We still get to vote, right?

This Tuesday, the Kissimmee City Commission begins the process of changing the City Charter with regard to election procedures. As they consider these changes, we ask that they keep this question in mind: "What compels Kissimmee to be different from other municipalities?"

Lottery for placement of names on the ballot
We feel that this is one of those "feel good" measures. Is there any statistical data that says that, in Kissimmee, the first name on the ballot gets elected more often than the second, third, fourth, and so on? That didn't seem to be the case in the last city election. And anyway, there are some people in the city that could change their name to "AAAAAIloveKissimmee" and still not have any chance of getting elected.

Term limits
Floridians statewide like term limits. A defined span of time in office should bring a sense of urgency to getting things done. And a truly beloved elected official could serve 8 years, sit out an election, and then run again. It seems to us that most city officials who have left office lately have been more likely to say "thank goodness that it's over." On the otherhand, looking at some of the recent elections, we might be running out of "good candidates."

Suspension from office
This should happen so infrequently as to never really be an issue. But it does seem that more candidates come out for an appointment process than a special election process... witness the 21 people who interviewed to be appointed acting mayor vs. the 5 who ran in the special election.

Eliminating petitions and adopting state election law
Getting 20 petitions signed isn't a big hurdle, and we all know that. But any reform of the qualification process has to begin with an across-the-board enforcement of the qualification standards. In the last city election, three candidates "opted out" of paying the qualification assessment fee simply by signing a piece of paper saying that it would be a "hardship" for their campaign (no further proof required). Interestingly, what all three had in common is that they have previously run for office or held elected office, so apparently one of the things you learn after a campaign is what "loopholes" you can exploit.

Election dates
Shifting the election dates appears to be all about saving the cost of a special runoff election. While this is a goal, we think a more important goal is to have the maximum number of people vote in the election that decides who our leaders will be. There are already too many "elections" going on in Osceola County, with St. Cloud holding spring elections, the School Board holding elections with the state primary, and Kissimmee and Osceola County holding elections with the state general election. We don't like the message in September of "hey, are you voting in the election today?" "no, it's just the primary" "well, it's the state primary, but it's the city general election". We agree with the letter submitted by Wade Davis in Saturday's Gazette, calling for St. Cloud election dates to mirror State and National dates. Let's get the maximum number of voters to vote by holding one election, in November (the traditional national election date), and the winner takes all... if seven candidates are running for one seat, and most get 10% and one gets 20%, the 20% candidate is the winner.