Supreme Court fight over Arbor Park carried by one

"If the Court ... finds I cannot, at this stage, proceed by myself, (I) request 21 days to find nine more contestants," Marhula wrote, referring to requirements that a case needs 10 people to contest an election. In a separate part of his brief, he argues that he ought to be allowed to proceed anyway, because the case had enough plaintiffs when it was first filed this past summer.

Marhula has previously said his case is about voters' rights, but it's rooted in a long-running debate at the park itself. The city-owned Arbor Park, 15 S. Fourth St., was headed toward a construction deal with a developer until a group of local activists intervened with a petition drive, forcing an election on the park's future.

That election resulted in construction anyway—and now Marhula, once among the roughly two dozen voters who sued to void the election, is now the last plaintiff standing. He's representing himself on the appeal to the Supreme Court after all others dropped out after the appeal was filed, and he still argues that the city erred when it held all the election's voting at the Alerus Center.

The brief, filed Wednesday, offers a range of legal arguments on the Arbor Park election and its aftermath. Most importantly, Marhula argues that the city broke the law by holding all voting at the Alerus Center instead of throughout the city.

Marhula has used this point to raise voter access concerns. Ever since the election was set at one location, park proponents worried that less affluent voters would find it difficult to cast their ballot if they had to cross the city to do so.

The city has argued that it did not break that law and has argued that the matter is now legally moot with the park sold and leveled ahead of development. The city has also noted that plaintiffs like Marhula didn't seek to legally bar the city from proceeding with a sale during the case.

Marhula, in his brief, argues that plaintiffs shouldn't have had to step in.

"(The city) knew of threatened and actual legal actions that prevented it from delivering a clean deed to the property," he wrote. "To reward the city for selling land they knew was in litigation would be a perverse attack on the rule of law and the judicial norms of our great state and nation."

Ron Fischer, an attorney who has represented the city on the matter for months, was unable to be reached for comment on Thursday evening.

"I'm very comfortable with where the city is at, both legally and factually, and we're quite confident that the Supreme Court is going to dismiss the matter as moot," Fischer said late last year. "Or if it does decide to address the merits of the election location at the Alerus Center, I believe the city will be upheld in that as well."