MISQUAH — The City Council on Monday appointed three members to the new subcommittee charged with studying a proposed fourth stop sign at Birch Street and Second Avenue, leaving the panel one seat short of the four it had, after some discussion, decided it ought to have.

Named were Alderman Pete Hagen, the sign’s longtime champion; City Clerk Donna Skoglund, serving ex officio and, she noted for the minutes, “against my own advice”; and resident Harold Aas, the retired postmaster, who said he had “nothing pressing until the fishing picks back up.”

The fourth seat went unfilled. Mayor Gloria Vik had proposed a four-member panel “for balance,” a structure that immediately raised the prospect of tie votes. Asked how the subcommittee would break a 2–2 deadlock, Vik said it could “cross that bridge if it ever builds one.”

Alderman Lloyd Bunde, the sign’s chief opponent, declined appointment on principle, explaining that he could not in good conscience serve on a body whose existence he opposed. “You don’t join a thing in order to stop it,” Bunde said. “You stop it by not joining.” He added that he intended to attend every meeting regardless.

The subcommittee is charged with examining the corner, reviewing the county’s $340 cost estimate, weighing “alternatives, if any,” and reporting to the council before the public hearing set for 7 p.m. July 14 at City Hall. Skoglund said the group would convene “once we’ve found a fourth person, or once the Mayor concedes we don’t need one, whichever comes first.”

In other business, the council approved paint for the Birch Street crosswalk, again tabled the matter of the dog at the public landing, and adjourned at 7:54 p.m. — a full eighteen minutes earlier than its previous meeting, an improvement Skoglund recorded “with some pride.”