Though Cosgrove expected to be unchallenged, Los Gatos Coffee Roasting Company owner Teri Hope will run for the position, too.

Cosgrove has been the town clerk for 16 years. An elected town clerk is typically a position with a limited scope of duties, but Cosgrove also took on the duties normally associated with a nonelected staff clerk. In 2001, the town council created the position of the town clerk administrator, to be appointed by the town manager. Cosgrove was also appointed to this post.

Since she announced that she would be retiring when her term expires this November, the council passed a resolution June 7 separating the elected and appointed clerks' duties, allocating more responsibilities to the appointee and establishing a monthly stipend of $150 for the elected official.

The reason for this, according to Town Manager Debra Figone, was that the town had been fortunate to have an elected clerk who could perform the skilled duties of both positions.

"There is, however, no guarantee that such good fortune would continue," she said in the staff report given to council members.

But Cosgrove said she felt the decision denigrated the elected clerk's duties.

Under the new definition, those duties only include maintaining an accurate record of town council proceedings and an ordinance book, acting as custodian of the town seal and administering oaths. The new elected clerk would set his or her own hours.

Cosgrove told the Los Gatos Weekly-Times that nobody is going to want to take on the position for $150 a month.

"I think it is a full-time position for an elected clerk," Cosgrove said. "I think what the management is doing is behind closed doors and sneaky. Just go out there and say, 'Do you want an elected clerk or an appointed clerk?' "

She said that if she is re-elected, she will draft an initiative to put that very question on the next ballot.

A full-time elected clerk, she said, is necessary because he or she can help residents visiting the civic center without fear of his or her job being terminated.

"What I do is explain to people how they can talk through bureaucracy," she said. "If you don't know how to work a political organization and it's the first time you've come to a municipal office, I think you're pretty well closed out, and I think an elected clerk can help them through that process."

Though she initially became interested when she believed Cosgrove was retiring, Hope said she still wishes to serve as town clerk even though she is now running against the incumbent.

"With the new scope of duties, that's something I can handle," she said. "Obviously [Cosgrove] has many years of experience with the job as it used to stand, and she certainly has a lot of credibility. I'm just offering my service if the community should deem it appropriate."

Hope has served as an arts commissioner for six years and decided to run for clerk at the urging of other elected town officials.

"A few of the council people approached me about doing so and talked to me about the purpose of restructuring that position, and it made a lot of sense to me," she said. "I'd like to provide my help."

Though she will remain on the arts commission if elected town clerk, Hope said she would step down from the commission if it became necessary.

Councilman Mike Wasserman echoed Figone's report, saying that it would not be reasonable to expect future elected clerks to have the same level of experience as Cosgrove.

"You, your brother, your next-door neighbor could run, and if you get the most votes, you're the elected official," he said. "So you could certainly have somebody who chooses to be the elected clerk with no clerk knowledge or experience. We've had the benefit of having Marian Cosgrove in there."