Road measure defeated

The Stutsman County ballot issue to raise taxes for road maintenance failed by an unofficial tally of 2,035 yes votes to 2,334 no votes.

It becomes the fifth road tax measure to fail since 1972, receiving only 46.6 percent of votes.

The measure was supported with 667 "yes" votes to 440 "no" votes in the rural precincts with all six rural precincts voting in favor.

However, the measure failed in all the city precincts by a tally of 1,368 "yes" to 1,894 "no" votes.

The measure would have increased property taxes in the county by 15 mills and have implemented a 1/2 percent county sales tax.

"We got a lot more votes than last time," said Dale Marks, county commissioner and one of the authors of the plan. "It shows people are understanding the problem."

A tax increase for road maintenance was defeated with 1,289 "yes" votes to 2,429 "no" votes in the June 2008 election.

"It is always difficult to get people to vote to raise their own taxes," Marks said.

Marks and other commissioners had presented the plan as a way to increase the number of miles of paved roads the county could afford to maintain. County crews began recycling Old Highway 10 from pavement into a gravel road last week as a first step in reducing the number of miles of pavement the county must maintain.

Some of the opposition to the measure centered their concern on road department planning.

"It's not as simple as throwing more money at the road issue," said Judy Graves, Ypsilanti resident and road activist. "Not knowing how the county commission would proceed, especially without properly applying criteria and doing valuable road studies and testing would have been asinine. It has to be a two-part solution."

Marks said he would like to see the same measure back on the ballot in November. That would take a resolution by the commission to place the measure, or a modified version of it, on the ballot, according to Noel Johnson, county chief operating officer.

Sun reporter Keith Norman can be reached at

(701) 952-8452 or by e-mail at knorman@jamestownsun.com