FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
May 21, 2021
On May 18, 2021 the North Royalton City Council in a 5-2 vote approved Ordinance 21-81. This charter amendment would be on November 2, 2021 General Election ballot and would change the way our Mayor and Council President are elected in North Royalton. The Council President and Ward 1 Councilwoman were correct in voting against this Ordinance. Sadly this is another move by the current majority on city council that wastes taxpayer dollars.
If this new charter amendment is approved, it would add a special May primary election with only the top two vote getters for Mayor and Council President moving on to the November ballot.
A primary election will waste at least $40,000 to $100,000 or more of our taxpayer dollars just to pay for a special election. Turnout for most municipal elections are typically low. How many residents want to, or will even show up to vote in an odd year primary? This is an unnecessary waste of our time.
The current Council President was quoted recently in a local newspaper saying, “Current system has worked previous times when multiple candidates ran for mayor and the current system gives plenty of time to evaluate candidates”. I concur too that the current process is not broken. In 2019, our current Mayor defeated four other candidates and obtained over 50% of the vote. Our current Council President ran unopposed.
This charter amendment if approved only benefits the five individuals on Council who voted for it and have higher ambitions as we get closer to the 2023 Mayoral and Council President elections. This will allow them to run from a safe seat for Mayor or Council President in future elections. If they are one of the eliminated candidates of the proposed new special primary elections they can still
run to retain their Ward Council seats in the same year, which currently nobody can do.
This all is just a ploy to keep the current majority in power and keep others out of the top two elected positions. This charter amendment is fiscally irresponsible, confusing, and self-serving. The money wasted on this proposed primary could be better used to fix our roads, storm water issues, aide our struggling small businesses, or provide more resources to our seniors. I urge residents to vote NO on this charter amendment come November 2nd.
Ordinance 21-81:
http://www.northroyalton.org/…/2021Legislation/21-081.pdf
