Many times when there is a vacancy on a school board or city council a person is appointed to avoid the cost of a special election. That is often a wise use of resources, especially in the current budget era.
But then the appointed person often runs for the office as an incumbent, which gives them many advantages over prospective challengers. An open seat is much more likely to be contested than running against an incumbent for many reasons.
There is a solution to this problem. Appoint someone that promises not to run again.
Moorpark did this when there was a vacancy on their city council and they just appointed someone to a vacant position on the school board.
More councils and school boards should follow their example. It gives voters a chance for their votes to matter more. People appointed to serve are often highly qualified and do a great job. But voters should be the judge of who is the most qualified in a contested election.
Click here for the article on the appointment to the Moorpark School Board.
It's a no-brainer. Make every interim appointee automatically disqualified from running in the subsequent election. The present process simply allows those in power to game the system to keep themselves in power.
I agree with you GS - the system is being gamed all the time and incompetence is perpetuated.
Katie, GS,
Thanks for reading and commenting on my blog.
What do you think of some sort of local ordinance to address this issue?
I can see people complaining how unconstitutional it is already.......
I don't see any constitutional issue here. Every state & municipality has great leeway in what qualifications they establish for office seekers, within reason. Since the interim position is an appointment, almost any condition can be placed on the appointee.
What is truly unconstitutional is the notion that a representative of the People can be appointed by office holders, rather than by those that person will represent. It's sort of like Parliament appointing individuals to represent a constituency that is about to be taxed by Parliament.
I agree with GS but I can see some lawyers foaming at the bit and some elected officials that would not like it. I think it would get tied up in the court system forwever.