Commentary On Elections-Part Forty-Eight

 The roles of elected local officeholders:

1. City/County District Councilperson/Supervisor- Elected by the electorate in a municipal and county district to pass ordinances and regulations for that entire locality.

2. Vice-Mayor- Elected by the entire electorate in that locality to preside over the City Council/County Board. They manage the sessions of citizen input, discussions, consultants' input, and voting. The vice-mayor only casts votes if there is a tie in the passage/amendment of any local ordinance or regulation.

The vice-mayor nominates the three candidates for head positions such as Circuit Court Clerk, Game Warden, Sheriff or Chief of Police, Commissioner of Revenue, Treasurer, and other bureaucratic local offices. These bureaucratic offices should never be electable because they are not supposed to be embroiled in politics. Their offices' objectivity would only be tainted by the Winds Of Populism.

3. Mayor- The mayor selects head positions for these offices out of the nominees the vice-mayor picks. The mayor sends these selections for confirmation from the city council/board of supervisors. 30% approval is needed for confirmation of the mayoral selections to take place. The reason why it is 30% is if 50%-67% approval is needed, that would be directly democratic and that would give too much power to the local elected body. Since these positions require objectivity, impartiality, and even expertise, too much political influence by this elected body would only contaminate the functions of their offices.

At the same time, the local elected body of councilpersons/supervisors has to have some input so that the mayoral position does not become imperially democratic. This local elected body has to make certain that the mayoral selections are not too incompetently or corruptly made.

The mayor of the city/county, as scheduled by the vice-mayor, gives briefings to the council/board at least once a month. The mayor provides oversight of all these bureaucratic offices and interferes only if an suspected act of malfeasance takes place. The mayor reports all findings to the local elected body in an open forum.