During an otherwise routine meeting on Tuesday, Columbus City Council split on who to appoint to the Municipal Election Commission.
Ultimately, the council voted 4-1 to welcome back former commissioner Leon Speck, with Ward 1 Councilman Gene Taylor opposed. Ward 2 Councilman Joseph Mickens was absent.
Speck will fill Barbara Mitchell’s unexpired term through June 30, 2017. Mitchell resigned from the commission last month.
Speck, 83, served 13 years on the Municipal Election Commission before resigning last year to seek election as a county election commissioner. He said he’s happy to return to his former post.
“There are things that need to be done,” Speck told The Dispatch after Tuesday’s council meeting. “We need to make sure people on the voting rolls are qualified to vote in the (wards) where the rolls say they are.”
Local independent insurance agent Eric Thomas also applied for appointment to the election commission. The 44-year-old also unsuccessfully applied earlier this year for appointment to the Columbus Municipal School District Board.
A motion to appoint Thomas to the election commission Tuesday night failed 3-2 (with Councilmen Charlie Box, Marty Turner and Bill Gavin opposed) before Speck was nominated and appointed. Ward 5 Councilman Kabir Karriem, who voted for Thomas in the first motion, also supported Speck’s appointment.
Box, councilman for Ward 3, said he supported Speck because of his experience.
“He’s served the city for years,” Box said. “Politics (Speck’s leaving the commission to seek election) got him off the commission, and I guess politics (a split vote) got him back on it. But when you’ve got somebody of his qualifications and experience, you need to hold onto him.”
Taylor said he is confident Speck will serve the commission well but supported Thomas because of his youth and willingness to serve. He said he feels the city should work to cultivate young leaders and afford them opportunities, such as through commission appointments, to show their leadership qualities.
“We need to go young. That’s my argument, and that will continue to be my argument,” Taylor said. “(Thomas) is young, he’s energetic and he works hard in the community. But Mr. Speck also works hard in the community, and I believe he will continue to do a good job on the commission.”
Other business
On Tuesday, the council also:
n appointed engineer Kevin Stafford and architect Major Andrews IV to the Board of Adjustments and Appeals of Development codes;
n adopted new redistricting and voting precincts from the 2014 annexation;
n approved the low bid of $415,422 from Burks-Mordecai Builders for exterior renovations at City Hall, which state general obligation bond money is funding;
n approved a $12,500 (2.5-percent) match for a $500,000 Port Authority project to resurface 1.7 miles of road near the city’s industrial park; and
n approved removing traffic signals at the intersections of Third Avenue and Seventh Street North, and South McCrary and Airline Roads, and changing those intersections to all-way stops.
Zack Plair is the managing editor for The Dispatch.
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