Council opts for closed process to assess candidates for Garrett's seat

Lynchburg City Council decided Tuesday it will follow a closed-door process while selecting an interim successor for departing Councilman Scott Garrett.

This temporary appointment, expected to be made early next year, will decide who holds one of council’s at-large seats during the next round of budget debates. The vote to assess candidates away from public view passed by a narrow 4-3 margin following an acrimonious debate.

The dissenting camp, made up of councilmen Jeff Helgeson, Turner Perrow and Garrett himself, advocated for a transparent process involving formal nominations and public debate.

The prevailing majority, consisting of Mayor Joan Foster, Vice Mayor Bert Dodson, Councilman Michael Gillette and Councilman Ceasor Johnson, opted for a more buttoned-up system that will have council members privately circulating names among each other, holding one-on-one interviews with candidates and scheduling a closed session to make their final pick.

The vote that will actually cement the appointment must, by law, be cast in open session and will only be made after Garrett departs for the House of Delegates in mid-January.

Under the city charter, council has the power to fill any vacancies among its ranks on an interim basis. Garrett’s successor will serve until his term expires June 30. The fate of his seat’s next four-year term will be decided by the spring elections.

The city charter does not specify how council must go about choosing Garrett’s replacement, leaving it broad leeway to map out its own path.

At various points of the half-hour debate on this point, different council members accused others of trying to ramrod candidates through and of using verbal “meat axes” on others. They also engaged in an extended argument about parliamentary procedure and raised questions over whether Garrett, who said it “saddens” him that council will not make its decision in the open air, was allowed to participate in the discussion.

“Maybe the folks who told me they were interested, after witnessing this today, maybe they won’t be anymore,” Mayor Foster said at one point.

Foster had noted earlier that three people had already approached her about the seat. She did not reveal the names of any of those individuals.

Councilman Helgeson, who continued to advocate for the appointment of former councilman Joe Seiffert and attempted unsuccessfully to formally nominate him for the job Tuesday, said he felt the process should be conducted in the open, much like an election is.

He urged other council members to disclose the names of the candidates they were considering. “I’ve shown my hand. I’d like to see someone else’s,” he said.

Councilman Gillette countered that this was not an election but rather a political appointment that council is entrusted to make.

“This is the way the system is designed,” he said during a later interview, adding that individual council members will be free to release the names of any candidates under consideration. “There’s no gag order.”

Gillette, who made the motion to close off the process, also characterized the appointment as a “personnel decision” and said having an open debate will only result in political grandstanding and detract from the question of what’s in the best interest of the city.

He also said that some of the questions officials may ask of candidates, such as whether their schedule will allow them to tend to the duties of office, may not be “appropriate” for public discussion.

In other news Tuesday, council voted unanimously to extend a permit for a town home development off Wiggington Road.

Parkside Villas was originally approved by council in May 2008, but has since been stymied in part by difficulties in securing a right-of-way for a required turn lane. Builder Tom DeWitt says they recently entered into new negotiations with an adjacent landowner and are hopeful they will be able to break ground by next spring.

Parkside Villas calls for 190 single-story town homes, sometimes referred to as “patio homes,” which are designed to appeal to retirees and empty nesters. The extension granted by council Tuesday will carry on until November 2010.