Iolan Ken Rowe, one of the community’s most vocal advocates of an eight-member city council, became the first candidate for one of the council seats Wednesday.
Rowe, a local insurance agent, is seeking a seat to represent Iola’s Fourth Ward, which covers most of the southeast part of Iola and whose boundaries extend to the east along Carpenter and to the north and east along Carpenter, Second, Douglas, Kentucky and East streets.
Rowe had run once previously for a seat on Iola’s city commission before losing narrowly to Craig Abbott.
Iolans rejected in November a charter ordinance that would have seated a five-member city commission to replace the existing three-member commission. By default, an eight-member city council — two representatives from each of Iola’s four newly redrawn voting wards — plus a mayor elected at large will transpire. A city treasurer also must be elected at large.
“Since the election in November, I have been encouraging other people to run for positions on the council,” Rowe said. “If I’m out there asking other people to serve a two-year term, I should be willing to serve as well.
“The first two years of this new form of government will be extremely important,” he continued. “Tough decisions will be made and we need good people making these decisions.”
Iolans have until noon Jan. 25 to file for any of the city government seats.
They have two ways of doing so: by paying a $10 filing fee; or by petition.
The number of necessary signatures on the petition is unclear.
The Register previously reported incorrectly that each prospective council member was required to submit a petition with at least 105 signatures, or a proportion of the number of voters who participated in the last city election.
As confirmed by City Clerk Roxanne Hutton, those seeking council seats only need to present petitions denoting a portion of those 105 signatures.
That means if the four voting wards have roughly equal populations, candidate may need to have petitions carrying only 25 or 30 signatures.
Allen County Clerk Sherrie Riebel is looking over the newly redrawn voting wards to determine the number of votes cast from each, which will determine the number of signatures necessary on each applicant’s petition.
“We still don’t have those numbers squared away,” Hutton said. “There’s quite a bit of work involved, particularly with the new boundaries.”
Petitions can be gathered citywide, not just in an applicant’s respective voting ward.
Anyone seeking the mayor’s or treasurer’s seat must carry at least 105 signatures on their petitions, unless they pay the $10 filing fee.
First city council applicant files
