Eden Prairie citizens voted yesterday in a special election to determine the fate of a proposed $22.5 million dollar bond issue that would have been used to construct a number of improvements to the City’s overall park and recreational facilities.
Citizens said “no”.
3,078 voted against the proposal. 2,357 voted in favor of the proposal. Overall, there was a 16% voter turnout. That’s low, but not bad for a special election.
The proposal would have funded a comprehensive set of new and improved public amenities for our community. But there’s a reason why State Statute requires these types of bond issues to be put directly to the people. We are talking about amenities. Citizens should rightly determine the level of amenities they are willing to support through their property tax dollars. And that’s what they did.
We will take a look at these results, and probably do some post-election surveying, to find out what aspects of the bond issue were objectionable to citizens. It might be the whole darn thing. It might be, for example, just the proposed aquatic center. It might be, for example, just the baseball park. We’ll never know until we ask.
My staff that worked on this effort will be disappointed. I think our Councilmembers will be disappointed. I know the various youth athletic association leaders and other advocates of the bond issue will be disappointed. I’m disappointed.
But the democractic process works. We accept the decision of our citizens – and we move on. Eden Prairie is still a wonderful place to live, and we’ll do the best we can to keep it that way.
