Councilman Jim Cleveland to run for Kenerly’s vacated seat

Hoschton City Councilman Jim Cleveland has announced that he intends to resign his Post 3 seat this week and qualify for the Post 6 council seat vacated by Theresa Kenerly.

Kenerly resigned to qualify for the mayor’s race, a position she recently won by default because no one else qualified. She will serve out the unexpired term formerly held by Mayor Erma Denney who resigned in October. That term will end at the end of this year.

The qualifying period for Kenerly’s previous Post 6 is through this Friday (Feb. 8). If only one person qualifies, the special election called for March 19 will be cancelled, city clerk Cindy George said.

Cleveland told the council Monday he is running for Post 6 because of the changes to the city’s revised charter, which city attorney Thomas Mitchell said might be passed by the state legislature as early as this week.

One of the key changes to the charter calls for the elimination of two council posts by the end of 2015.
Cleveland’s is the first post to be eliminated and is scheduled to be phased out at the end of this year. “Post 6” — which might change by name in the coming months — is the second post to be phased out and will end at the end of 2015.
“I’m running for (Kenerly’s) vacancy,” Cleveland said. “Doing it this way it gives me two additional years, which I am willing to work with.”

Regarding Cleveland possibly vacating his current post, Mitchell told the council that he did not think a special election to fill that seat would be necessary because of Hoschton’s unusual circumstances stemming from charter revision.

“Hoschton’s in a unique situation with your charter, because you are eliminating a seat,” Mitchell said. “Because of that, I don’t think it is necessary (to have a special election). The city is basically getting where it wants to be six months earlier than it would have.”

For more coverage from the Hoschton City Council meeting, see this week's issue of The Braselton News