That item's front page is imaged below, click to enlarge:
I took my shot at running for mayor, and running in Ward 1. Bless those who this time will run for the at large seat, and Wards 2 and 4. And for mayor. Strommen will not run at large, so that seat will not have an incumbent. Of the three incumbents, Dave Jeffrey has turned out best, but I still favor a clean sweep. This is a part of the crowd responsible for the Town Center fiasco, together with the $19 million Norman Castle that will keep Ramsey taxes higher than necessary for years into the future.
And they did the Norman Castle [the dog-legged City Hall] as a cram down.
No Referendum.
Now that above image says, beyond the info on the filing for office running through July 15 -- don't miss it if you intend to run -- that plans appear afoot to do a Community Center cramdown next.
If Jim Deal or any other capitalist entrepreneur wants to put private money at risk into such a thing, bless them. But public money - do a referendum. And voters, remember, there will be the cost of a train palace, if there is a train stop. Bet on that. City Hall palace, ramp in the middle of nowhere, train station, and on top they want taxpapers to carry a community center.
Any candidate filing for office who wishes to run with a policy platform plank, no community center without a prior fairly and justly worded referendum and then only if a voting majority says yes, and who wishes that fact publicized, I will help such an effort by posting the information on this blog. Just send me an email stating that committment - not NO to the concept, but YES to the idea of a referendum [in effect saying NO to a cramdown without a referendum], and I will post the information.
If I like other aspects of a candidacy, I will try to be helpful in any way I can. On the other hand I will not endorse any candidate not willing to make that kind of a pro-referendum pledge. Not that any candidates might care. But it is an inflexible precondition with me - if you care who I might endorse, please take care to let me know, yes or no, on the referendum committment.
My belief is ample use of referendum rights at the local level is how democratic decisions of this kind should be made. Decisions that go beyond when the roads get tarred or scheduling snow plowing, decisions on the major capital committments, (and a community center expenditure would be major for a town like Ramsey), are the kind of thing which can and should hinge on direct citizen participation, by referendum.
It has been said and it is a total lie that a referendum, even by a special election, is too costly.
If the present council can blow a million bucks for sidewalk and street lights along lengthy deserted stretches of Sunwood Blvd. in Town Center, they can pay ten grand for a special election. Look at it that way. And would you have voted for that cosmetic million, in that money sinkhole called Town Center? I would not have, had that been a referendum question.
And beyond any thought of special elections, there will be a general election this November. The council can simply put the ballot question to voters then. There would be no extra cost to speak of for that.
All we citizens need to have a referendum is a good faith act of will of the politicians who apparently would rather run things their way, and tell us what's good for us, when they instead could ask us, by referendum what we feel is good for ourselves.
Bottom line: There is no decent excuse to not be holding a "Community Center" referendum instead of dog-and-pony "focus group" sessions on what we want a community center to include. Focus on a referendum, instead. On whether we want the idiotic thing at all, not what one should include. That presupposes a done deal, you will have one no matter what: Good, Bad, or (like city hall and the Deal Office Plaza), Ugly.