Minot voters will choose their next mayor on Tuesday, Aug. 5.

The Minot City Council selected the date for the election on Monday after sufficient signatures were found on citizen petitions requesting an election. A vacancy for mayor occurred on April 1 with the resignation of Tom Ross following an incident involving inappropriate texts, reported to have been sent inadvertently, to the city attorney.

The council was required by law to set the election at least 95 days out. July 29 and Aug. 5 were the dates identified as most feasible based on the availability of election staff at Ward County and of the Minot Auditorium for polling.

The city has $15,000 budgeted for elections in 2025, which is the estimated cost of the election if no early voting is included.

Four individuals already have declared their candidacies. Mark Jantzer, a long-time council member who moved from council president to acting mayor, has announced he is running, along with council members Paul Pitner and Rob Fuller. Josiah Roise, who was involved in the circulation of the petitions for an election, also has announced.

They must collect at least 300 valid signatures to get on the ballot and file by the 64th day before the election.

Roise spoke at Monday’s council meeting, along with several other individuals, to voice concerns about the direction of city government.

“I’m grateful when people get involved,” Roise said. “But I, as mayor, want to involve the people in more of these things because so often they don’t even know what’s going on. One can say that’s their own fault for not just engaging and getting more into it. I was guilty of the same thing before 2020. 2020 was a wake up call for a lot of people. They had no idea the rights that had been taken away from them.”

Roise spoke about taxes out of control, a government grown too big, a lack of police accountability that warrants a state investigation and poison in drinking water in the form of fluoride.

“There’s all sorts of issues that have just gotten way out of hand,” he told the council.

City extends deadline for police chief applications

By JILL SCHRAMM

Associate Editor

jschramm@minotdailynews.com

The City of Minot had received 12 applications for its police chief position as of Monday, with the deadline for applications now on Monday, April 28.

The city had pushed back the deadline about two weeks to allow more time for recruitment. City Manager Harold Stewart had reported in his message to the council recently that the firm recruiting a police chief is aggressively attempting to encourage more candidates after receiving a very small number of applications.

Stewart said Monday that of the 12 applicants, only one is an internal candidate.

Capt. Dale Plessas has been acting police chief since John Klug and the City of Minot parted ways in January. Klug had been on administrative leave during an investigation into his management of the department.

The city had hoped to find an external interim police chief to serve for 6-12 months while a nationwide search was conducted for a permanent chief but was unable to fill that position.