REDDICK, Fla. - – Voters in Reddick will have the opportunity to meet the candidates running for mayor and town council at a “meet the candidates” event on Thursday after the town’s entire council resigned back in December.
“For the last seven months, the town of Reddick has been without a town council.
Only the town’s clerk stayed on board back in December after each councilmember and the mayor handed in a resignation letter.
James Stroup served as Reddick’s mayor for 30 years. He said he has never seen anything like this before.
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“Well, it’s going to be a complete changing of the guard,” Stroup said.
He said he thinks there will be a learning curve for whoever is elected to serve on Reddick’s town council since the council’s former president, Steve Rogers is not seeking re-election after serving for 37 years.
“He has done most of the fiscal stuff and so it’s going to be a learning process for whoever comes out of here,” Stroup said.
Stroup said the biggest impact of not having a council is not being able to solve code enforcement or zoning disputes.
“All of that stuff is done with an interlocal agreement with the county,” Stroup said. “Well that is not happening now you know for instance if we have a zoning dispute, then we have a zoning board which is the council.”
Members of Reddick’s town council all resigned last December after a new law required people in public office to fill out Form 6, a financial disclosure form.
However, only two of those resignation letters specifically site the new financial disclosures as a reason for leaving.
Stroup said he thinks the upcoming special election has sparked more interest in people wanting to run for town council.
“Before I never had to run, in 30 years, I never had anybody run against me and so now it’s different,” Stroup said.
Both Nadine Stokes and Myra Sherman are returning to the town council after resigning in seats 2 and 5 since no one else qualified to run against them. Former Mayor John Vetter and former Councilmember Shirley Youmans are facing opponents in their races for mayor and councilmember seat 4.
Bob Law is running against Vetter, while Kathryn Leskosky is hoping to fill seat 4 on the council.
Council Seat 1 has already been filled by Andrea Barnes. Kim Law and Patti Vetter are running for councilmember seat 3.
Reddick is set to host the event on Thursday. Stroup said he can’t remember the last time the town held a meet the candidates event.
“Come tomorrow night,” Stroup said. “People need to come because some of these people they may not know and it gives them an idea.”
Thursday’s “meet the candidates” event will take place at the Reddick Community Center beginning at 7:00 p.m.