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Ishpeming City Council selects mayor

ISHPEMING — The Ishpeming City Council voted to appoint Joe Juidici as mayor at its regular meeting on Wednesday — but not without a bit of controversy.

The meeting was opened by outgoing Mayor Mike Tonkin and then handed over to city attorney Bonnie Hoff who explained why the process of appointing a mayor was necessary.

“We have an interesting situation in the city of Ishpeming tonight as you can see; we are very visual people. We have an empty seat. This represents the seat of the mayor. And, before I go into the legalese of that I will acknowledge the elephant in the room. The city made a mistake,” Hoff said. “The issue should have been on the ballot, this is a matter properly put before the electorate in the city of Ishpeming.”

Former city attorney David Savu, who is also an Ishpeming resident, said he was not satisfied with the city’s explanation that the omission of the mayoral seat from the Nov. 8 election ballot was an administrative miscommunication.

“Who made the determination that the mayoral position would not appear on the ballot?” Savu asked. “Which of the city clerks, prepared the ballot for the November election and decided not to review the draft formative ballot with the city attorney?”

Hoff said the Ishpeming city charter states that only those council members whose terms do not expire immediately following the general election are automatically candidates for the office of mayor.

“What this means to the population is if the matter had been on the ballot, we would have had two people who would have been qualified to run for office: Councilman Koski and Councilman Juidici,” Hoff said.

Hoff said the city charter clearly mandates how this kind of situation is to be remedied.

“It’s charter driven, that’s how we get the answer to this question,” Hoff said.

The charter states that a vacancy occurring on the council or any elective city office shall be filled within 30 days by majority vote of the remaining council members.

Hoff said the city did consult with the state election commission before moving forward in correcting the error.

“We were assured it was a local issue, the answer to be found within our charter to be determined by the city attorney. So, we are not violating state law, rest assured of that,” Hoff said.

The council also voted to approve a change in the title of the assistant to the city manager to include clerk of the council.

Savu said during public comment prior to the vote that he had concerns about the proposed change in the job title because it violates the city charter.

The city charter assigns those duties to the city clerk.

“I don’t think you should strip away clerk duties and ship them off to another employee,” Savu said. “It would be like stripping off duties from the treasurer and sending them off to someone else or stripping off the duties of the city manager and sending them to another employee. It can’t be done, the charter is explicit.”

Cathy Smith, the current assistant to the city manager, has regularly attended all council meetings and kept records of the proceedings.

Savu said the charter states the clerk shall be clerk of the council and shall attend all meetings of the council.

“I think it would be a clear violation of the charter if you were to confirm the job title,” he said.

City Manager Mark Slown was appointed clerk along with his duties as the city manager in February 2014 as a cost-saving measure.

Tammie Leece who had worked for the city as an assistant city clerk was appointed to the part-time city clerk position by the city council in June, effectively taking over duties formerly performed by Slown, such as overseeing elections.

Council member Stu Skauge said he could see Savu’s point, and abstained from voting due to his belief that changing Smith’s job title was a violation of the city charter.

“I have no problem with Cathy being the assistant to the city manager, but why would we have a city clerk and not have them be clerk of the council?” Skauge asked.

Juidici said Leece would not be able to take over city council administrative duties because her position is part-time.

“She can only work so many hours a week, and with all her duties that she has downstairs now, if she is here for these council meetings and stuff like that I think it’s going to put her over what is classified as part-time,” Juidici said.

Slown said the situation created by the part-time city clerk position creates a complicated problem.

“I did ask for a full-time position for the clerk, but it was deemed that we don’t have funding for that,” Slown said. “Honestly, what I would ask you to consider here is, what’s in a title? I mean we haven’t had this title given to anyone and we all know that Cathy and before her Carol (Holmgren) has been doing this and there’s not been a problem.”

Hoff said although some of the charter is out of date and the city should create a commission to revise it, she rejected the idea that changing Smith’s job title to include clerk of the council would be a violation of the document.

“With all due respect to former city attorney Savu I think he reads a document as a strict constructionist,” Hoff said. “I read a document, and especially the charter as a living, breathing document. I am trying to get the intent and the spirit of the document.”

Hoff said all city staff members complete tasks that may not traditionally listed in the description of that job.

“I am city attorney, but I don’t hold to that title only. We don’t have a human resources department, so between the finance director, the treasurer and Cathy Smith we have our own human resources titles,” Hoff said. “There are a lot of part-time positions in the city. But we all do it; we all pull together to get it done.”

Lisa Bowers can be reached at 906-486-4401.

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