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Voters’ Guide: Millville will elect mayor, two council members

October 24th, 2009 Posted in Opinion

By Cassidee Cline

MILLVILLE—It is coming close to Election Day in November and with three spots open, the hardest vote for Millville will be deciding who’ll be mayor. This contest is between current mayor Michael Johnson and his neighbor, Guy Curtis.

Curtis served on the city council about four years ago. Curtis said his experience with Cache County Search and Rescue and Millville’s First Responders shows his ability to serve others in different capacities. “It’s another chance to be available to them and assist them in another part of their lives,” Curtis said.

“I enjoy serving,” Curtis said, and being mayor is “another opportunity I have to serve the citizens of Millville.”

Curtis said he thinks the council now is doing a good job, but he would like to see more programs implemented to help promote businesses in Millville. “I’d like to see the dollars in Millville stay in Millville,” he said.

“The important thing is to have a slow sustained growth and to make
sure we don’t grow beyond our means,” Johnson said.

Johnson served a total of 12 years on the council. The past six years he has served as the mayor. He said he doesn’t think Millville really needs to change. Johnson said he would like to see more public involvement, but as far as promoting home business, Johnson disagrees with Curtis.

“The responsibility of a city is to provide basic services,” Johnson said, ”with a small city like this we don’t have the budget to try to do a lot of self promotion.”

Even though their ideas differ, Johnson said in this election the city would win either way. “I’m willing to leave knowing that I have done a good job and accomplished a lot of things,” Johnson said.

City Council seats

It has been several years since Millville has had women on the council. Deborah Redman and Sheryl Hair are almost guaranteed the two spots available for council this year and they said they are pretty excited to get the chance.

Redman is a mother of six children and said her experiences moving around the country has given her some idea of what works for a city and what doesn’t. Redman said she decided to run when she attended a meeting and found that she had no real ability to vote.

“I realized that I wanted to have more of a say in the decisions that were made,” Redman said. “It should be our responsibility to take part in our communities and government.”

Redman said the opportunity to be part of the council in a small town is a good way to figure out how councils work. In bigger cities, she said, it would be harder to participate in the council because a lot more people are interested.

She said she would like to see if there is an ability to get a countywide library system in Millville.

Hair didn’t mention any need for change in the community. “I really enjoy the country living atmosphere here the community,” she said. Her husband, David Hair, has been on the council for some years and chose not to run again this year.

“I wanted to get involved in the community,” Hair said. She said she seeing her husband participate in the council has given her a good idea about what needs to be done.

Hair has lived in Millville for about 26 years and feels it’s time to give back to the community. She said she is looking forward to having the ability to listen to citizens concerns and meeting their needs in the community.

Tags: Millville, Voters' Guide