Hulten Named Newest Champaign City Council Member

Gordie Hulten took his seat last (Tuesday) night as the new Champaign City Council member for District Five, covering the southwest part of the city.

City council members voted 6 to nothing, with Councilman Mike LaDue abstaining, to appoint Hulten to the seat left vacant by Dave Johnson's resignation earlier this year.

Hulten is a sales and marketing director for the Devonshire Group, who's also worked on various Republican political projects, including Congressman Tim Johnson's election campaign. But he says there's little risk that he'll bring partisan politics to the officially non-partisan Champaign City Council

"I think it is less of a concern" says Hulten, "because there is very little business that the city council does that is partisan, or that can be broken down on partisan lines. You know we do very little scorekeeping by which team or which coalition. You know, you see shifting coalitions on the city council much more than you see on the county board of the state legislature. It's much less top-heavy."

Hulten also says he plans to discontinue "Illinipundit", his blog on local politics.

Hulten beat out two other applicants for the District 5 council seat --- retired Deputy Fire Chief Tim Wild and health care consultant Cathy Emmanuel. The council seat will be up for election next spring, and Hulten has said he plans to run at that time.