Please, Please Let This Day be Quiet

It’s a Friday in August. Things are supposed to be slow, quiet, peaceful. It’s almost too hot even to go outside. Is it too much to hope that people in this town can try to avoid causing any more commotion for a few days? Come on!

We are a small city relative to many others in the rest of NJ and the Northeast, but we sure punch above our weight when it comes to political theater, right? Yesterday had certainly had more than its share. Most of it was basically fallout and aftershocks from the previous days. There was scant resolution on many of the issues causing turmoil throughout the week,  but it’s a start.

The Mayor began the morning with a press conference intended to highlight the accomplishments of the first 30 days of his administration. Reasonable enough, and there were indeed some positive things that warranted attention. A version of the press release distributed at the conference is on the front page of the city website this morning. Video of the press conference is here.

The real news from that conference was on two fronts: the withdrawal of Carleton Badger’s name from consideration for appointment as director of economic development; and the police intimidation of a few reporters during the conference. The intimidation was low-key ( a plainclothes detective in the face of Trentonian editor Paul Mickle), and the reporters in question were actually being pretty loud and insistent (OK, they were jerks, but the Mayor was obviously ducking their tough and legitimate questions ). But press intimidation it was, and following as it was by only one day the police intervention to remove  Deputy City Clerk Cordelia Staton, didn’t go over well.  When asked by another reporter after that if this kind of response was to going to become routine in his administration, Mr. Mack was pretty equivocal. Not encouraging for future open relations with the press and public.

The City Council meeting last night was also eventful. There are better accounts available about the meeting than I could give you, so I won’t go into too much detail. But a couple of things. The meeting was very well attended: Council Chambers was filled. That kind of interest and attention is good. I’m sure a lot of the turnout was due to the events of the last few days, but still. I’m mostly working from home for several weeks, at least, so I should be able to attend more frequently.

The main event was the dustup about the Deputy City Clerk position, and all the ancillary events. In my mind, this was entirely avoidable. There are many, many, many more important issues that the Mayor and Council should be devoting their limited time and energy to, than this inside-baseball shouting match. I disapproved of Ms. Staton’s appointment in the first place, so I am amazed that of all the parties involved in this mess, she is now emerging as a martyr. But, a  rather craven dismissal-by-office-chair-lunchtime-letter on Monday followed by a police intervention on Wednesday can do that for a person. Everyone who has ever had a job, and everyone (like me) who’s ever been fired or laid off from a job would not want to be treated that way. There was a lot of sympathy generated by the circumstances of Ms. Staton’s dismissal; this also had the unfortunate effect of distracting attention from the circumstances of her hiring and tenure at the Clerk’s office. Council left unwinding that particular knot for its next meeting.

But for me the astonishing, breathtaking (Yeah, I’ve been using a lot of hyperbole this week. It’s been that kind of week) moment came when Mayor Mack, without prompting, jumped to the podium during Public Comment after his presentation earlier in the evening, and suggested that the police intervention of Wednesday may have been staged. He didn’t make any specific accusations, but he definitely cast his suspicions on Ms. Staton and L.A. Parker of the Trentonian.

This accusation takes questions – or should take them – about Wednesday’s incident to a new level. The Mayor of this city, in remarks to City Council in open session, has suggested that elements of the city’s police force and the Mercer County Sheriff’s Office may have participated in a staged incident  to remove a city official . This wasn’t any tinfoil-hatted crazy, this was the duly-elected Chief Executive of this town saying this.

With this accusation by the Mayor before Council openly on the table, the questions about the chain of command I raised yesterday now require answers from Police Director Ernie Williams, from Sheriff Kevin Larkin, and from Mayor Mack.

How was it that Trenton Police Officers and Mercer Sheriff’s Deputies were dispatched to the City Clerk’s Office to settle a politically-motivated  personnel dispute? Who gave the orders? Was the event in fact staged by private parties, or was this an abuse of power by this Administration?

Mayor Mack himself has now cast some of these accusations. They need answers.

But, please, it’s Friday.  Please, no new drama!