Mayor TenHaken told the Argus that he hopes he doesn’t have to break a tie Tuesday night over changing back a 20 year old rule that served the citizens and city council just fine.
I agree, he should not have to. While I can’t predict if it will pass or not, I do think it will come down on a 5-3 vote. And it should.
It’s obvious that Stehly, Starr and Brekke support changing it back. While that is 3 votes, shouldn’t the other 2 they need be a piece of cake? Erickson and Neitzert voted against the change almost two years ago. Why? Because the process wasn’t broken.
Now some have argued that this should be up to the voters. I suppose, and if you believe that, Brekke has offered that this be looked at by the Charter Revision Commission for the 2020 ballot. But as we all know, it wasn’t broken and should not have been changed to begin with.
While Erickson and especially Neitzert have argued that they don’t want to be messing with city elections, this would be a perfect reason to change it back to as it was, unharmed for 20 years.
In the last election, there was a city council run-0ff, but it still would have occurred under the old ordinance, because neither DeBoer or Soehl received the 34% plurality. Another reason why the change was not needed.
I don’t expect the votes of Rex Rolfing Jr. (Kiley) or Selberg (who probably doesn’t even understand the math) or Soehl (who sold his soul to Erpenbach and Huether a long time ago) to change. But I would expect Erickson and Neitzert to hold their votes like Starr, Stehly and Brekke did on the 2nd go around on the Elmwood street vacation.
But I’m not holding my breath.