MayorSuttleRecall.com

The folks who plan on “forming a committee” for a recall of Omaha Mayor Jim Suttle held their first presser today and fleshed out, a little, their plans for the recall.

Jeremy Aspen, an Omaha property management company owner (who also hosts a Saturday real estate show on KKAR) stood up as the group’s spokesman (sort of).

Also joining were Nicole Jesse, owner of LaCasa Pizzeria (oh yeah) and Rod Tevis, who described himself as a “lifelong Democrat” and spoke very briefly.

The man behind the curtain, it seemed, was John Chatelain, who was the spokesman along with Tom Jizba of the Metro Omaha Property Owners Assoc (MOPOA -- pronounced “moh-poh-uh”, we discovered) when they released their poll recently.

One nugget that Chatelain gave up during the presser was that one questions was left out of the public release of the MOPA poll:

“Considering the Mayor’s intention to raise property taxes by nearly 10%, and his proposal to raise restaurant sales tax by 4%, would you be willing then to go along with a recall?"

Poll showed people would be willing to go along with it.

Now along with the people at the presser, who are apparently on the committee, Aspen stated that they have two political consultants involved -- Jim Cleary and Pat McPherson.

Also, Mayor Suttle Recall has filed with the Nebraska Accountability and Disclosure Commission, and shows Chatelain as their Treasurer.

Also on the form are Aspen, Pam Greer (local floral company owner, and active in Republican politics) and Acela Turco (co-owner, with her husband Jay, of an auto repair business -- Jay was part of an ad last December urging Ben Nelson to vote against the Health Care bill), listed as “Controlling Individuals”. In the group, but not speaking, Republican activist Lee Ann Chinn.

But again, from the presser we got the feeling that while Aspen is the spokesguy, Chatelain is the one running the show.

But we could be wrong.

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In any case, they set out four to six questions for whether to go forward with a recall campaign:

1) Does recall make sense before waiting until 2013?
2) Can the city otherwise survive under the mismanagement of the current Mayor and his governing against the will of the People?
3) Can they reach the level of funding needed for a campaign?
4) Will they have adequate volunteer support?

Well kids, as they say in the courtroom, you only ask the questions you already know the answers to.

1) Sure.
2) They wouldn’t be there if they thought Suttle was OK.
3) We’d say yes. (Note our earlier post listing, for starters, Mike Simmonds as a seed money guy.)
4) Probably yes. (Though Joe Jordan asked a relevant question regarding whether they will use paid petitioners to get the required signatures. We’d guess the answer is “probably”, but maybe not. )

They said they will announce more in September.
We’re guessing that the September announcement will work towards getting the majority of signatures on Election Day - November 2nd.

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A few other noteworthy points:

Hal Daub was asked what his thoughts were on a recall.

He noted that back in ‘87, he was against the recall of Mike Boyle.
However...

"But today is a very different story," said Daub. "Whether or not I sign a recall position, I just don't know right now. I have never seen it this bad. It's about leadership."

Nonetheless, the Mayor Suttle Recall guys say they are not a front for Daub, or Nabity, or the Republicans or Democrats.

And they may as well throw in, or Vokal or Stothert or Festersen or many others who would be interested in jumping in the Mayoral campaign waters, if and when it would come to that.

By the by, note that if Suttle is out, then the City Council President (Gary Gernandt) would become acting Mayor, and then the Council would vote on the new interim Mayor.

So, until a special election 90 - 150 days later -- could it be... Mayor Pete Festersen?

Could very easily happen.

And could strengthen someone like Festersen.

Now there’s a discussion for ya.

Have at it kids.

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Oh, and by the way, yes we saw that recall applications were filed for Councilpeoples Festersen and Stothert. While those may slightly throw some mud in the waters, lets not get too excited. Get back to us when the signatures are in.