Tulsa World: Tulsa councilor Christiansen announces re-election bid

Home > News > Article

Comment

RSS

Bookmark

Tulsa councilor Christiansen announces re-election bid

District 8 City Council Republican Bill Christiansen announced Thursday he plans to seek re-election. TOM GILBERT/Tulsa World File

By BRIAN BARBER World Staff Writer
Published: 7/2/2009 1:54 PM
Last Modified: 7/28/2009 3:40 PM

City Councilor Bill Christiansen announced Thursday he is seeking re-election to the District 8 seat he has held since 2002 instead of running for mayor.

The Republican said he still has a lot more work he wants to do for the city and south Tulsa on the council.

“I hope the citizens of District 8 feel I’ve done a good job,” he said. “I’ve worked very hard to represent them and take care of their needs and issues. I look forward to representing them for another two years.”

Christiansen, 61, who owns Christiansen Aviation, said he was seriously considering a run for mayor since incumbent Kathy Taylor bowed out of the race.

Christiansen said that with the current economy, he realized it would be difficult to raise the money needed to mount an effective mayoral campaign.

“It would be tough for me to go to the good citizens of Tulsa and ask them to contribute when they are having trouble making ends meet at home,” he said.

On the council, Christiansen said, he wants to maintain his involvement with improving the city’s planning and zoning processes and making them more transparent.

He also said he wants to continue his “fiscally conservative spending ways,” identifying waste in city government.

So far, those who have officially announced campaigns for mayor include Democrats Tom Adelson and Robert Gwin Jr., and Republicans Dewey Bartlett Jr. and Clay Clark. The municipal election filing period is July 13 to 15.

The primary will be Sept. 8, while the general election is Nov. 10. There are no runoff elections.

Register for Latest News Alerts: Every day at 4 p.m, get the day's top headlines sent directly to your inbox. It's free and easy to set up. Already a registered user? Click here to visit your profile to sign up. For new registration, click here.

By BRIAN BARBER World Staff Writer

Comment

RSS

Bookmark

Reader Comments

Reader comments for this story have been moved to the most updated version of the story, now under the headline "Councilor will seek re-election, not mayor's post," which was published on 7/3/2009. So far, 14 comments have been made.