Councilman, organizer of petition to have him removed from council share optimism about city’s future
By Per Peterson
The year 2017 was filled with negativity at City Hall. There was name-calling. There were accusations. There were resignations and finger-pointing. Since the beginning of it all — more than a year later — the dust has settled. The city council has undergone a facelift with a new mayor and two new members. A failed, citizen-led recall election last week to oust a city councilman served as the exclamation point to a year’s worth of vitriol.
A year ago at this time, “We were headed down a really negative trail,” said Rosemary Martin, one of the main organizers of the recall petition to get councilman Tony Peterson removed from the council.
Martin said a lot of research and due diligence went into the recall process.
“We had many meetings, lots of soul searching,” she said.
The recall last Tuesday was rejected by 54.8% of the voters (211-174).
“When I learned about the votes, I thought, at the end of the day, we ran a clean campaign, we did everything we could to keep Tracy’s name as clean as we could,” Martin said. “One hundred-and-seventy-four people said they don’t want him in that office. The people were heard. That doesn’t mean that we’re not going to stay involved, that doesn’t mean that we aren’t going to work the committees and try to keep Tony in check.”
For more on this article, see this week’s Headlight-Herald.