Leaders fail to fill seat on commission

A fiery back-and-forth between city leaders Tuesday night led to a deadlocked Delray Beach City Commission that will likely result in no black representative on the commission for at least the next three months.

The city’s highest board was assigned with filling a seat on the City Commission vacated by Al Jacquet, who is Haitian and left after winning an open House District 88 seat in the general election. They were split in their choice between two black candidates, which means it will likely leave the seat open until the March municipal elections.

Several African-American and Caribbean residents spoke at a city meeting Tuesday night to encourage the mayor and three commissioners to fill the seat immediately.

“Please, do the right thing for my community,” said Angie Gray, a former Delray Beach commissioner. “This is the first time in a long time that we do not have representation.”

The temporary commissioner would have sat on the board until the March municipal elections.

The four commissioners could not come to consensus in a choice between two black candidates: Yvonne Odom, a retired teacher and co-founder of the decadesold Delray Beach American Little League baseball team; and Josh Smith, a retired educator and community activist who unsuccessfully ran for City Commission in 2015.

Smith and Odom have both indicated they are not interested in running for the seat in March.

More than a dozen residents coordinated and showed up in yellow clothing to support Odom’s temporary appointment to the City Commission. Several of them urged city leaders to appoint Odom as she best represented the “black community.” None spoke in support of Smith. “The community heard and saw the proceedings and as a result, the community has responded,” said Reggie Cox of the West Atlantic Redevelopment Coalition, which represents the downtown communities west of Swinton Avenue.

Mayor Cary Glickstein and Commissioner Jordana Jarjura cast their votes aloud for Odom, and publicly condemned Commissioners Shelly Petrolia and Mitch Katz for not also doing so.

“The community is supporting a single candidate. They are entitled to voice their opinion and your job is to listen,” Glickstein told Katz during the meeting, followed by applause from the crowd.

Petrolia and Katz insisted they wouldn’t change their choice of Smith because they believe he is the best candidate.

In a politically charged exchange during the public meeting, Katz pointed out that Glickstein and Jarjura’s husband donated to Smith’s campaign during his 2015 bid for City Commission, which Smith lost to Katz.

Jarjura called the appointment “political” and said a candidate was “specifically asked to apply” by Petrolia.

“Unless you can tell me who I did this with, I think the discussion is over,” Petrolia fired back.

After nearly an hour of debate and deliberation, the members couldn’t agree. The city charter calls for special election if the City Commission cannot agree on an appointment within 60 days of vacancy.

But the earliest that a special election that could reasonably be planned is February, said attorney Max Lohman. It would cost upward of $75,000 to carry out and the temporary commissioner would sit for only one meeting.

It’s an “impossibility,” Lohman said, meaning the fifth commission seat will likely remain vacant until March.

The deadline to apply to run in the election is January.