Ed.— From the Sunday, Sept. 19, print edition.
COURTHOUSE— The City Council was expected to select a new vice mayor earlier this month following the resignation of Jim Wood, but the body put off that decision until a special meeting scheduled for Thursday, Sept. 23.
Additionally, the council on Tuesday, Sept. 21, is scheduled to establish a procedure for nominating and selecting vice mayor. Various procedures have been used in the past.
Three members of the council have said they are now interested in the position. They are Councilmembers Aaron Rouse and Rosemary Wilson, who hold at-large seats, and Sabrina Wooten, who represents the Centerville District. The council selects a vice mayor from its own ranks.
On Tuesday, Sept. 7, Mayor Bobby Dyer said he had feedback from some council members seeking more time to deliberate. He said the retreat would give them a chance to discuss the matter and the choice the council will make.
“The mayor is elected by the public, but the vice mayor is selected by the body,” Dyer said Tuesday, Sept. 7.
City Councilmember Louis Jones, who represents the Bayside District, made a motion to defer selection of the vice mayor until after the retreat. City Councilmember Barbara Henley, who represents the Princess Anne District, seconded the motion. She said, at that time, she was not yet sure who to support to become the new vice mayor.
Both Jones and Henley have served as vice mayor in the past.
During the retreat on Tuesday, Sept. 14, Dyer said, “Usually, we have an election for a vice mayor every two years, and that is done after a November election. We do the selection the first meeting in January. With the sudden departure of our friend Jim Wood, we started to do this on a short timeline, and my thought was we needed, as some of the councilmembers expressed, they needed a little bit more time.”
Additionally, Dyer said he wanted to talk through the process.
City Attorney Mark Stiles discussed the means of selecting the vice mayor, and the council worked through the process of finding six votes for one of the anticipated three candidates from among 10 people.
“The gist of this is, this body controls how it elects officers including the vice mayor,” Stiles said.
Stiles noted that the city’s charter only has two requirements for the vice mayor: they must be a member of the council, and they are elected by a majority of the 11-member council.
“And that means six votes,” Stiles said.
The charter does not spell out how to elect the vice mayor, and some of the discussion during the retreat was about the process that would be used. The city attorney recommended the council adopt a formal policy for nominating and selecting its vice mayor.
In the past, according to his presentation, there have been roll call votes in contested elections in which members state the names of their preferred candidate, and the process stops when someone gets six votes and – as happened this past January – a vote is held on each candidate even after a candidate has the majority of six or more votes.
“I prefer the roll call, voice vote of all the choices,” said City Councilmember John Moss, who holds an at-large seat. “If there’s six votes, then there’s six votes. If there is not, start over.”
The process of picking a vice mayor continues and repeats if there is no majority, and nominations are made anew.
“That’s how we get a compromise candidate, perhaps,” Henley said.
Later, she added, “It might be a good time for us to clarify what we, as a council, believe are the responsibilities of the vice mayor.”
Vice mayors essentially are meant to step in when the mayor is not available, but the position has evolved, she noted, to include overseeing appointments of people to boards and commissions and setting the consent agenda during meetings. The vice mayor also has been involved in the budget reconciliation process.
“Those are all very big responsibilities,” Henley said.
Appointing someone to the Lynnhaven District council seat Wood vacated when his resignation took place on Wednesday, Sept. 1, is another process.
As this edition of The Independent News went to press on Thursday, Sept. 16, applications to represent the seat were due to be submitted to the City Clerk on Friday, Sept. 17. The City Council is expected to review applications and develop a short list on Tuesday, Sept. 21, and may have public interviews with candidates on Tuesday, Sept. 28.
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