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DELEGATE J. CLARK (presiding):
Delegate Schloeder.
DELEGATE SCHLOEDER: The inten-
tion of the Committee was to provide for
the local elections to be on four-year terms,
yes. A great deal of discussion and thought
went into staggered elections but the feel-
ing was that under this provision we
would maintain four-year terms or eight-
year terms.
DELEGATE J. CLARK (presiding):
Delegate Maurer.
DELEGATE MAURER: In an attempt
to prevent staggering of terms, if you have
four-year terms, you cannot have some
elected in one year and the rest elected
two years later. That is, in the guise of an
election law you are prescribing the terms
of offices of local officials and the composi-
tion of the board in a sense. Is that not
right?
DELEGATE J. CLARK (presiding):
Delegate Schloeder.
DELEGATE SCHLOEDER: Yes, I
would not say we were attempting to pre-
vent anything. We were weighing, of
course, on the one hand what would happen
and what would be precluded from hap-
pening and felt that having the visibility
and short ballot and lack of coattail effect
on the local level would overbalance the
situation, as I understand it, in Mont-
gomery County where the Board of Elec-
tions is elected to a staggered term.
If something could be worked out where-
by staggered terms would still be possible
for Board of Education officials, there
would be no problem as far as we would
be concerned.
DELEGATE J. CLARK (presiding) :
Delegate Maurer.
DELEGATE MAURER: May I then ask
you this. You consider us local officials, not
state officials?
DELEGATE SCHLOEDER: No, this is
all under the assumption that Board of
Education officers would be considered
local. I thought we were working under the
premise that that was the basic assump-
tion.
Of course, with your state officials, that
would be something else.
DELEGATE J. CLARK (presiding):
Delegate Maurer.
DELEGATE MAURER: Delegate Schloe-
der, there has been a good deal of interest
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in our community to have the school board
terms similar in length, to the terms of ap-
pointed members, which would provide for
a slower turnover, six-year terms, three,
two, two.
Were you attempting to prohibit that
kind of an arrangement in the Constitu-
tion?
DELEGATE J. CLARK (presiding):
Delegate Schloeder.
DELEGATE SCHLOEDER: No, there
was no attempt to prohibit it. The language
may end up doing that, but there was no
intent or motivation on our part to do that.
DELEGATE J. CLARK (presiding):
Delegate Manrer.
DELEGATE MAURER: Mr. Schloeder,
would your Committee be willing to at-
tempt to provide some kind of language
to provide flexibility in terms of staggering
of terms of office both for county councils,
boards of education, and other locally
elected representative bodies?
DELEGATE J. CLARK (presiding):
Delegate Schloeder.
DELEGATE SCHLOEDER: I would
certainly think that at all times we would
be open to any considerations that you
might want to make, certainly. We would
never want to foreclose that opportunity.
DELEGATE J. CLARK: (presiding):
Delegate Chabot.
DELEGATE CHABOT: Delegate Schloe-
der, could you look at article 17, section 2.
I believe you had referred to section 1 in
response to a question by Delegate Mudd.
DELEGATE SCHLOEDER: I have it
before me.
DELEGATE CHABOT: As I understand
section 2 it says that elections by qualified
voters for state and county officers shall
be held and then specifies 1926 and the
same day in every fourth year thereafter.
Would it be the Committee's understand-
ing, or am I correct in believing that it is
the Committee's understanding of this
point, that whatever it is that now permits
the Montgomery County School Board to
hold staggered terms, to have staggered
terms despite this provision in the con-
stitution, would not be disturbed by the
Committee. The same route would be avail-
able under our new constitution.
DELEGATE J. CLARK (presiding):
Delegate Schloeder,
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