Iolans will have the opportunity to say what form of city government they prefer in a non-binding opinion poll the city will conduct April 6, when Mayor Bill Maness also will be up for re-election. As explained on Wednesday’s front page, the two events must occur at separate locations. One is an election, the other is a request for citizen opinion.
The opinion poll will ask citizens to choose among city commissions with four commissioners and a mayor; one with six commissioners and a mayor; and one with eight commissioners and a mayor.
These three forms were the ones considered by a 14-member advisory committee the city commission appointed from among volunteers for the assignment. All of those who volunteered were appointed, which is why so large a group was named.
I was among the 14 who spent Monday afternoons for a couple of months listening to in-formation presented by the Kansas League of Municipalities and considering research done by individual committee members and opinions expressed by the 14 of us. The meetings were open and from time to time visitors also expressed viewpoints.
Anyone with experience on committees of that size will understand that no consensus developed. Instead, the 14 of us separated into three groups, each supporting one of the configurations citizens will be asked to choose among on April 6.

ONE OF THE points of contention revolved around the decision to abandon the three-person commission the city adopted by charter ordinance Sept. 25, 1968. On the April 7, 2009 ballot, voters were asked to answer yes or no to this question:
“Shall the City of Iola abandon its organization under chapter 82 of the laws of 1909, and the acts amendatory thereof, and become a city under the general law governing cities of like population?”
Under a 1906 law, the decision the voters made to abandon the three-commissioner form of government would result in default to an eight-member council (not commission) in 2011, unless the current city commission used its home rule  powers to adopt another form of city government before that automatic change was made.
Cities were granted home rule powers under a constitutional amendment approved by a majority of the people of Kansas in 1960 and be-came law in 1961. Under that amendment, a city commission or a city council may issue a charter ordinance spelling out how the city will be governed, including the number of commissioners, or council members, how they will be elected and what powers they will have.
The purpose of the amendment was to keep local government as local as possible and to avoid unnecessary state interference.
When Iola voters decided on April 8  to abandon the three-person commission, they did not also decide in favor of a eight-person council. There was no mention of creating a council or commission of any size on that ballot. But be-cause the 1906 law did provide for a council IF THE CITY DID NOT ACT TO ESTABLISH AN ALTERNATIVE GOVERNMENT, some on the advisory committee and some other interested citizens assumed that the 2009 vote had determined the form of a successor government as well as abandoning the current government.
The Register added to the confusion by not clarifying in its reports and some of its editorial comments that the default provision of an eight-person council and a non-voting mayor would be enacted only if the city commission did not act on the matter.
This mistaken view still persists, despite authorities on the pertinent law to the contrary. The Kansas League of Municipalities and other legal authorities agree that the Iola City Commission has the power under the home rule amendment to create a new government for Iola by charter ordinance. The people then may ask for still another election by petition. If the petition is successful, then the charter ordinance could be rejected by a majority of the voters and a substitute governmental ordinance adopted.

Friday, I will make the case for a four-person commission and a voting mayor.

— Emerson Lynn, jr.

I know this letter will upset people and might make some mad, but I feel I need to say it. School District 257 needs to cut costs like all the other districts.
First, we can start buses going from point to point by the straightest route. Don’t go three miles for one student. Some students may have to meet the bus at an intersection instead of the bus coming to them. Do not go up long lanes. We need to cut fuel costs.
We need to go back to the old gym classes, not bowling. I saw a bus going to the building trade’s class with one student. I think we should drop the building class and just have a wood and metal shop. If we built the houses complete, it might be different, but we have to contract so much of it out.
We use the buses for too many activities. When I was in school, we paid a dollar to go to out of town to watch a ball game. I believe in an activity fee  — pay to play — for each sport. We might start with a $25 fee. I know there’s a player that can’t afford the fees. You work it just like the lunch program, reduce the fees some and some could even play for free.
The students and parents will also help with all the cuts. We might even have to drop a sport, although it’s hard to make that kind of decision.
I also think we should close the alternative school in Gas and work those students back into the regular system. If they choose to drop out of school, it’s their choice.
The next step is wages for employees. Freeze them, no raise this year. Millions of Social Security people didn’t get a cost of living raise this year. I think everyone should tighten their belts somewhat.
We should try to keep the entire faculty for the sake of the students. Bigger classes and fewer teachers is not the answer as there will be less time to help the students that need it.
I know our buildings are getting old, especially the grade schools, but in our present economy, it’s cheaper to fix than build new. People can’t afford the higher taxes.
Hopefully, I haven’t upset too many people.

Bob Wayne
Iola, Kan.

The national news media has been inundating us with their reporting of the broken health care system. I believe that they are as out of touch with reality as the ignorant politicians. They report that the primary issue is spiraling insurance costs. It is true that the cost of health insurance is way too high, but none of the media have asked the obvious follow-up question … why? The cost of insurance is rising because the charges filed by the doctors and the high cost of medicine is rising to the point of being ridiculous; and insurance companies are blindly willing to pay for it. Why not? It is not their money!
I am fortunate to be in fairly good health, so I rarely visit the doctor, but I recently was required to seek treatment for an arthritic knee. A specialty clinic tried a “low cost” treatment option. This treatment was a series of shots into my knee joint. When I reviewed the details of the charges, I was appalled…. The doctor charged $110 to administer one shot (inject the needle and squirt the medicine). The medicine in one shot cost $250. Then there was the office charge and the up-front co-pay. Once I was in the room it  took less than a minute to process me. How many of you can relate to this?
Why should the price of medicine be so high? Americans give generously to good causes like heart associations, lung associations, cancer, MS, arthritis, etc. We also support our colleges and universities where much of the research is performed to develop medicines for these diseases. Why aren’t the media and our elected officials asking why medicine cost so much?
How about this scenario: the drug companies get research money from politicians and the charitable organizations; they get quite a bit of grunt work done by our universities; they give doctors incentives to prescribe their drugs. This equates to huge profits. Their huge profits will allow them to purchase a lot of air time on television and cable networks. These networks control the media.
Politicians get their piece of the pie through generous donations from the profits of drug companies. Their contention that the cost of insurance is the problem is only a smoke screen. The problem is them! The result is high insurance costs.
Possibly a start to solving the riddle would be to have comprehensive campaign reform, for the politicians, that would put an end to corporate contributions; limit the incentives that doctors can reap from the drug companies; scrutinize the patent award for drugs to assure that the patent really belongs to the drug company (maybe it belongs to the university);  the insurance companies should review and revise (to realistic standards) what they are willing to pay for doctors’ services; doctors need to realize that insurance companies and drug companies are not bottomless money pits and revise their charges to something that is realistic.
There also has to be a general, and major, cultural change that says, “We do not all need to be multi-millionaires.” Maybe the universities could help society take on this task.

Bill Fritsche,
Iola, Kan.