Board of Aldermen 03-12-2019 Page 16
Two quick things; if it gets referred back | would ask that the Chair of that Committee, Alderman Caron call
a meeting as soon as possible and not necessarily if it's not for 2 or 3 weeks, wait that amount of time.
President Wilshire
The next meeting is April 1°.
Alderman Dowd
Yeah | would move it up if it was my call. The other thing is | just want to tell you that voter turnout is a real
bugaboo with me and even in regular City Municipal Elections it just fries me because it should be much
higher than we have. I'll give you a quick story, the date of the special election | had “I Voted” sticker on my
coat and | went back to a Village at Kessler Farm Board Meeting, we have 7 members. All of the 6 asked
me what election is that? No one even knew about it. The City makes a very poor, if you are not on
Facebook or City Sounding Board, and you know, it just doesn’t get the word out, number one. Number
two, it was fairly chilly that day although the sun was shining but people are not going to take time off from
work or make a special effort unless they have some interest in the election. Fortunately Alderman
Clemons had a lot of support so all those people came out to support him. But the turnout was ridiculous
and for us to be spending $100,000.00 plus in the last 3 years is to me ridiculous. We could either reduce
the City budget by $100,000.00 or we could add another employee. But we certainly could spend the
money in a much better way because I'll tell you the budget this year is tight and to be spending it to geta
few hundred people out to vote is crazy.
Alderman Caron
So first of all | don’t think anyone that wants to send this back to Committee is looking to continue running
special elections. | think for me personally because we had this meeting before we had the public hearing,
| think it is important that we take some of what they’ve said, whether you like it or not, and really evaluate it
and maybe we have to make some changes. | myself, |’ve worked the polls, and been there and gone
crazy because no one shows up and | think that if appointing someone for a short period of time works, |
think we can do that. But my question, Madam President to City Clerk, if we hold this Personnel Meeting
April 1°*, is that too late.
Ms. Piecuch
No it’s not.
Alderman Caron
So Alderman Dowd, sorry but April 1* will be the day.
Alderman Dowd
It has to come back to the full Board too.
Alderman Caron
Right but it would be within 2 weeks. So my thinking is that everyone has some ideas and questions and
concerns. | think the place to do it is at the Committee on April 1*' and let the Committee put something
together that is conducive and a compromise that fits everyone. | certainly don’t want to see us spending
thousands of dollars for nothing, but let’s make sure that we have everything in place so that legal can say
“yes it’s concise” and we don’t have any problems up in Concord.
Alderwoman Melizzi-Golja
