Two Candidates Vying to Succeed Longtime Stearns County Commissioner Leigh Lenzmeier in District 4 Special Election on Tuesday

(KNSI) – Voters in Stearns County Commissioner District 4 will be electing a new representative for the first time in decades on Tuesday.

Leigh Lenzmeier retired in April for health reasons, triggering the special election. He represented the district, which includes the southern half of St. Cloud and Waite Park, in the county for 34 years.

After a primary election in August, Amin Ali and Bob Johnson emerged as the top two candidates and are on the ballot for November 4th’s election.

KNSI News spoke with both candidates to help voters get to know their next commissioner. We asked each candidate the same question. The questions and answers are below as asked and answered in our interview.

Amin Ali:

Age: 39

Occupation: Housing expert, youth soccer coach and community organizer

Q: Tell us about yourself.

A: “I’ve lived in St. Cloud for the last 10 years, and through this time, I’ve worked in our community in many ways. I’m a housing expert, a community organizer, and I’m a coach. I train little kids. Mostly, I work with individuals and families who struggle to find stable and affordable housing. I’ve seen how a lack of housing affects everything from health and education to jobs. Also, outside of my professional work, I started a youth program.”

Q: What made you decide to seek public office?

A: “Well, first of all, I’m a proud patriot. I care deeply about this community and the people who live here in St. Cloud and Stearns County. I have seen the challenges families face, rising housing costs, limited job opportunities, and growing safety concerns. I believe it’s time for leadership that listens and takes action. Our county has so much potential, but we need to focus on policies that lift people up, not leave them behind. I want to make sure our county government works for everyone, especially those who feel unheard or left out.”

Q: Why are you running for commissioner?

A: “I was working closely with the families of Stearns County, and I’ve been listening to them, the challenges they had for a while. And with the experience I had with these families that I work closely, I wanted to take that experience to the county level and make some changes.”

Q: What skills or experience from your personal/professional life do you feel would make you a good commissioner?

A: “Well, first of all, being a good commissioner is listening to the people, reaching out and representing them on their issues. I think as a county commissioner, you have to listen to the concerns of our community and make some changes at the county level. So, there was a lot of issues. One of my priorities is housing. Housing was an issue for a long time in our county. And then nothing has been done. And I’m a housing expert. I worked closely with homeless shelters and working families. And I want to take that experience to the county level and make some changes.”

Q: What do you feel is the most critical issue facing District 4/Stearns County?

A: “The main issue is housing. Our youth, also the substance use, opiates, that need preventions. Because I’m a coach, I work closely with youth. Information, the community to have the right information is also an issue. People don’t know where to run to when they need help. And I believe I can be a county commissioner that can address people and work on the challenges that arise at that moment.”

Other:

Q: Property Taxes and, by extension, the budget are always big issues.

The county’s preliminary budget proposes a 5.2% increase in the property tax levy, from $97 million to $102 million, to make up for a $4.2 million revenue shortfall. While the overall tax rate will drop due to growth in the tax base, homeowners with average property value increases would still see their county taxes go up by about 6.75%, or roughly $70 per year on a $279,000 home.

What are your thoughts on how the county should address this $4.2 million revenue shortfall?

A: “As a county commissioner, I believe we need to make sure tax dollars are used wisely, focusing on essential services, like housing, roads, public safety. But ultimately, my goal is to make county government efficient, transparent and accountable for residents and their tax dollars are being put to work for them, improving the quality of life, not wasting it on things that don’t serve the public good.”

Q: Workforce and Housing Shortages

According to Federal Reserve Economic Data, in 2023, the median household income in the county was $76,400. A common rule to make sure a person is in housing they can afford is to not spend more than 28% to 36% of their gross income on housing. Assuming a 6.5% mortgage, that puts ‘workforce housing’ at a price tag of $228,000 to $300,000 for a single-family home. According to real estate numbers released in September 2025, the average new home in Stearns County is selling for approximately $294,000, though the median listing price is slightly higher at around $319,900.

Given this data, what policies would you like to see the county adopt to encourage the development and availability of homes in the $228,000 to $300,000 price range?

