City accepting applicants for council

Torus Tammer

FOUNTAIN VALLEY -- The city is accepting applications until today from

people wanting to fill the council seat vacated by former Councilman

Chuck Conlosh.

The council voted to open the seat up at a special meeting Monday

night and also decided to make the term of the appointment about 21

months long. After that, the remaining two years of the term will be

added to the ballot in the November 2002 election.

The council will pick a person to fill the seat on Tuesday.

Some people have expressed concern about how short the application

window is open.

Mark McCurdy, who ran in last November’s election and is an applicant

in the running for the vacant seat, said he would have preferred more

notice.

“With the deadline for applicants being today, most of the public

won’t have enough time to respond,” McCurdy said.

But the city responded to the situation in the quickest way it could

under the circumstances, said City Manager Ray Kromer.

“The state law provides that an appointment or a special election has

to be done within 30 days of the vacancy,” Kromer said. “The council

chose to appoint. Then, in order to establish a procedure for the

appointment, they set a meeting where they felt the fairest way to do

this was to open it up to the entire community.”

There has been much debate about how the city should fill Conlosh’s

seat since he lost it under California’s 60-day absentee law. A top

suggestion has been that council should appoint the next highest vote

getter from last November’s election, Cheryl Brothers.

“It’s not fair to the candidates who invested their time and resources

for over eight months in the last election,” McCurdy said. “I think

people underestimate some of the sacrifices candidates make. It should be

between the remaining candidates and beyond that, it should come down to

the order of votes and the next highest vote getter, which in this case

is Cheryl Brothers.”

Doug Henry, also a candidate from last November’s election, has

applied for the vacant seat as well. Henry said that in the name of

fairness, whoever gets appointed on Tuesday should not be eligible for

the 2002 election.

“Traditionally, Fountain Valley elects incumbents, which in this case,

kind of gives whoever is elected a free ride,” Henry said. “I think that

[the council] should consider the possibility that [the] nominee be

exempt from running for the special election in 2002.”

Cheryl Brothers confirmed that she will be one of the applicants up

for consideration and said that like everyone else in the city, she is

awaiting the council’s decision on Tuesday.

“I hope that as the council makes their decision, they consider the

voice of over 6,000 voters who supported me in the last election,”

Brothers said.However, not everyone supports a Brothers appointment. At

the March 6 council meeting, Robert Richards voiced his opinion on how

the situation should be conducted and added how he felt about a possible

Brothers appointment.

“I recommend that council does not appoint someone, rather let the

people of Fountain Valley elect someone,” Richards said. “Cheryl Brothers

campaign was full of inaccurate statements and appointing her would

prompt a recall.”But the suggestion of a special election was promptly

quashed by the council due to its possible $60,000 price tag.Instead, the

council will make its decision with three votes needed to win.

“The ballots will be passed out, and the people who applied for the

seat will be on that ballot,” Kromer said. “[The council] will then check

off the votes, and whoever gets three votes will be next the

councilperson.”

The City Council will hear from all of the applicants on Friday and

Monday in an interview process that will be open to the public.