Surprise, AZ News blog

Surprise voters will have the last laugh

Let’s hope Surprise voters will have the last laugh.

It’s almost too hot to be thinking about elections. But for the people in Surprise, I would like to think that Sept. 11 can not come fast enough.

I’m convinced this will be the most important election in the city’s history. I mean, when the city manager, Jim Rumpeltes, read a statement in June that talked about a dysfunctional city and said some council members ruled by “threats and coercion,” the antennae of all voters should have shot up.

City managers don’t normally say those things. It was a gutsy and courageous performance that gave the public a scary glimpse into the power politics practiced in Surprise. Two inquiries are underway to see if the politicians violated open meeting laws or city codes by their behavior. Wouldn’t it be good if these were completed before the election?

Lots of candidates are squaring off. That’s good for representative democracy. In most municipal elections few people are willing to challenge incumbents. It certainly helps that longtime mayor Joan Shafer is calling it quits, prompting six challengers to vie for the mayor’s office. The three council races also are contested. That’s the way it should be.

These races should pivot on City Council performance, but whether their shenanigans will prompt voters to turn out in droves and dump the incumbents, remains to be seen. I hope they do. I hope the voters are angry.

Their performance of the incumbents has been marked an unusual sense of entitlement that I have not seen in a career of covering politics. It’s been all about them – voting themselves higher salaries, not wanting any accountability on mileage reimbursement, retroactive pensions that’ll cost Surprise $291,000 all at once, increasing discretionary fund accounts without putting in place spending guidelines. The list goes on.

One of the things that most distressed me was the curt manner they have dealt with citizens at City Council meetings. There should be no place for rudeness. Can you imagine, in this day, of a group of politicians calling those who disagree with them “CAVE people,” or Citizens Against Virtually Everything?

Only in Surprise.

Election Day is approaching. It’s the opportunity for the people to have their say. Or is it the last laugh?

Above article by Joel Nilsson, Arizona Republic

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