A Prairie Village man is suing over the appointment to a vacancy in the Prairie Village City Council.
In his filing, Tim Swanson says the city council violated the law when it allowed Mayor Eric Mikklelson to appoint Chi Nguyen to the seat recently vacated by Lauren Wolf. Wolf resigned in March because she is moving out of her ward.
Wolf submitted her resignation from the Ward 3 seat on March 4, 2024, and Swanson put forth his application to join the council on March 21, but says in his filing that Mickkleson claimed to have the authority to fill the position — something the court seems to agree with — at least provisionally.
On April 5, Swanson asked District Court Judge K. Christopher Jayaram to issue a restraining order and temporary injunction to prevent Mikkleson from filling the position.
On April 15, Jayaram ruled that Swanson had “failed to adequately demonstrate the elements to permit relief,” and declined to issue a restraining order. Jayaram did not rule on the merits of the case, however.
Just hours later, on April 16, Mikkleson appointed Nguyen to the position, which was confirmed by an 11-0 vote.
The Sentinel has reached out to Swanson’s attorney, Cody Hagen, of Graves, Garrett, Greim, for comment but has not received a response.
The argument
At issue is a charter ordinance in Prairie Village, which changed the procedure for filling open positions.
Kansas law — K.S.A 13-515 — requires that whenever “a vacancy shall occur in the office of councilman, the governing body shall appoint an elector of the ward where the vacancy occurs to be councilman for the balance of the unexpired term.”
Prairie Village’s procedure is that the mayor appoints — and the council approves — an appointee to the vacancy.
Swanson’s filing points out that in the Mayor/Strong Council form of government used by Prairie Village, Kansas law also states that the mayor is “considered part of the governing body for purposes of voting on the passage of a charter ordinance.”
However, Kansas law — because cities of varying size and “class”, and therefore which laws apply also vary by class — allows cities to opt out of certain types of state regulation or law via a “charter ordinance.” Charter ordinances somewhat resemble constitutional amendments —- allowing a change to the basic charter that incorporates a city.
In 2015, Prairie Village passed such an ordinance — Charter Ordinance 26 — which purports to exempt the city from K.S.A 13-515 and permit the mayoral selection of a council member. It is worth noting that the city has passed a similar Charter Ordinance every few years since 1990.
One of the requirements of a charter ordinance is that it provides “substitute language” for the provision from which the city is opting out.
In this case, Swanson argued, the ordinance simply states, “additional provision on the subjects addressed … are and will be contained in one or more ordinary ordinances.”
Swanson maintains the procedures for filling governing body openings need to be spelled out in the charter ordinance, not later in an ordinary ordinance.
He also argues that charter ordinances are not allowed to “contain more than one subject.”
“Charter Ordinance 26 contains at least two subjects,” the filing reads. “First, it purports to provide substitute provisions regarding the filling of vacant positions on the City of Prairie Village’s governing body. Second, it purports to provide substitute provision regarding the procedures and timing of primary elections.”
According to the lawsuit, as those are separate topics, they cannot be in the same Charter Ordinance.
The lawsuit argues that Charter Ordinance 26 should be null and void because of those issues.
It is unclear if the lawsuit will continue as court records do not indicate if the matter has been set for further hearing.
