In Springfield, the voters have voted the wrong way:
As the votes were being counted, a group of opponents of the controversial E-Verify ordinance waited anxiously at a downtown bar.
Marla Marantz, an organizer with Citizens for a United Springfield, watched the results trickle in on a laptop computer on a table near the east wall of Ophelia’s Tapas & Wine Bar.
Mayor Jim O’Neal, who on Friday called the initiative “misguided,” checked his iPhone periodically for the latest results as he mingled with others gathered for the watch party.
And:
Marantz acknowledged she was emotional about the results.
“I care deeply about it,” she said. “I think people were misled about what the ordinance is really about.”
O’Neal acknowledged disappointment.
“How close this vote was demonstrates a great division in the community.”
“But the people have spoken,” he said.
O’Neal said he and city council are now in a “precarious position” – mandated to defend inevitable legal challenges.
O’Neal said taxpayers could now have to pay for “hundreds of thousands of dollars” to defend the measure in court. He cited parts of the ordinance believed to be problematic.
The measure would require employers in city of Springfield to check employee eligibility with a Federal program:
A petition-based ordinance requiring local employers to screen employees using the online E-Verify program passed by a narrow margin Tuesday, although how and when it will be enforced remains unclear.
“We’re pleased that the citizens of Springfield heard our message and agreed with us, but we temper the celebration with the knowledge that this is a contentious issue and people of good conscience can disagree,” said Jerry Wilson, a spokesman for the Ozarks Minutemen.
He said the group hopes both sides now will “put aside their differences and support the rule of law.”
“This has always been about one thing,” Wilson said. “You’re either eligible to work in the United States or you are not.”
Opponents conceded the loss Tuesday but said the fight against the ordinance isn’t over.
The 221 vote difference — less than 1.4 percent of the vote — is outside the 1 percent threshold for a recount. But Mayor Jim O’Neal, who came out strongly against the measure in the days before the election, said he expects the ordinance to be challenged in court.
Not so that you could tell in the radio advertisements that Citizens for United Springfield were running on election day, where the nature of the question was not discussed, but only the impact of the check on local businesses leading to fewer jobs in Springfield.
The election was close:
VOTES PERCENT
City of Springfield Question 1
YES . . . . . . . . . . . . 8,247 50.68
NO. . . . . . . . . . . . . 8,026 49.32
How different that was from an election a year ago:
VOTES PERCENT
City of Springfield Question 2
YES . . . . . . . . . . . . 11,201 53.35
NO. . . . . . . . . . . . . 9,795 46.65
Where was the mayor lamenting the lawsuits then? The concerns by the right-thinking crowd about the adverse impact on business? Not here:
Clean air won out over living free Tuesday in an election battle that had been defined as a showdown between public health and business rights.
Springfield voters approved a sweeping indoor smoking ban by a margin of 53 percent to 47 percent, setting the stage for all businesses in Springfield to be smoke-free by June 6.
“We’re glad to see people decided in favor of the health of the community,” said Carrie Reynolds, spokeswoman for the group, Clean Air Springfield, that had lobbied on behalf of the ordinance.
Opponents, meanwhile, said they intend to support businesses impacted by the ban and remain active through an inevitable legal challenge.
“We’ll basically be a lobbying group for them,” said Live Free Springfield Chairman David Myers.
In both cases, a tiny fraction of voters won a ballot-initiated election, but the reactions from the members of the city government itself are very different.
