Congratulations to Mayor-elect Dickey and council members Magazine, Scharnow and Spelich. And thank you to Ginny and all council candidates for running positive campaigns focused on the issues. Since Ginny won every single Fountain Hills precinct, it is obvious that voters were turned off by the negative ads and mailers the Kavanaghs sent out on behalf of Mr. Yates. We hope this is a lesson for future candidates that outlandish accusations against your opponent just makes you look bad.
We still have a council seat to be filled and it seems obvious that the next highest vote-getter, Sharron Grzybowski, should get that seat. If Mr. Yates wouldn’t have hung onto his seat an extra 30 days, keeping it off of the ballot, we would’ve been electing four council members rather than three. The council can remedy this injustice by recognizing what voters wanted and appointing Ms. Grzybowski. It would go a long way toward healing the anger that voters felt by being denied a vote.
There is also precedence for this, as this is how John Kavanagh began his career on the town council; he lost when he ran, but received the next largest number of votes. So when a council member moved, he was appointed to finish her term, based on being next in votes. We should follow this “Kavanagh Precedent” with Ms. Grzybowski.
The new mayor and council will be sworn in Dec. 4. Let’s hope we can turn the page on the negativity and work for what is best for all Fountain Hills residents, regardless of party.
