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Staff writer

The East Bethel City Council Wednesday night (Dec. 2) delayed narrowing the list of six candidates to replace a resigning council member because it wanted to include an absent council member in the discussions.

Councilmember Kathy Paavola was unable to make it to the council meeting and the resigning Councilmember Anne Klein could not vote, so Mayor Greg Hunter and Councilmembers Bill Boyer and Steve Voss would have been the only people voting on which of the six replacement candidates should move onto the interview round.

Klein is not able to fulfill the last year of her first four-year term because her family is moving out of the community. Because there is only one year remaining, state law allows the city council the power to appoint a resident to complete the term. The seat would be up for election in November 2010.

Klein announced her end-of-the-year resignation at the Oct. 21 council meeting. The time line announced at that meeting was that residents would have until Nov. 25 to apply for the vacancy. Paula Anderson-Beldin, Brian Bezanson, Steve Channer, Stephen Colburn, Richard Lawrence and Julie Moline applied for the vacancy.

The original time line anticipated the council narrowing the list of candidates Dec. 2 by reviewing the applications. However, with the absence of Paavola, the council wanted to delay making a decision so they would have four voting members.

The plan now is to trim the list of candidates at a special Dec. 9 meeting, which will start at 6:30 p.m. The council is tentatively planning to interview the finalists toward the end of the regular 7:30 p.m. Dec. 16 council meeting.

The council has not determined when it would appoint a new council member. Voss said he would not want to choose the replacement immediately after interviewing the finalists at the Dec. 16 meeting because he wanted some time to make a consideration.

The first council meeting of 2010 is Jan. 2.


Eric Hagen is at This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it