Preserve Your Historic Right to Choose, Protect and Support Your Local Government

By Marian V. Cosgrove

This heritage is worth maintaining in its entirety. It is an historic office and it is an elected office. Every element of our form of government is worthy of preservation, especially in this day and age, as big government, agencies, and regional organizations confiscate the resources from local municipalities. We need to preserve our local elected offices, and if anything, seek to re-establish pride in that form of government that helped establish California, and which is still strongly supported by the voting public.

Our most precious right as Americans is our right to elect our government officials. Only this right protects all freedoms and the other rights we cherish. Because the Office of Town Clerk is not a high-profile office like the Town Council is, few people know of the hundreds of important duties mandated to the Town Clerk by the California Government Code, which also states, "The powers of government in General Law Cities are vested in a City Council of five members, a City Clerk, a City Treasurer and such other officials as may be provided by law."

The Town Clerk and Town Treasurer are charged with the care of our tax dollars and official records, which are every municipalities' important treasures. While other Town officials are accountable to the Town Manager, these two officials should be elected by you, so that they may maintain a degree of independence for speaking out on your behalf, and for having the ability to refuse political favors without their position being jeopardized.

In 1988, when you first elected your present Town Clerk, there were 160 elected clerks in California. Now 16 years later there are still 160 elected city clerks. The people of these cities and towns, as large as 150 thousand to those just about 5 thousand, and from northern California to the southern parts of our state have chosen to keep a full time elected official in charge of the safety, security and maintenance of their records.

Elected clerks are residents and registered voters of their communities and are committed to their terms of office and in serving their neighbors. My continuing focus and drive as I serve you shall be to preserve this full service office, open to you during the Town's regular business hours.

During the years I have served, I have had interested residents enquire about the Elected Town Clerk's position. I have strongly suggested and shown them that it is a totally elected and functioning office and should be compensated as such by the electorate. As I continue to work with that commitment I know that qualified constituents will come forward in the future to serve you well in this position. With the rich field of business management and entrepreneurship to choose from in this valley and which is so very well represented in Los Gatos, there is no question that we have a huge pool of qualified residents that would be delighted to serve our Town with a median compensation comparable to all other municipal Silicon Valley City Clerks.

With your continued support we can keep this position a full time one: Fully elected by the public; Fully compensated by the public; Fully answerable to the public, and filled by fellow citizens, accountable to us who trust them, elect them and pay their salaries.

Commit to not losing your ability to elect your local Town Clerk. Keep each one of your election opportunities as local as possible. Continue to care about strong local government by preserving your ability to vote for it.