(KNSI) — St. Cloud Mayor Dave Kleis will meet with residents for his 900th town hall meeting this week.
The four-term mayor says holding public meetings is part of keeping a promise. “When I first ran for mayor 17 years ago, there was two promises I made. One was to be available and accessible and to hold a town hall meeting every week.”
Kleis talked about why he feels it’s important to hold town hall meetings. “A lot of folks don’t feel comfortable coming to a meeting and speaking. So, having smaller groups, having small individual opportunities is a much better way of having an actual dialogue and a discussion.”
His conversations have included as many as 500 people and as few as one. Kleis says he’s had some interesting get-togethers, including a 24-hour town hall. “And we actually, believe it or not, had people come in at 3:00 in the morning. In fact, one gentleman came in at about 3:30 in the morning saying, ‘you know, I don’t have any issues or anything, I just want to make sure you’re actually going to be here.’”
Kleis says he has held the town halls in parks, while walking, in the gym, his home, office and coffee shops throughout the city.
He says there is never an agenda other than whatever the people want to discuss.
Mayor Kleis’s 900th town hall is Thursday, December 1st, at 10:00 a.m. at the Paramount Center for the Arts.
The town hall meeting locations and times are posted on the city’s website on Fridays.
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