Sherman Frederick
Novato Advance
It will be an appointment rather than a special election.
That’s how the Novato City Council decided to proceed in filling the District 5 council seat now vacant after the resignation of Amy Peele, who quit because being on the council hurt her mental and physical health.
The plan is this: The council will solicit resumes of people who live in District 5 and would like to represent District 5. Those who apply will be vetted in public at the Oct. 26 Council meeting. The names of those who apply will be made public on the city website before the meeting so that the public can participate.
Then, the four remaining City Council members will choose District 5’s representative. The person selected will join the council in November and serve until the Nov. 8, 2022, general election.
The Council had two options. One was to call for a special election on April 12. That would have left the seat open five months longer than the appointment process. Both Councilmembers Denise Athas and Susan Wernick were adamant that leaving the seat open that long was unacceptable. Mayor Pat Eklund and Councilmember Eric Lucan favored a special election, but the cost was likely to be over $100,000.
In the end, all four members on the Council agreed to appoint.
The council, as it does at most of its virtual meetings, experienced technical issues.
Someone who had called in was called upon three times to speak, but he could not get himself unmuted. So this citizen went unheard.
Several others were able to speak on the matter, however.
The first caller to get through blasted the Council for spending what was supposed to be $1,000 to mail “little cards” (as Mayor Eklund called them at the last meeting) to 4,100 District 5 residents to explain the options for filling the seat. City Manager Adam McGill told the Council that the actual cost ended up being about $3,500.
“I am astonished how far off you were on the cost of mail,” the caller said. “That’s frightening.”
The cards were sent after the last meeting when Mayor Eklund said that more people needed to know about the vacancy.
Before the meeting, the city received just under 100 messages from District 5 residents. The lion’s share of them favored filling the vacancy with an appointment.
Councilmember Peele, who had served only 2 years of her term, caught her district off guard on Sept. 15 when she began the meeting announcing her resignation.
“The intense stress and demand of this position in the current climate have severely affected my mental and physical health,” Peele said.
Mayor Eklund said she remains a “strong advocate of a special election” but because of the timing and cost she was OK with the appointment. She said she hopes the decision will be unanimous. Councilmember Lucan agreed, but said if it ends up 3-1, that would OK, too. What matters, he said, was that the Council have a good, honest discussion about potential replacements.
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