Democrat Lisa Alexander, who will face Jeff Hough for the Bannock County Commissioner District No. 2 seat in the upcoming Nov. 3 presidential election, believes adding the advisory question to the ballot “circumvents the normal process,” which to her would involve creating a legally binding question to place on the ballot and asking the residents of Pocatello and Chubbuck to definitively cast their vote of approval or dissent for a merger.

“I have no opinion on whether the cities should merge. My problem is with the process that they are using to get this on the ballot,” Alexander told the Idaho State Journal during a Thursday afternoon phone interview after the Bannock County Commission work session meeting that saw the advisory merger question receive a final vote of approval, contingent upon costs.

“Having run the elections office back in the day, the normal process would involve the two cities getting together to decide to put this on the ballot,” said Alexander, who attended Thursday’s commission work session. “The other option that could be used is the petition process to create a ballot initiative by way of obtaining a certain number of signatures from registered voters in the two cities. This advisory question is not using either of those avenues.” |  FULL ARTICLE