RACINE - Sitting in the City Council chambers Wednesday night, Kelli Stein was one of eight waiting to find out if she would be the next member of the council.

By the end of the night it was determined that the 31-year-old would be the city's next alderman - or you could say alderwoman.

The Committee of the Whole voted Wednesday night to recommend Stein as the next 10th District alderman to replace Tom Friedel who recently resigned to become city administrator. The district is roughly bordered by 21st Street, Taylor Avenue, the Union Pacific Railroad line and the city limits.

Their recommendation will go City Council Tuesday for final approval. The City Council is made up of the same members of the Committee of the Whole but is able to make final decisions. If she is approved she will be sworn in after the meeting and become one of two women on the council.

She would be up for election in April 2010.

The recommendation came after a more than two hour interview process, where the alderman asked all of the candidates questions about their experience and plans for the city.

The aldermen made their recommendation and chose her out of eight candidates, two of which happened to be father and daughter.

Nine candidates sent in their resumes, but one of the candidates did not show up for the meeting.

After the interviews, the aldermen narrowed their votes down to Stein, Dave Martin, who serves on the chamber board for Racine Area Manufacturing and Commerce, and Dennis Wiser, who is a member of the Racine Unified School Board. Then they narrowed it down further to just Stein and Wiser. In the final anonymous vote, Stein won with a 7-3 majority.

It was a vote that took Stein a minute to take in.

"My brain is kind of a blur. A good blur but a blur," said Stein, just a few minutes after the vote. "It's a lot of responsibility."

As a computer analyst for Wheaton Franciscan, Stein said she deals with many different personalities every day and not always when they are in the brightest of moods. She even joked that as the person who fixes computer problems she actually ends up being a part of bad days, but she said she is there to calm them down and fix the problem.

At this point, Stein said she does not have any big initiative that she wants to move forward. But she strongly hinted that there may be in the future.

"Give it time. There will be," Stein said.

First, she said she wants to get her feet wet and research her soon-to-be job as alderman.

The recommendation is set to go to the City Council Tuesday for final approval. The meeting is scheduled for 7 p.m. at City Hall, 730 Washington Ave., Room 205.