The City Was Broke. The Paper Wanted the Mayor and Council to Quit.
With Olympia's finances in a muddle and a bond election already doomed by irregularities, the Tribune pressed Mayor Kerr and three councilmen to resign early so the newly elected government could take charge.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
THE BEST METHOD.
There is nothing at all impracticable in the suggestion thrown out by the Tribune that Mayor Kerr and three of the present councilmen should resign in order to get the council-elect in working order before another month elapses. On the contrary, it is the only practicable thing to do, to gain time. We understand that Mayor Kerr indicated to some friends a purpose to resign some time ago, when he failed to get the council to straighten out the finances. The new council does not meet for thirty days. It will take some time afterward for the straightening out of the financial muddle, and then it will require thirty days more for the preliminaries to a bond election. Thus it will be seen that if the newly-elected mayor and the councilmen are placed immediately in power, everything would be in readiness to go ahead when the new city government begins operations on the 13th of January. The present city council and the people are well aware of the irregularities that existed, which made it fatal for the last bond election, and the proper foundation for a speedy remedy is the placing of the council-elect in power at once. The present mayor and councilmen whose terms expire are not fools. They certainly see that such a course is for the best interests of the taxpayers and citizens.
“There is nothing at all impracticable in the suggestion thrown out by the Tribune that Mayor Kerr and three of the present councilmen should resign in order to get the council-elect in working order before another month elapses.”
The 1891 standoff over when elected officials should assume power—and who gets to manage a city's money in the meantime—has a familiar ring. Modern cities still wrestle with lame-duck councils, emergency budgets, and bond measures that fail because the public does not trust the books.
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