‘Meet the Candidate’ night is March 28 in Charleston

CHARLESTON, Mo. — The Charleston City Council has a large number of candidates for one seat on the ballot this year, so the city has chosen to hold a “Meet the Candidates for Charleston City Council” event at 7 p.m. Tuesday, March 28 in the Clara Drinkwater Newnam Auditorium on the Charleston High School campus.

The mayor of Charleston, Richard Toon, stressed how attending the event would help people pick who they believe is most qualified for the city council seat. He also said that attending would reassure people.

“It would give the person a better feeling,” Toon said. “I mean, if you already have your mind made up, then you already have your mind made up, but Charleston is a city of 5,000 people.”

Toon said he wants to see more voters in the city, and they should become more active.

“I would like to see the number of voters boosted up,” Toon said. “There are approximately 2,000 people who vote, some of them are located out in the county, but the majority of them are here in the city. Also, I feel like we would like for the voters to get more involved in selecting the representatives that are on the city council for them.”

Toon also highlighted on the significance of the event for the community.

“This gives the people a chance to come and hear because I’ve had a lot of people ask me who I was going to vote for,” Toon said. “And my answer to them is: ‘Well, after we have this Meet the Candidates, I will know which one I want to vote for, but right now I don’t know any of the four of them other than just by name and face.”

Toon said the reason he decided to have the event was because of the community’s interest in the candidates.

“All four of these people deserve to be heard,” he said.

Toon said this year there are four candidates running for the same seat Jason Oliver, Monica Goodin, Talisha Mays and Joe Moloney. There will be a table set up for those four candidates, as well as a microphone for each of them. Toon said that they will then pass a number between one and four, and the number they draw decides the sequence in which they will talk.

“They get three to five minutes to talk about themselves and tell what their goal is if they get on the city council,” Toon said.

Toon also said they would have a special visitor, Perry Harper, who is a professional stage performer and will emcee the event. Harper has lived in Branson, Missouri, for many years, although he was raised in Charleston and has since returned.

“I am gathering questions from people out in the city to give to him to ask the candidates,” Toon said.

Toon also discussed this year’s ballot and why there are so many nominees.

“Our terms are for three years, and in two years we have two candidates on a ballot, and the next year we only have one candidate on a ballot,” Toon said.

Toon described how the candidates are running for a two-year term to fill a vacancy.

“This year is kind of a strange predicament because we appointed one of the city councilmen, Phil Halter, as our city manager, so we have the three-year seat, and then what remains of his (Halter’s) seat, which is a two-year term, and that is the reason why we’ve got so many candidates on the ballot.”

Toon said in Charleston, mayors are elected one year at a time, and he’s been mayor since April 2022. He also said he would be running unopposed.

Toon noted this is the first time in years they have had this much interest in a council seat, and it is critical that everyone be aware of the “meet the candidates” event.

“We’ve never had this much interest in a city council seat,” Toon said. “Let’s say it’s one of the years that there are two seats open; we’ll usually have three people run. When there’s one seat open, we’ll either have one person or two people run. We’ve never had four people run for one position.”