The search continues
Troy City Council continues search for McGrath’s replacement
TROY, N.Y. >> There was nothing particularly odd about Thursday night’s Troy City Council meeting. That’s because there’s an even number of filled seats, following the resignation of former Councilman Mark McGrath, earlier in the week. Hence, six council members remain and the search to fill the vacated seat moves forward.
McGrath resigned after a three-year-old voicemail emerged of him using racial slurs against African-Americans.
Heading into the meeting there was speculation as to how the process would unfold in ultimately filling the seat. Would a special committee be established? How much involvement, if any, would members of District 2 have a say in McGrath’s replacement?
“After speaking to folks and being contacted by various folks over the past week I thought it’d be a great idea to appoint a special committee per our rules, and we’ve done this for other important issues such as city hall and other issues. The special committee, my proposal would have two folks, a minority, and a majority member, and five folks from Dis- trict 2,” Troy City Council President Carmella Mantello said of her proposal, which she was asked to and ultimately tabled.
“I’ve been asked to table this for the time being so folks from District 2 can talk about how they’d like to proceed. If the committee is not the route that District 2 would like to proceed and just handpick to the council, that’s fine too. I saw it as being more inclusive, more open, rather than a hand-picked person from a political party,” Mantello added.
“I think the Council President’s thought was to be inclusive to the members of that district. I don’t think there was any harm or foul to say that she wanted those peo- ple to select the person, just to work with everybody to get the information. If we’re included, I’d appreciate it, if we’re not, I understand it, but let’s move on,” Councilman Jim Gulli added of the process.
Along with wanting input to be heard, Mantello and other council members stressed the need for inclusiveness and diversity from District 2, which boasts a 30 percent African-American population.
“District 2, their district is 30 percent African-American. I sat down with the Pastors Alliance, the African-American Pastors Alliance of Troy yesterday, Reverend [Charles] Burkes and I had a great conversation in terms of the filling of that vacancy. Stating that this evening, Reverend Burkes and I had a discussion and I received an email and some other folks would like to vet the committee a little more,” Mantello said.
“It is the ultimate goal of the council to ensure that we have an open process and are seeking qualified candidates for the position of City Council. We are accepting applicants from the district to submit their application. We are requesting applicants who are interested in this position to submit their resumes to the city clerk’s office. We are very well aware of the makeup of the district, and we think it is important that there is the representation and a reflection of that seat having input from the community members that are a part of that process. We are open to that process, so we are looking forward to having a dialogue and to ensure that we can move forward in a way that best unifies the city,” Councilman David Bissember said of how they are fielding candidates.
Bissember also spoke to the need of added diversity on the City Council and for the healing process to continue, following McGrath’s racist remarks.
“The process is going to be open and inclusive in the way that our city charter dictates. We don’t need to change the rules from what currently exists, and we are currently seeking input from all members of the com-
munity,” said Bissember. “We are seeking resumes from all potential candidates who can reach out to the city clerk’s office, and I would encourage as many candidates who are interested in this position to do just that and that being said, we are looking forward to ensuring that we can have representation in the district and move forward from what was an incredibly unfortunate and hurtful language that was coming from our former council member.
“As the only person of color on this council myself, I can relate to the language that was used, it’s hurtful and I’m not going to speak for the black community, I’m a person of color but my color is lighter skinned so I have privileges in that regard too. What I will say is, that type of language has no place in the city council. Our city council members should be held to a higher standard. I’m glad that our former colleague resigned, he did the right thing by doing so. We need to heal these wounds, and we need to move forward in a way will do just that,” Bissember added.
Council members are hoping to have the vacancy filled by March.
As currently constituted, there are four Democrats and two Republicans serving on the City Council.
City officials noted that Mayor Patrick Madden will serve as a tie-breaking vote during the appointment of a new council member. He does not cast votes for other legislation.