I’m pleased to see we have four candidates vying to fill Minnetrista’s open council seat. I’m looking forward to meeting them Monday night and having an opportunity to interview them. I take this 9 month appointment to the council very seriously because this person will be the incumbent, if they choose to run, in the November election and will have an incumbent’s advantage. Here are the candidate names (in alphabetical order): Ryan Boogren, Scot Pekarek, Cathleen Reffkin, and John Tschumperlin.
Some thoughts going into Monday’s meeting after reading the candidate letters and resumes. I’ll reserve judgement until after the interviews but I see that three of the candidates are relatively new to Minnetrista and I don’t see that as a negative at all. A fresh perspective can be a good thing. I value the experience and longevity of one of our planning commissioners that has applied as well. The three fresh faces live in the southern subdivisions of Minnetrista (yes, I looked up their zip codes). That will be the location of future commercial development and continued growth so I’m happy to see the interest from candidates in that area. Our current council is heavily weighted from rural and lakeshore areas.
Whomever is chosen by the council to fill this seat should, in my opinion, be the individual that would most likely have been elected had there been a special election. That’s not an easy thing to predict but I am interested in hearing what’s important to Minnetrista residents and I’m sure other councilmembers are as well. Email us your thoughts: lwhalen@ci.minnetrista.mn.us; sbruce@ci.minnetrista.mn.us; mmolitor@ci.minnetrista.mn.us; pmortenson@ci.minnetrista.mn.us. Or, better yet, come listen to the interviews at our worksession Monday, April 2 at 5:30pm or sign up under “Persons to be heard” at the council meeting at 7pm to express your views.
Minnetrista Governance Blog 