A: “I would advocate for partnership with developers and nonprofits to create more affordable housing options, including mixed income development and workforce housing, near major job centers. We also need to streamline zoning and permitting process to make it easier and faster to build quality affordable homes. At the same time, we must invest in our workforce by supporting job training and small business growth. So residents can earn a living wage and stay in our community. The goal is simple, make sure people who work here in Stearns County can also afford to live here, strengthening both our economy and our neighborhood.”

Q: How do you feel Stearns County can prepare for an aging population and increase social integration for the area’s newest Americans?

A: “I believe Stearns County needs to take a proactive and compassionate approach to preparing for our aging population. But we need to expand affordable and accessible housing options for all the adults, including senior apartments, assisted living. Equally important, we should invest in senior wellness and social programs that reduce isolations, keep all the adults connected and active by planning now. We need smart policies, strong partnerships, and community input. Stearns County can make sure our aging population is supported, valued, and able to live well for the years to come.”

Bob Johnson

Age: 76

Occupation: Retired in August 2023. Administrative Director, Michigan Heart Institute; Executive Director, CentraCare Heart and Vascular Center, Dialysis program and CentraCare Wound Center; Executive Director Paramount Center for the Arts.

Q: Tell us about yourself.

A: “I’ve been in St. Cloud now for about 35 years, came here from Ann Arbor, Michigan. I was an administrative director there at the Michigan Heart Institute and came here to start what is now the CentraCare Heart and Vascular Center with five cardiologists. I was the executive director of the Heart Center for 23 years and moved from there to the Paramount Center for the Arts and became executive director there. And then I served there for nine more years before I retired. I have a wife who’s a retired teacher, four kids, 12 grandkids, a master’s in public health from the University of Michigan. I’ve done public service most of my career. In fact, I consider my career to a great degree public service. I wasn’t touching patients, but I was supporting people who were touching patients. I wasn’t on the stage at the Paramount, but I was certainly helping performers and artists do what they needed to do to get out there in the public.”

Q: What made you decide to seek public office?

A: “I’m a failed retiree. I’m not very good at sitting still. I’m curious. I am interested in new relationships, new people, new information, and I have a passion for service. I just like the idea of doing something for the community. That gives me joy. I don’t mind saying it. And I think it reflects some of what I did as a career for 54 years and also reflects the fact that there’s a need. And I don’t think seniors should sit back and watch what’s happening and not participate.”

Q: Why are you running for commissioner?

A: “I served on the St. Cloud City Council for three terms and I loved that work. And the county commissioner position had been held by Leigh Lenzmeier for greater than 30 years. I actually spoke with Leigh a couple times as he was deciding to run again in those last two terms and decided he was doing a good job and I wasn’t going to worry about running against him. When it turned out that he retired, I thought here’s an opportunity to do something that I’m familiar with. And I also think that a lot of people don’t understand what the county does. They don’t understand that 70% of what the county does is mandated by the state and there are so many needs out there. And in today’s world, they’re exacerbated by the national and statewide political situation. And I think we just want people to support one another in this community. And I think I’m capable of getting in there and doing the work and doing it for the people of Stearns County.”

Q: What skills or experience from your personal/professional life do you feel would make you a good commissioner?

A: “My educational background is helpful. I do have an undergraduate degree in education, English and psychology. I have a master’s from the University of Michigan in public health. I’ve been in administrative positions for my entire career. And with that, of course, you become the ultimate generalist. Sometimes you’re working on financial issues, on human resource issues, sometimes on capitalization. Sometimes you’re just supporting all the people that you work with. So the skill set is that of a generalist, administrative person. And if you think about the county, that happens there, too. There’s everything from tax levies to supporting farmers to working with child protective services, justice, whatever the case may be. There’s involvement all across the county with those kinds of skills, I think.”

Q: What do you feel is the most critical issue facing District 4/Stearns County?

