No matter what happens, council will see new faces

With the closing of the city of Homer election filing period at noon Monday, five candidates have filed for three seats. In the Oct. 4 city election, and with no incumbents running for their current seats, voters will choose two new Homer City Council members and a new mayor. Council members Gus VanDyke and Bryan Zak and Homer Mayor Mary E. “Beth” Wythe are not running for re-election. However, Zak is running for mayor. Wythe on Tuesday lost her bid to represent District 31 in the State House. (See story, this page.)

In order of how they filed, the candidates for mayor are:

• Bryan Zak, a current council member, and

• David Lewis, also a current council member and mayor pro tempore, the member who runs meetings in the mayor’s absence.

Running for the two council seats, also in order of filing, are:

• Tom Stroozas, publisher of America’s Cuisine-Anchorage, a restaurant review guide;

• Shelly Erickson, owner of HomeRun Oil, Homer Tours and Short Stop Tesoro gas station, and

• Kimberly M. Ketter, a social-media marketer and an employee at the Auction Block.

In the council election, the top two candidates receiving votes are elected provided the candidates receive at least 40 percent of the votes cast.

VanDyke was elected to his first term in 2013 and received the most votes in that race. VanDyke, owner of Scrugg’s Automotive, said he plans to retire soon.

“I don’t want to be married to the city. I’m going to go out and have a little fun and not have to worry about every other week to be at the council,” he said. “I think we have some good strong candidates who will fill the seats nicely.”

The filing period for city of Homer seats started Aug. 1.

Michael Armstrong can be reached at michael.armstrong@homernews.com.

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