AURORA | The forthcoming vacant seat in Aurora’s Ward II is already generating interest after Councilmember Nicole Johnston announced her resignation at Monday’s city council meeting.
Idris Keith, a business attorney who sought a seat on the Arapahoe County Board of Commissioners last year, said in a news release Tuesday morning he would seek the appointment for the seat.
Johnston plans to leave the council in mid-June.
Keith, who ran in the Arapahoe County race as a Democrat, is also running for the Ward II seat in November. He is so far the only person running for that position.
“Councilmember Johnston has been an effective leader in moving the city forward,” Keith said in a statement. “I intend to proceed in the spirit of cooperation that she established.”
Johnston announced her resignation at the end of Monday’s meeting, saying she has plans to move to Colorado Springs so that her kids can be closer to their father, who was deployed most of their childhood. Johnston said she’s also taken a job in El Paso County.
“I strongly feel there are many ways to make a difference in the community and it isn’t always as an elected official,” she said in her address to the council and public.
Cooperation is a bizarre word to characterize the beginning of the deep divide on the council. Johnston, Murillo, and Hiltz started to push for hyperpartisan “progressive” policy on the nonpartisan council.