Former state Sen. Keith King is considering running for City Council District 3.
“I picked up the papers, but I haven’t made a final decision,” King, 64, said Friday.
“I’ll be making a decision shortly.”
King is well known in Colorado Springs, especially in political circles.
King, who moved to Colorado Springs in 1977 and started a waterbed furniture store chain with 18 stores in six states, served on the Cheyenne Mountain School District Board. He served as a state representative for eight years and as a state senator for four.
“I would have run one more time, but the district got gerrymandered, and I didn’t want to run against Bill Cadman so I walked away,” he said.
King has started four charter schools and is currently the administrator of Colorado Springs Early Colleges.
King said he’s interested in running for council primarily to help the council transition to the strong-mayor form of government.
King said the council should focus more on things like developing policy and strategic planning and less on the operations of the city.
“I think the citizens of the city spoke and said they want a strong mayor to run the city much like a CEO or much like the governor of the state of Colorado,” he said.
“I bring a unique opportunity, I think, for Colorado Springs to step forward and really embrace the strong mayor form of government and have a way for council to collaborate and cooperate with the mayor and not be so confrontational that we don’t get good things done,” he said.
“I’m just looking to bring my legislative expertise and how the legislature functions and bring that to the operation of City Council to make it something that would be beneficial for good, effective governance of the city along with the strong-mayor concept,” he said.
If King decides to run, he would face at least two other candidates. Former county Commissioner Jim Bensberg announced his candidacy last year, and City Councilwoman Brandy Williams is expected to make a formal announcement next week.
King, like Jim Bensberg, have plans to run for the state legislature and only serving half a term on Council until House 21 opens up. Another promoter of King Bach and his dictatorship is not what this City needs. Give me a representative of the people who isnt trying to have a career in politics jumping from one seat to the next.
Why would we be interested in electing someone who votes like he hates government spending….yet clearly relishes the power to wield this hatred to the detriment of the people who vote for hiim?
He lost my vote as soon as he mentioned supporting a strong mayor. Steve Bach is no Bob Isaac.
Another Bach cone head as in Leigh AND DUGGAN
Just vote no.
Lilithia
King sounds like he will be another puppet in Bach’s power hungry, unprofessional,corrupt and secretive administration. Bach has Melcher and is trying to build a council that he can control and manipulate in order to pursue his own agenda and the agenda’s of the developers and other anonymous individuals who stand to benefit from Bach’s corrupt, uneithical, and secretive behavior. It is time to seriously consider a recall petition. Bach is destroying our city. His self-serving behavior, decisions, and lack of ethics is killing our city. Any company looking to start a business or relocate here just needs to read the newspapers or search the internet to realize that Colorado Springs is not the place to start a business. Shame on you Bach !
I just read Keith King’s website http://keithking.org/, It is very apparent that he will definately be one of Bach’s puppets. His objectives and beliefs are almost indentical to Bach’s. I would not be surprised if Bach is behind his run for office. He is most likely another one of Bach’s cronies right up there with Melcher and Leigh. Hopefully the voters of Colorado Springs are starting to understand how stubborn, unethical, and destructive Bach and his associates are and will vote for city council candidates with integrity, honesty, vision, and intelligence. Hopefully they will vote for candidates who do not have a hidden, self-serving agenda. We have seen enough of that in the last year.
[...] who is running for re-election against former state Sen. Keith King and former county Commissioner Jim Bensberg in the race for District 3, lists the Housing and [...]