Tuesday’s meeting began with Lisa Hall Blackmer taking her oath as the city’s third council president this term, which began in 2020.
“According to council rules, I ascend to the presidency and will now do the swearing,” she said.
After Paul Hopkins stepped down in May as he moved out of the city, he was succeeded by Jason LaForest. LaForest – who was accused of personal misconduct in March after planning a run for mayor – tendered his resignation earlier this month, citing both personal and professional obligations as well as unspecified political intrigue on the council.
Blackmer then turned to the question of the vacant ninth seat.
“The last time the council had a resignation in August, we waited to fill the position until after the November election," she said. "The highest ranking non-incumbent was appointed to the council in November. Following that precedent, I would recommend the following: Accept the resignation of Councilor LaForest, which we've done, announce the above stated procedure. A candidate would be sworn in on November 9th, 2021, in our first meeting in November.”
This prompted some debate.
“Yeah, I’m a little confused because we had a resignation by Councilor Hopkins, and that precedent is more recent," said Councilor Marie Harpin. "And really the last- We've had three councilors resigning from this city council in this term. Each time we filled that position with the next person in line from the last election. This recently just happened in June. And as a matter of fact, this council wanted someone on the city council so quickly that we did a special meeting to do it. We did not even want to wait the two weeks until our next meeting. We did it immediately.”
“I would be in favor of a system that we appoint the next highest vote getter, which would be Mr. Roger Eurbin," said Councilor Bryan Sapienza, who was sworn in this June, filling the seat left open by Hopkins’ departure.
“Mr. Eurbin has done a lot for the city in North Adams, including the Hillside Cemetery restoration," continued Sapienza. "And I think we would be honoring him by offering him the position of the seat in the council for the remaining of this term. Myself as well as Councilor Oleskiewicz and Councilor Wilkinson were appointed because we were the next highest vote getters in the previous election, and I think that's the way it should be done if we're going to fill the seat. Let's fill it now, and let's move on and get ourselves back up to a full council.”
Peter Oleskiewicz was another mid-term addition to the body, replacing Robert Moulton, who resigned under pressure after making controversial statements about the Black Lives Matter movement and the COVID-19 pandemic last summer.
Councilor Keith Bona sided with Blackmer’s proposal, saying the outcome of the November 2nd election would best reflect the will of North Adams voters.
“The election was two years ago. The current election, newest election coming up is actually much sooner. So we would have a much more current idea of how the voters stand in November," said Bona. "They may not place us where we were placed two years ago, they may not agree with what we've done. As I've told you in the past, we've had members who have come in 10th place who have then ended up in jail. And if it came down to us saying we would just vote the next person in we would be voting a convicted felon that, most likely, the voters would have said no to. So things do change within two years.”
All of this left councilor Ben Lamb frustrated.
“I will just say that it is incredibly ridiculous that we are spending this much time trying to figure this process out three times during this term," he said. "We should have just created a new rule. We shouldn't be continuing to go through this circular conversation of what are we going to do. So this is something that needs to be resolved. And originally it was supposed to be resolved this year. But that process got thrown out of whack by resignations and such. But this needs to be fixed so that the system is not continually figuring itself out.”
In a 5-2 vote, Blackmer’s motion carried, with Harpin and Sapienza opposed.
“We will reconvene on this topic at the first meeting in November and appoint the highest vote getter, non-incumbent vote getter, on the next ballot,” said Blackmer.
