City Council Collects Signatures To Oust Mayor

The Eagle City Council has collected more than 800 signatures from voters who want to recall Mayor Chuck Bower.

The council plans to give them to the city clerk Tuesday.

“We now have sufficient signatures to warrant a recall election,” Council member Stan Bastian said Saturday night. “I know (council member) Nancy Merrill had been counting them, and she felt that we had enough to not only meet the 740 we needed but to have a buffer, too.”

Council members said that Bower’s “confrontational” management style has prompted a dozen city employees to resign during his first 13 months as mayor. They argue the turnover has impaired the city’s ability to keep up with growth.

Bower disputes the claims, saying the council’s campaign to recall him is a culmination of more than a year’s worth of futile efforts to rein him in.