Three female city councilors marks most in Aberdeen history

For the first time in Aberdeen City Council history, three women will be serving.
Published: Jun. 28, 2022 at 6:16 PM CDT

ABERDEEN, S.D. (Dakota News Now) - For the first time in Aberdeen City Council history, three women will be serving.

Of the eight councilors, Tiffany Langer was previously the only woman serving. She was elected to serve the Southeast District in 2020.

After the city election earlier this month, Langer will now be joined by two more women.

”I think that women in Aberdeen are absolutely going to be more represented by having more women on the council. I feel like three women who are so different make this council the most well-rounded it probably has been in awhile,” said Langer.

Charlotte Liebelt was elected to the Northwest District and Erin Fouberg was elected to the Northeast District. Liebelt is the owner of Liebelt Homes and Fouberg is an Associate Vice President for Academic Affairs at Northern State University.

Fouberg says her experience as a woman could help on issues such as creating job opportunities for young females.

”Understanding the demands of work-life balance of women and how different they can be than they are for men in a lot of circumstances gives me a perspective. Even just accessibility to opportunities needs to be different for young women, especially those with families,” said Fouberg.

Having more women represented on the City Council might even make it more approachable.

“What it does is it enriches any discussion that we have, but it also makes the council more approachable to people in Aberdeen. Hopefully, there’s somebody on the council that everybody in Aberdeen feels comfortable contacting if they have questions or concerns or ideas,” said Fouberg.

Before she even won her seat, Fouberg was being approached by young women. Two 7th-grade girls reached out to Fouberg during her campaign to ask for help on debating over changing the voting age to 16.

”I just thought, that’s amazing, you know, that they thought to contact me instead somebody who is already a sitting council member. It just gave me the notion that this matters, right? That even running matters because I was a role model for those girls, I think, in the fact that they thought they could contact me,” said Fouberg.

Langer says the perspective women bring will help when the City Council needs to solve issues or spend their $60 million budget.

“Having a woman’s perspective on how and when and where that money is being spent is good. Also, women have a different perspective on how to solve problems. We have a lot of problems in regards to traffic flow, lights, different situations like that that need other perspectives,” said Langer.

The newly-elected City Council members will participate in their first meeting on July 5th.

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