23 y/o Goddard, KS. council member completes hostile takeover of mayors office

A bit of background info before we dive into the deep of this story. (Link is under if you want to skip the background)

Goddard, Ks. is a smallish town just to the west of Wichita. Hunter Larkin (21, I believe at the time) was appointed mayor in 2020 after the then mayor stepped down after being caught counterfeiting tickets to a charity event for the local zoo.

Flash forward 1 year the kid gets charged with dui after an accident and then has a newspaper article come out accusing him of all kinds of shady shite (awarding contracts to buddies all that fun stuff) a couple month later.

He steps down as mayor in may of last year. In his announcement at the council meeting he first says he was resigning but before leaving says new mayor, Zimmerman, would be leading things temporarily (or something along those lines). Which caused a bunch of confusion but Zimmerman “cleared things up” by saying Larkin was resigning the mayors seat but keep his seat on the city council.

Flash forward to Tuesday and there’s this shite show.

Local News station story

Some highlights.

quote:

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When the meeting started, Larry Zimmerman was mayor. One agenda item was to fill a city council vacancy, left when Michael Proctor resigned on Dec. 31, 2022. Zimmerman initially nominated Jeffery Jones to fill the position. After a tied vote, Zimmerman then nominated Aubrey Collins, who was approved and immediately sworn in.

As Collins was taking his seat as a new council member, Larkin made a motion to amend the agenda and move into executive session to discuss the matters of unelected personnel.


After 25 minutes, the council returned, and Larkin made a motion to remove Zimmerman as the mayor, effective immediately, and have a new mayor election. The motion passed, with Vice Mayor Sarah Leland becoming mayor. Larkin then makes another motion to elect a new mayor and vice mayor

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quote:

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“I do not feel that I have the capability to do these job duties of the mayor, especially the current situation we are dealing with, so I would like to nominate Hunter as I feel he can complete the steps that need taken,” Leland said in response. The motion carries, making Larkin mayor, and Leland vice mayor.

Larkin’s first action as mayor was to call for an agenda item for the “removal of certain city staff” which prompted an immediate response from Zimmerman.


“Before you get to that point I’d like to tenure my resignation of city council effective immediately,” said Zimmerman, opening a new council seat

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Larkin nominated one of his buddies who was conveniently in the meeting then went on to fire the city administrator out of left field. fricking insane shite.