Who will rid me of this meddlesome priestess?

Local residents might remember that in November, 2013, we had a municipal election in New Brighton. As part of that election, Gina Bauman was reelected to the City Council to serve a four-year term. Or so she thought.

Fast forward to November, 2015. We recently had another municipal election in New Brighton. In this election, Bauman decided to run for mayor in what became a three person race. Her opponents were the incumbent mayor, Dave Jacobsen, and newcomer Val Johnson. When the votes were counted, Johnson narrowly defeated Jacobsen and will be seated as the new mayor in January. The term for the mayor in New Brighton is 2 years. Or so we thought.

Two days ago, the City Council met. Council member Brian Strub introduced a motion to change the timing of the next municipal election to 2016, so that it would now coincide with the normal, even year election cycle in which citizens go to the polls to elect state and national politicians to office. As part of Strub's proposal, he effectively proposed that the city council members who were elected in 2013, himself and Bauman, would now have to run in 2016, rather than 2017, effectively changing the term of office from four years to three, while extending the term of the incoming mayor, Johnson, to 2018. The motion passed.

So what's really going on? Strub explains it here:

Okay, technically that's not Strub. But it's pretty close. While the change was couched in terms of saving money and ensuring that more voters will weigh in on municipal elections, it was really about getting rid of Bauman, who has been an impediment in the efforts of the local left to install A Better New Brighton. A few points:

• Just a guess -- if Bauman had been elected mayor, the proposal would have changed the mayoral term to one year, rather than extending it to three.
• A petition is likely to appear on the ballot in 2016, asking voters to approve the change to the election cycle. But since the change will have already been made, it will be a fait accompli.
• The idea that moving municipal elections to even number years will somehow save money is ludicrous. There will still be elections for school board and other offices in odd numbered years.
• As Bauman rightly pointed out during the discussion, many voters, especially in a presidential election year, don't bother voting in the down-ballot races, so the idea that more citizens will now vote in municipal elections is specious. In fact, it's likely that these municipal elections and the campaigns themselves will get lost in the weeds.
• Strub tried to make himself seem selfless in offering to shorten his own term, but he's banking on the usual DFL get-out-the-vote effort to carry him to victory, even though his office is, theoretically, nonpartisan.
• If you doubt that the local DFL isn't trying to make these changes happen, consider this screen grab from the New Brighton Political Exchange group on Facebook:

That would be our state senator, asking to rid us of this meddlesome priestess. The city council has answered her call. There is more to say about all this and we'll revisit the issue in the coming days.