Currently Betsy Vega has a 40 vote lead over incumbent Mai Vang in the Ward 6 Salem City Council race. Since it looks virtually certain that Vega will have gotten more than 50% of the vote when this race is certified by Marion County Elections, seemingly Vega will replace Vang as the Ward 6 councilor next January when her term begins.
Seemingly. Not certainly.
Because the Salem Reporter has a May 28 story by Joe Siess with the provocative title, “Vega’s Ward 6 residency questioned as Salem city council race remains unsettled.” Excerpt:
State elections officials are reviewing allegations that Betsy Vega, a leading candidate for a Salem City Council seat, may not have properly reported where she lived when filing for the office last fall.
…A submission to the city, from Vang’s campaign manager, questioned whether Vega lived in Ward 6 at the time she filed for office and didn’t notify authorities as required when she moved last fall.
Vega didn’t respond directly to questions from Salem Reporter about her residence or share documentation establishing where her home is. Under the city charter, Vega must have resided in the city ward for one year before her filing to run.
It seemed curious to me that the city charter would specify that a candidate for city council has to reside in that ward for one year before filing to run, since this might mean that the candidate could move out of the ward after filing and still be a viable candidate, albeit one who no longer lives in the ward they hope to represent.
So I downloaded a PDF file of the city charter, did a word search for “reside,” and found Section 25. I’ll share a copy of the PDF file. I’ve boldfaced the pertinent sentence.
cityofsalemcharter
Section 25. Qualifications.
(1) An elective city officer shall be a qualified elector under the state constitution and shall have resided in the city during the 12 months immediately before being elected or appointed to the office. In this subsection “city” means area inside the city limits at the time of the election or appointment. In addition, a councilor shall have resided in the ward the councilor represents during the 12 months immediately before being elected or appointed to the office.
Unless I’m missing something, it sure seems like the Salem Reporter story is incorrect. The one year residency requirement is the time period immediately before being elected or appointed as a city councilor, not the period before filing to run. This is pertinent for several reasons.
(1) It means that even if Vega lived in Ward 6 for a year or more before she filed to run for the city council, if Vega didn’t live continuously in Ward 6 for at least a year before the May 19 election (meaning May 19, 2025 to May 19, 2026), she would be ineligible to serve as the Ward 6 city councilor. The Salem Reporter story says:
Paige Barton, the political strategist managing Vang’s reelection campaign, submitted evidence by email to the city recorder’s office that she said appeared to show Vega moved out of her Northeast Coral Avenue apartment in November. Barton said in the complaint that Vega returned her ballot on May 19 with that address.
…As evidence, Barton submitted an audio file of a phone call she made to the apartment complex where Vega lived when she filed for the election.
In the recording, it appears a representative of the property management firm for the complex told Barton that Vega lived at the complex from August 2023 until November 2025.
That indicates Vega did live in the city ward for the year prior to her filing, which she made two months before her apparent move.
I wondered why Barton would submit evidence that shows Vega lived at a Ward 6 apartment for more than two years before she filed to run for city council if the one year residency requirement referred to the period before filing — since the apartment manager said she was a resident during that period. Again, the confusion is that the Salem Reporter story says that the residency requirement pertains to the filing date, whereas the city charter says the residency requirement pertains to the period immediately before being elected.
(2) So this makes the challenge to the legitimacy of Vega’s election as Ward 6 councilor carry more weight. Because if the one year residency requirement was the period before filing to run for city council, Vega could question why her opponent’s campaign manager waited until after the election to question whether Vega actually lives in Ward 6.
But since the city charter says it is the date of the election, May 19, 2026, that Vega must have lived in Ward 6 for a year prior, this means that a challenge can only be made after the election — since even if Vega lived in Ward 6 for 364 days before May 19, then moved out of the ward on May 18, she would be ineligible to serve as the Ward 6 city councilor.
At least that’s how I understand Section 25 of the city charter.
UPDATE: Forgot to mention that Progressive Salem has a Facebook post that casts doubt on whether Vega has lived in Ward 6 for the required time.
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