City obliges campaign’s desire to change wording | Opinion | March 27

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March 27, 2009 9:16 am

There was a minor dust-up during the last week concerning the wording of the council-manager proposition on the May 19 special election ballot. While the matter has been resolved, it reflected the lack of trust some residents have for the current city administration.

The Bainbridge City Council approved the following resolution (offered by City Attorney Paul McMurray) during the March 18 meeting:

Shall the City of Bainbridge Island adopt the Council/Manager form of government and abandon the Mayor/Council form of government? The adoption of the Council/Manager form of government would not affect the City’s eligibility to be governed under Title 35A of the Revised Code of Washington.

Spokesperson Dennis Vogt and other members of the VOTE Council-Manager ’09 Campaign took exception to the second sentence, saying that it was unecessary and, citing two previous measures (both defeated, including the 1991 vote on Bainbridge) where a similar passage was used, could lead to voter confusion and the defeat of the proposition.

“Most voters, when faced with something they don’t understand, will vote ‘no.’ Keeping this language as it is will raise the question whether the election was designed to be fair to the Council-Manager choice,” Vogt wrote in an email in which he asked McMurray to replace the approved language with a resolution the campaign preferred.

McMurray, while opining that he didn’t believe the proposition was “unclear or confusing,” agreed to replace it with:

Shall the City of Bainbridge Island abandon the Mayor/Council form of government as provided in RCW Chapter 35A.12 and adopt the Council/Manager form of government as provided in RCW Chapter 35A.13.

This was all done very cordially and without conflict between McMurray and Vogt, who in fact apologized for not having thoroughly read the original resolution during the council meeting.

However, the incident underlines the delicate nature of any election and the importance of there being absolutely no appearance of a conflict of interest by the city. So far, so good.