Small-town Politics

Sometimes I can't believe my local government. Yesterday, our brand new mayor - actually, not officially mayor yet until today(!) - made an announcement that I personally found appalling, because of the lack of public input in the decision.

His becoming mayor left a vacancy on the council (his old seat) that had to be filled. Our city law requires council to appoint someone to fill a vacancy, rather than a special election.

So yesterday, without any public input, and notably - in the absence of two council members - the new mayor and the three remaining council members announced their pick.

Here she is, here's the woman we're putting into a public office. I know technically we all promised in our campaigns to do a better job listening to the people and everything, but we decided we didn't need to consult with the public this time around.

Now, they held public hearings before appointing the new members to the school board a month ago. Why not consult the public now? Or at least say, here's the person we're considering putting on council... what do you think about that?

That's not how it was done. But that's OK... if the "old guard" on my small city's council wants to do things this way, that's fine. When they want to know what happened come the next election day, I'll know exactly what to tell them.