative petitions, signatures proved invalid for several reasons – most commonly, because the signer was not a registered voter or signed more than once.

For Carr, 659 signers were not registered to vote and 570 signed at least twice; for Kalmick, 695 weren’t registered voters and 399 were repeats; and for Posey, 663 weren’t registered and 570 were duplicates.

“In the end, the effort did not gain the traction to support a recall,” McNeely said. “I accept that.”