It disappoints me when legislators like Reps. Jean Poppe and Robin Brown undermine our republic by working to turn elected positions into appointed occupations. This is in direct contrast to our system of government: of the people, by the people and for the people.

Poppe and Brown recently co-authored and argued on the House floor for a bill (HF 3335), which passed the House, making the Mower County office of county recorder appointive and denying the citizens’ right to vote.

Voters need their local officials to be accountable to the voters by offering customer service. This includes a willingness for officials to speak up and freely evaluate situations for the voters and not go silent to protect their job or somebody else’s. For example, an auditor in my area recently took issue with some building expenses proposed by some county commissioners. His elected status gave him the liberty to make a stand without fear of retribution; local voters appreciated the effort.

The key question we need to ask ourselves is whose best interest is being served. These offices belong to the people. If a referendum takes place and citizens relinquish their right to vote for local officials, that’s one thing. But neither a board nor legislators like Poppe and Brown should make that decision for our rightful voters.

Voters in Mower County need to know that their representatives — Poppe and Brown (both DFLers) — recently authored and voted for a bill that takes away your right to vote for your county recorder. Typically, these bills are used to bypass the local voters because Poppe and Brown could have requested the county commissioners to follow state law and have a local referendum of the voters to make this change.

They know these referendums usually fail, so they instead think they know better than you and bypassed the right for locals to vote on such a change; that’s one way to ensure it does not fail. Our democracy is not well-preserved when we steal away citizens’ rights to vote!

Voters should request Reps. Poppe and Brown reconsider this bill and not have the state Legislature take away your right to vote.

Torrey Westrom

representative

House District 11A

Elbow Lake