In case you're late to the party, let me catch you up. Richardson citizens face a referendum in November in which they'll be asked whether to change Richardson's city charter to make the office of mayor directly elected by the voters.
OK, I know it doesn't sound like much of a party. No fun here. Still, some are cackling about it like they somehow got into the good stuff. At least those people should find something to amuse them here.
Previously, I wondered, if direct election of the mayor is such an obviously fair and democratic way to do it, why in the world did Richardson's voters not set it up like that way back in 1956 when they adopted the current system? I started searching to find out what I could about that long ago decision, to find out if there might be any faint echoes of it still reverberating today that might inform the choice about to be thrust upon us in this year's November election.
I didn't find the answer to why Richardson made the choice they did in 1956, but I did
discover that the City of Dallas, in 1949, switched from a system remarkably like Richardson's today to a system of direct election for mayor. I also found a back story that suggested that contentious council government after Dallas made the change would have justified Richardson's decision not to follow Dallas, but I didn't find any hard evidence that was behind Richardson's decision. For whatever reason, Richardson rejected Dallas's decision.
After the jump, the results of a little more digging.