District 2 Centennial City Councilmember Sue Bosier has announced her candidacy for re-election and will run on a campaign of fiscal conservatism and improved citizen representation.
“There’s so much work that needs to be done that I just decided that I really wanted to hang in there and see if I could help get the job done,” she said.
During her first term, Bosier, who was elected in 2005, has not been shy about defying her colleagues. The official’s campaign announcement says “Oftentimes Bosier is the lone voice on council representing the citizens of Centennial.”
As an example, she cites the fact that she was one of only two councilmembers to publicly oppose the city’s home-rule charter, which was voters passed by a 2-to-1 margin last year. Bosier contended that the governing document placed too much power in the hands of unelected city staff.
Although Bosier differed with the Centennial Charter Commission’s decision to eliminate the city’s elected clerk and treasurer, among other changes in the government structure, she concedes, on balance, that going home rule has been the city’s greatest accomplishment during her first term.
“I was certainly never concerned right now anyway,” she said. “I was just thinking once you pass the charter, it’s difficult to change. With the staff we have now, I have no concerns at all. Down the road, I don’t know.”
Home rule brings permanence to a city’s government structure and allows Centennial greater autonomy under the Colorado Constitution. Centennial had been by far the largest city in the state without a charter.
Bosier’s plans for a second term would include continuing to implement the charter, helping to rewrite the city’s land-development code and working to bring a new park to fruition on 11 acres of open space adjacent to Centennial’s new civic center.
Bosier’s only declared challenger in the election is Eric Castle. The first-time candidate is a senior director at Western Union.
“I don’t know him that well to make a comment on him,” Bosier said. “He came to one of our District 2 meetings and he didn’t say very much.”
Although serving on the nonpartisan city council has been Bosier’s first foray into elected office, she has been no stranger to politics in Arapahoe County. The ex-wife of former County Assessor Ed Bosier is a longtime Republican activist.
The councilmember, a onetime aide to former state Senate President John Andrews of Centennial, has never been shy about her conservative politics, but she says the city council has stayed true to its nonpartisan mission.
“Often the vote goes different ways,” she said. “There’s not anybody there that I say, well, he’s a Republican, he’s going to vote with me. I don’t remember anytime the council split on Republicans vs. the Democrats.”
Bosier has frequently been a leading proponent of lower taxes and smaller government. In 2006, she was a dissenting vote when Centennial partnered to create the Southeast Metro Stormwater Authority.
The councilmember argued that the city’s voters should have had a say in the decision to create a new layer of government. The council instead approved a mandatory fee to support the intergovernmental body. Fees are not subject to limitations imposed by the Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights in the Colorado Constitution.
“I know that we needed to have that funding to take care of our stormwater, but I felt it should have gone to the people and probably put on as a tax. I would have supported it as a tax,” Bosier said.
The Republican activist continues to carry the banner for lower taxes. At last week’s budget retreat, she agreed with the majority of council who rejected initiatives for proposing new taxes to the voters, especially since the city has not yet begun auditing current sales-taxpayers as allowed under home rule.
“I thought we did an excellent job of reaching consensus,” Bosier said. “We didn’t even discuss the ‘20 Ways to Raise Your Taxes.’”
Bosier has recently taken a particular interest in Centennial’s problem with urbanized coyotes. She has reported to council requests from constituents who want to participate in a possible lethal-control program.
In February, the council passed a comprehensive coyote-management plan that leans heavily on education and co-existence, but also includes a limited back-up plan for lethal control of problem coyotes.
During a recent council discussion on so-called “hazing” methods to encourage a fear of humans in the animal, the Greenwood South resident brought a BB gun, a paintball gun and an air-soft gun as visual aids.
“My poor dog has gone three rounds with the coyotes,” she said. “You’ve got to realize that over in my neighborhood, the coyotes are out there every day and every night. Your dog will keep you awake all night because the coyotes are in the backyard.”
Originally from Peoria, Ill., Bosier began working in Arapahoe County in 1966 and moved to her home in present-day Centennial in 1977, in large part due to the quality of the Cherry Creek School District, which her daughter attended.
She worked as a dental hygienist in Denver Public Schools for many years before settling into her current career as a broker in the sign industry, in which she specializes in the printing of political yard signs.
In her other life as a political and government activist, Bosier worked for the Governor’s Office of Economic Development and as a grassroots Republican precinct organizer.
In 1999, her ex-husband, Ed, one of Centennial’s five “founders,” convinced her to get involved in the Centennial incorporation movement.
“Ed called me and said, ‘We need to run a campaign,’” Bosier recalled. “‘Are you interested?’ I said, ‘What’s it about?’ He said, ‘I can’t tell you.’”
Bosier signed on anyway as a charter member of the incorporation movement and wound up editing its campaign plan.
The councilmember is indifferent to a proposal to honor Centennial’s “founders,” the five civic leaders who over breakfast in 1998 hatched the idea for incorporating the 28 square-mile area — a group that includes her ex-husband and Mayor Randy Pye.
“I don’t know that we really need a monument to the five founders,” she said.
Election Day is Nov. 3.