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Mounds View Residents FB Page Posts
Posted February 15, 2022
ATTENTION MV VOTERS: MV CITY COUNCIL has scheduled a SPECIAL VIRTUAL (Zoom) CITY COUNCIL MEETING for Friday, February 18 at 10am. It will be solely to discuss the PETITION, and Attorney's
letter delivered to City Council, Staff & Attorney on Feb. 14.
From the agenda, it appears they will be deciding the issue that morning, one way or another. I for one hope they follow the law (statutes), and reverse their decision. We will see
. . .
SO BE SURE TO CALL OR EMAIL YOUR MAYOR & COUNCIL MEMBERS BEFORE THE MEETING, to tell them your thoughts on this important city issue. Or join the meeting via Zoom on Friday morning,
and comment during the Public Comment portion of the meeting. Hold them accountable - so they do the right thing.
However this turns out on Friday, we can feel good. 🙂
V. Amundsen Responses to Comments
Kim Hanson Ruedy - Kim, the county does not decide this. They offered the city their opinion. But the city apparently did not tell the county the type of petition it was. The County
assumed it was an ELECTION petition, which it was not. I was given a contact person at the County Elections office, and immediately reached out to them after the city council mistakenly
deemed the petition as deficient (2/4). I spoke to the office for an hour, after which they suggested the city resubmit. They said they had NOT evaluated it based on the Statutes under
which it was submitted (MN 410.12), and that we should let the city attorney know that they should resubmit. They also stated that they are NOT the decider, and that responsibility
rest with the City (specifically with the city clerk). The city, in addition, did not fulfill their statutory obligation of verifying signatures, and/or providing the sponsoring committee
with the "particulars" (meaning specifics) of any and all insufficiencies. The city even refused, when asked, to let the committee know how many signatures were needed before the deadline
expired. A very clear violation, as detailed in the Attorney's letter. So much more I could share. I encourage you to read the letter, it's long but very good.
Posted February 14, 2022
FYI Mound View Residents: Petition update... a highly respected legal firm has advised the city council, staff and city attorney that the petition was indeed acceptable under MN law,
and should not have been rejected because of form used. The firm delivered a 12 page letter to the city this afternoon, informing them of relevant MN law, and case precedent. The
firm instructs the city to immediately reverse the February 4 insufficiency declaration, and accept the MV Citizen's petition as submitted.
As one of the sponsors of the petition, I was copied on the letter, and would be happy to email the letter to anyone wanting to read it. Just PM me your email and I'll send it to you.
The argument the city used for throwing the petition out (not proper form used) has already been litigated in many other cases and it was found that it is NOT sufficient grounds for
determining insufficiency under MN state law, as the petitions DID meet statutory requirements (as did ours).
I know a lot of you care about this issue, so I wanted to bring everyone up to speed with where this issue is right now. So now it is up to the city council to do the right thing.
V. Amundsen responses to comments
William Stoffel - The petition was simply bringing an Ordinance the city passed back to the voters for a vote. When a council passes a change to charter language, citizens can bring
the issue to the ballot box if they get 5% voter's signatures in a petition, and then decide the issue instead of the council. We got more than 5%, but city claimed wrong form was
used, and wrongly threw out the petition. That apparently is not legal in MN according to current law, and they were advised of that today.
Bob King - Yes Bob, the elections office was copied and notified. But the county does NOT make the decision about determining sufficiency of petitions. Read the letter (Chris above
posted a link to the letter) - it explains everything. The county did NOT consider the relevant statute in determining, and there is case law and precedence that the petition was sufficient
in current form. It's a very detailed legal read. 12 pages long! Everything is thoroughly covered. I think it will help you understand.
Scott Gamelin response - Thank you for putting in your time and everything else you do. Maybe these people should step down that are responsible for their incompetence of doing their
duty. Corruption starts at all levels I see. Way to go Mounds View city council people. What a embarrassment, you people should be ashamed of yourselves and the shit you all try to
pull.
Scott Gamelin - I think some good and decent people who really want to listen to the people of Mounds View need to start thinking about running for Council and Mayor. We will have 3
seats to fill later this year. We can speak with our votes come November, and get this city back on track.
Marissa Sweet - Brian and I have been a part of this community since 1979. This is our home, and we love the people in this community. Walking and talking with folks made this even
more personal. We heard stories of seniors struggling to stay in their homes, people actually seriously considering moving out of MV because of city stuff going on, and many other
stories too many to tell here. This is not our petition - it is the people's petition. We got 98% of those we asked to sign, actually wanting to sign. Many more signatures could
have been gathered had we continued longer. But we had more than enough signatures, and we were concerned about the walker's well being when the weather turned really cold.
Andrea Shoup (one of the petition circulators) Thank you Valerie and Brian for the countless hours and now money spent hiring this law firm. Regardless of whether you as a resident support
this petition, the city cannot disregard laws either through ignorance or intentionality. Our community deserves better than this. We need accountability. Sent from my iPhone "Fire
is Everyone's Fight"
Don't forget to call or email your city council and Mayor about how you feel about this issue. And tell them that you expect them to follow the law. Hold them accountable. It is part
of the oath they take when taking office. This is our statatory right to petition for this (MN 410.12, subd. 7) https://www.revisor.mn.gov/statutes/cite/410.12