Letters: Legislative update Feb. 17, Stevens on city council

League of Women Voters Legislative Update on Feb. 17

Editor's note: This letter was not received in time to be published in print before the event.

The public is invited to an online legislative update on Saturday, Feb. 17, from 9:30-11 a.m. on Zoom. The event is co-sponsored by the League of Women Voters of Bloomington-Monroe County, the Greater Bloomington Chamber of Commerce, the League of Women Voters of Brown County, and the League of Women Voters of Johnson County.

State legislators representing any parts of Monroe, Brown, and Johnson counties have been invited to report on their work and on the state of the current session of the Indiana General Assembly. They will first give brief updates on the proceedings in the legislative session to date and will then take questions from attendees.

To sign up for the Zoom meeting, go to https://lwv-bmc.org/legis-updates.

This is the second of three planned legislative updates sponsored by the Leagues and the Chamber on Zoom. A subsequent update is set for March 2. All legislative updates are free and open to the public. Community Access Television Services through the Monroe County Public Library has been invited to record the events, with the video available on the CATS website shortly after each update.

The work of the Indiana General Assembly can be followed on its website, http://iga.in.gov, which provides a wealth of information and offers the possibility to track the progress of individual bills

Nancy Boerner, Publicity, League of Women Voters of Bloomington-Monroe County

Jenny Stevens is best fit for city council vacancy

Jenny Stevens should be appointed to fill the current Bloomington City Council vacancy. Jenny is the only person who qualified for the District 5 primary and remains able to fill that role. Further, she received more votes than any other person currently on city council.

Bsquarebulletin.com wrote: "Rana won the District 5 nomination over ... Jenny Stevens, with 1,291 votes (58.13%) compared to 930 votes (41.87%) for Stevens. ... even though Stevens was well behind Rana in District 5, the 930 votes she received was more than the winner received in all the other district races— by a lot."

We live in a Democratic Republic; people vote for representatives who then lead our government. State law specifies that the Democratic Precinct Chairs in District 5 make the selection. Voter intent is clear. I hope the precinct chairs follow it.

Of course, it is important that people filling vacancies be well qualified. Jenny is. Jenny’s prior experience with MCCSC will be very useful on city council. I worked with Jenny on a large research project at IU and know her to be an excellent administrator with a careful eye for budgets — useful skills to strengthen the current city council.

Craig Stewart, Bloomington