Jonathan Mariande Puts Charter Reform at Center of Council Bid

Charter reform has become a central issue in the Beverly Hills City Council race, with candidate Jonathan Mariande arguing that the city should begin a formal process to examine whether its governing structure still meets the needs of a modern Beverly Hills.

Mariande, a filmmaker and Beverly Hills resident running in the June 2 election, has built his campaign around the idea of creating a Charter Commission to review and potentially reshape the city’s governing framework. He argues that Beverly Hills, which has operated as a general law city since 1914, should reconsider whether that structure still gives residents enough control over local affairs.

At the heart of his case is the argument that Beverly Hills faces growing pressure from Sacramento and from legal rules that leave the city with too little flexibility to respond on its own terms. Mariande has pointed to issues including public records disputes, development pressures and the broader question of local authority as reasons to put charter reform before the public.

If elected, Mariande says he would introduce a resolution to start the charter process and assemble a commission made up of former elected officials, business leaders, renters, homeowners, legal experts and residents from different generations. The commission would be tasked with holding listening sessions, studying peer cities and developing recommendations for how Beverly Hills should govern itself going forward.

“I’m not a politician. I’m a neighbor who walks the city every week, watches the council meetings, and got tired of just having opinions at the dinner table,” Mariande said. “Beverly Hills deserves someone who will ask the hard questions without an agenda, and the Charter Commission is the mechanism to make sure the answers actually stick.”

Mariande has framed the issue as a defining question in the race, arguing that voters should pay close attention to which candidates are willing to publicly support a deeper look at charter governance in Beverly Hills.

He works as a filmmaker and has also freelanced with the Los Angeles Times on entertainment photoshoots, while separately producing documentary work in Iraq and Antarctica. Mariande has lived in Beverly Hills since 2022 and is raising a young daughter with his wife, Stephanie, according to the announcement of his candidacy.