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The City of Springfield has approved a plan for choosing someone to fill the vacant City Council seat left by Nick Ibarra, who resigned Wednesday—and it will begin taking applications this week. KSMU’s Jennifer Moore has the details.
According to City Charter, City Council must choose an individual to serve until the “next regular city election,” which won’t be until April of next year. The elections coming up in February and August of this year are considered “special elections,” and don’t qualify as venues.
Mayor Jim O’Neal has approved City Manager Greg Burris’s plan for filling the Zone 1 seat.
Burris says that process will be very similar to the way the Zone 3 vacancy was filled when Ralph Manley resigned two years ago:
Starting Friday, January 6, the city will release the qualifications for the position, and will solicit applications from the public. Those applications must be turned into the City Clerk’s office in person by January 20that 5:00 p.m.
Then, on January 23, the City Clerk’s office will gather and scan all applications send them to City Councilmembers. In Early February, Council will try to narrow the field down to a few finalists.
In mid-February, Council will host a series of public interviews with the finalists, giving each candidate up to ten minutes to speak.
Council will then make its choice and the new member will be sworn into office.
The new Zone 1 Councilmember will fulfill the rest of the Zone 1 term through April 2013, at which time that post will be filled by election.
According to the Associated Press, Ibarra is facing a charge of unlawful use of a weapon after being arrested Sunday on suspicion of threatening his wife and himself with a handgun. He’s free on $25,000 bond.
According to a detective’s report, Ibarra admitted havinga gun on Sunday, but denied threatening his wife with it.
A lawyer for Ibarra said Wednesday the former councilman would have no further comment.
For KSMU News, I’m Jennifer Moore.