A: “Well, I’m not going to suggest that it’s the most because I think there’s some equality across some of the issues. We just heard that we might see some positive results in terms of our relationship with China and being able to sell soybeans. But farmers are struggling today. We have 114,000 acres of soybeans in Stearns County, and they don’t want a one-time subsidy. They want a relationship. And again, today there’s some hope for that in the news. You may have heard about it because our president has just met with Xi. Other things, housing, and affordability. In St. Cloud, 51% of the people in town rent, some because they want to, but many because they can’t afford a house. If you look at the county as a whole, that number drops down to about 32%, but that’s still pretty high. We have a poverty rate of 20% in the city of St. Cloud. And so affordability not only impacts housing, but it impacts healthcare, it impacts safety and security. Thinking about the SNAP program, for example, we have about 12,000 to 15,000 people in Stearns County who receive SNAP benefits. Well, those are going to stop on November 1st. Even if that wasn’t happening, the big beautiful bill that was passed in July has an impact because many of those people are going to lose their benefits because of that. So now back to affordability. If you don’t have the money to buy food, what do you do? Do you let your rent go for a month and then risk the security of housing? Do you not take your kids to the doctor or the dentist and risk the security of that, of good health? It’s all sort of interrelated. And I think we have to work on it together as a county. All the thousand employees are going to work to make sure that people in the county are happy, healthy, and doing well. I mean, that’s the ultimate goal. So I think it’s difficult to say what the most important thing is, but I think there’s a list that’s fairly long.”

Other:

Q: Property Taxes and, by extension, the budget are always big issues.

What are your thoughts on how the county should address this $4.2 million revenue shortfall?

A: “Well, I don’t know as if there are many alternatives. I would like to suggest first that the preliminary budget of a 5.2% increase cannot be raised at this point. The final budget, which the Board of Commissioners will look at in December, cannot go higher than 5.2%. It can go lower. So it may be that in conversations, the directors of the various departments at Stearns County and the commissioners will look at tweaking that and still get that down a tad. If you think about property taxes, though, typically the county property tax as a percentage of all my taxes is about 30%, whereas the city is about 40%. And people have expectations. They want their roads to be good. They want their bridges to be sturdy and long-lasting. There are so many things that need to happen. We know that safety and security, the sheriff’s department, and the legal department -there’s so much work to be done that it’s difficult to suggest we can keep doing what we’re doing and meeting the needs of the people without an increase, given that expenses are going up. So I want to say that the tax levy was raised in 2024 at about 4.2%. So, 5.2% still could come down a tad, but I think basically the people have to help us decide what it is that they want us to give up and what they really want because that’s key.”

Q: Workforce and Housing Shortages

Given this data, what policies would you like to see the county adopt to encourage the development and availability of homes in the $228,000 to $300,000 price range?

A: “I would suggest that we need more workforce housing. We need more housing at every level. We need low to moderate income housing. I think subsidization of housing, helping builders with SAC and WAC fees for example, is something that should be looked at more seriously. I am on the Stearns County Housing Trust Board currently. We have a few hundred thousand dollars available on a regular basis and we’ve allocated by virtue of application. We’ve allocated, say $100,000, for a large 55 unit housing complex in Melrose for example. That will help the builder be able to price those at a level that people can afford. At the same time, we’ve looked at some older housing stock right in the center of some smaller communities where a couple just wants to retire, they need to sell their house, they can’t do it unless they replace their windows. So we allocated $16,000 or $20,000 to those folks and that allows them to take that next step and move into retirement. So I think it’s kind of a number of different scenarios that one might picture where you have to apply different strategies. I don’t think everything is ever the same where one size fits all.”

Q: How do you feel Stearns County can prepare for an aging population and increase social integration for the area’s newest Americans?

A: “I think we can start by thinking about ourselves as a community. So I think we have a responsibility, a corporate responsibility to all of those around us. I think it’s really important that we consider that seniors are the foundation upon which we’re building today. It’s the people who came before us, and we want them to be healthy and safe and have good housing and have plenty of food. There’s a lot of money out there and there’s quite a gap between people who have decent funds and people who don’t. And I think it is incumbent upon all of us to look at ways that we can serve. I mean, getting back to the purpose of why I’m running, I mean, that’s one of the issues. I just want to see people do better. So I think, again, in terms of the integration issue, you know, we have Hispanic Americans, we have Somali Americans, we have African Americans, we have North European Americans. We’re all Americans. And the differences are slight compared to what makes us the same. And I think in those cases we need to look at appreciating the beauties and the contributions that everyone is offering. And that might sound a bit pie in the sky, but I think if you think about it, that’s how community has developed over thousands of years. No one stands alone.”

Polls for the election open at 7:00 a.m. and close at 8:00 p.m.

Find your polling place here.