ISU students and Ames residents will decide Tuesday whether City Council members will serve two- or four-year terms.

Proponents of reduced terms say they would allow short-term residents of Ames — including ISU students — the opportunity to serve a term on City Council that is more feasible for temporary residents.

Tom Peter, owner and operator of Tom’s Barber Shop, 415 Main St., said he has not heard anything to convince him to vote in favor of the term reduction. He said some council projects would last longer than the two-year terms and that the re-election process would be time consuming.

Peter said reducing the terms to allow residents who attend Iowa State to serve on council may not be a good thing. He said students will not look at the community as a whole and would have narrow agendas because they would only be residents of Ames for a short time.

“[Long-term residents] will have to live with all of these decisions made, while students won’t have to,” he said.

Peter said some residents who attend Iowa State could be worthwhile candidates, but opportunities already exist for student involvement with City Council. He said students can serve on boards and give input to city government officials.

Susan Bedell, resident of Ames for nearly 10 years, said she is unsure of how she will vote on the issue. Her primary concern is the cost to the city of running twice as many elections for City Council members, she said.

She does not agree, however, with some City Council officials’ concerns about the inability of temporary residents to learn the City Council position in two years, she said.

“If they are doing a good job, they will get re-elected,” Bedell said.

She said two-year terms would mandate that City Council members be more responsive and involved while serving their respective constituencies in order to maintain the position.

Claude Dellmann, owner and manager of The Downtown Deli, 328 Main St., said he will be voting in favor of lowering term lengths.

“Without Iowa State students, pretty much none of us would be here,” he said.

He said Iowa State is the foundation of Ames, and the four-year term is too much of a commitment for most students to make.

Fresh ideas would accompany two-year term lengths, he said.

“It would keep [council members] on their toes,” Dellmann said.

Jen Hogan, graduate student in interdisciplinary graduate studies, is in favor of a term reduction.

She said reduced terms would allow the council to be more dynamic. With the two-year turnover rates, the council would not become stagnant, she said.

“I think it will benefit the changing needs of the community,” Hogan said.

Councilman Russ Cross said he is opposed to a term reduction.

“There is a lot to know and understand about the community and Ames governmental processes that, I believe, make it sensible for the term to be four years,” he said.

The term length is fine as it is because City Council currently has elections for three of the six council spots every two years, he said.

Cross said ISU students have ran for four-year City Council terms as recently as 2003, so nothing is keeping them from running without the term reduction.

Some ISU students feel two-year terms would be beneficial for short-term residents of Ames.

Three advocates for the reduced terms visited Main Street businesses Friday.

Mansoor Khadir, senior in computer science; Ryan Doll, Government of the Student Body Towers Residence Association senator, and Henry Alliger, GSB speaker of the senate, walked down Main Street on Friday handing out flyers and asking businesses to put signs up for the reduction of council terms.

“We want to reach out to everyone in the community,” Khadir said. “We want to help community members who don’t attend Iowa State understand our side.”

Close to 20 businesses on Main Street received a visit from the three advocates Friday. All but a few businesses accepted flyers from the three men; however, only one sign was placed in a window readily visible to passersby. Other businesses allowed the flyers to be posted inside the business on community boards.

Doll also handed flyers to a few people walking down the street.

“I’m voting against you,” one person said to Doll.

Doll said he appreciated her taking the initiative to vote.