By Bryce Abshier – Contact Bryce@VoiceofSouthMarion.com
By the time another qualifying period arrives, Belleview will have gone 18 years without a contested City Commission election. Mayor Christine Dobkowski says she does not see that as a problem. Instead, Dobkowski believes the lack of challengers may say something about how residents feel about the direction of their city.
“The lack of response indicates that most residents are happy with their city government,” Dobkowski said in a recent comment to the Voice.
Her statement comes as Belleview residents Andraea and Michael Thorn are circulating a petition aimed at opening the door for more people to serve on the City Commission.
The couple’s proposal would seek a change to the city charter allowing certain property owners who live outside Belleview’s municipal boundaries, with Belleview mailing addresses, to run for commission. Currently, commissioners must live within Belleview city limits. The Thorns have argued the change could help expand the city’s pool of potential candidates after more than a decade and a half without a contested race.
Belleview’s last contested City Commission election was in 2010. Since then, seats have repeatedly gone to candidates without voters having a choice between two or more people at the ballot box.
Dobkowski, however, does not believe a lack of candidates means something needs to be fixed. She pointed to the city’s efforts to advertise qualifying periods and encourage residents to become involved. She also pointed to her own political history as evidence that residents can challenge sitting officials when they believe a change is needed. She first ran for office in 2006, challenging Paul Anderson and winning the seat. She later challenged Mayor Tammy Moore and has served as mayor since 2011.
For Dobkowski, the fact that nobody has followed that path in recent years may have a relatively simple explanation: residents aren’t unhappy enough with their government to do so.
The mayor said she makes herself accessible to residents, including publishing her cellphone number and holding regular office hours at City Hall. Despite that availability, she said she receives few complaints. Dobkowski said that in roughly eight months of holding office hours, only about four residents had stopped by to speak with her.
That view puts the mayor on the opposite side of a larger question raised by the Thorns’ petition: Is 16 years without a contested election evidence of a problem, or evidence that residents are content with the people already representing them?
For now, the petition has put a spotlight on a streak Belleview has lived with for years without much public debate. Maybe Belleview residents are happy. Maybe they are simply not interested in running and content for it to be somebody else’s headache.
Whatever the reason, until someone else steps forward, voters have no way to answer that question at the ballot box.
