For those hoping to gain a seat on the Greensboro City Council without devoting the time and expense of going through an election, Tuesday, Sept. 14 is a key day.
The Greensboro City Council has scheduled a special virtual meeting beginning at 5:30 p.m. on Tuesday, Sept. 14 with the main purpose of the meeting being to hear from each self-nominated person and then appoint a new at-large city councilmember.
Former At-large City Councilmember Michelle Kennedy resigned via an email to Mayor Nancy Vaughan prior to the Aug. 17 City Council meeting.
While a sitting councilmember, Kennedy had applied for the job of Neighborhood Development Department director and had been offered the job on the condition that she resign from the City Council. Kennedy resigned on Tuesday, Aug. 17 and the announcement that she had been hired by the city was sent out on Thursday, Aug. 19.
It will take five affirmative votes on the City Council to appoint a replacement who will finish out Kennedy’s term on the City Council. That term will end when the City Council elected in 2022 and is sworn into office. Nobody knows when that will occur, because nobody knows when the City Council election will be held.
The primary for the City Council election will be held on Tuesday March 8, 2022, the date of the statewide primary for the November 2022 general election. However, the state law setting that as a primary date also sets the date of City Council general election as the date of the statewide primary runoff election, which will either be Tuesday, April 26 or Tuesday, May 17, depending on what races have runoff primaries.
So the newly appointed councilmember will serve at least until the end of April and perhaps until the middle of May.
Vaughan, at the Aug. 31 City Council meeting, said that 36 people had already nominated themselves for the City Council seat but that a few of those people did not reside in the City of Greensboro making them ineligible to be a member of the Greensboro City Council. The deadline to apply to be appointed to the vacant City Council seat is Thursday, Sept. 9 at 11:59 p.m., so there is still plenty of time for applicants to get their names in the hat.
Vaughan said, because of the large number of candidates, the amount of time each would be given to speak at the Sept. 14 virtual meeting had been reduced from five minutes to three minutes.
The Tuesday, Sept. 14 meeting is not listed under “Upcoming Meetings” on the city website and is not listed on the City Council meeting calendar, but don’t let that fool you, a notice about the meeting has been sent out and the meeting is scheduled for Sept. 14.
Who’s got odds that it won’t be a married heterosexual conservative white male?
I don’t know, 3 out of the 5 might be possible.
Is it me or does city council look unhappy?
Ha, Ha. You nailed it! Great observation!
Why is this in letters to the editor? John’s talking to himself again, no surprise.
Do you know why this council did not want to interview all the candidates for Michelle Kennedy’s new position? They did not want to interview her, so they had a consulting firm do it for them. Pathetic.