Cambridge Runs Mayorless

Earlier this year, the city of Cambridge found itself without a mayor at the helm for nearly two months—showcasing the need for reforms to the election process to prevent the ship from running aground in the future.

As the City Council disagreed for weeks on end about which of the nine councillors would hold the post of mayor for the next two years, the city lingered without an elected leader.

Some say that the vacuum posed considerable problems for the city, while others contend that the mayor’s duties are not so significant that a vacancy in the spot is a major problem.

But many agree that such drawn-out complications should be curtailed in future mayoral elections to ensure that preventable delays do not disrupt the city’s smooth sailing—and civic leaders have proposed a variety of amendments to a clearly troubled selection process.

MAYOR, MAY I?

On the first Monday of the new year, five City Council members declared their aspiration to ascend to the top spot in Cambridge politics: Henrietta J. Davis, Marjorie C. Decker, David P. Maher, Kenneth E. Reeves ’72, and E. Denise Simmons.

With more than half of the nine-member City Council signed up for the race, each candidate faced the daunting task of garnering at least five votes from their fellow councillors to be elected mayor.

At the end of that January night, Maher commanded a slight lead with three votes—an insufficient number to secure the mayorship.

“I’m ready to vote as often as I need to until we as a group can choose a mayor,” said council member Sam Seidel at that first meeting. “It’s going to take a lot more talking, and some more cups of coffee.”

The deadlock during the Council’s inaugural meeting would set the tone for the following two months.

Over the next four elections, Decker and Simmons announced their plans to run for a recently vacated State Senate seat and dropped from the mayoral race. As for the remaining contenders, Maher continued to hold a firm lead with four votes, while Reeves and Davis split the other five.

Despite the smaller pool, however, the Council was repeatedly unable to reach a consensus. During the sixth and final election—on Feb. 22, eight weeks after the initial ballot—Decker expressed a desire to expedite the sluggish process.

“We have to ask ourselves, if there is no mayor, and there are no committee assignments to chair, then what does the City Council do?” Decker said in a lengthy defense of urgency.

“We cannot effectively advocate for public policy,” she added.

Decker’s impassioned speech accompanied her motion to move the vote for the city’s next mayor to the top of the agenda.

That night, Maher seized six votes and the title of mayor of Cambridge. The Council then voted to make the result unanimous.

“Although the process seems a bit difficult, it is the process, and it is democracy,” said Simmons, outgoing Cambridge mayor, during the final meeting. “It gives us an opportunity to continue to discuss with each other in an informal context.”

ARE YOU MY MAYOR?

The mayoral position that was so hotly contested this winter comes with several responsibilities and significant compensation.

The mayor earns a salary of $105,025, almost $35,000 more than the other councillors’ $70,329 annual paychecks, according to Michael P. Gardner, the city’s personnel director.

In addition to chairing the City Council meetings, the mayor serves as chair and as a seventh vote on the School Committee.

But some say that the mayorship carries very little recognition—in fact, the delay in selecting a mayor had “practically zero” impact on the city, according to local political pundit Robert Winters.

“The mayor of Cambridge could be walking down any street in Cambridge and wouldn’t be recognized by most of the city,” Winters says. “It’s largely a symbolic position.”

But members of the School Committee point out that the sluggish mayoral race forced them to wait for the selection of their final committee member—the mayor—and thereby stymied their attempts to assign members to subcommittees.

“I think in some ways it had a profound impact because there were many significant issues...that were difficult to work on without knowing who the permanent chair was going to be,” says School Committee member Marc C. McGovern.

But he adds, “We did...a very good job of not letting that slow us down.”

Now that Maher has served on the committee for the past several months, School Committee members say that they are pleased with his contributions to the group.

“Mayor Maher brings the perspective of someone who once served on the School Committee,” says committee member Patricia M. Nolan ’80. “He’s a voice of calm and quiet leadership, which is really nice.”

MAYOR ADJUSTMENT

The turbulent history of Cambridge mayoral elections—coupled with what some view as inappropriate roles in the mayor’s job description—has led several elected leaders to call for change in the selection procedure.

“I am always a believer in more direct democracy, and this is not direct democracy,” says Nolan, who believes that the mayor should be elected by citizens in November when they choose councillors and School Committee members.

McGovern says that the City Council needs to give greater consideration to the School Committee when selecting the mayor.

“City councillors make their decisions on a lot of things other than who’s the best chair for the School Committee,” he says.

To remedy these issues, McGovern says that the School Committee should have a vote in the selection of the mayor, or it should choose a chair from any of its seven members in a selection process independent of the vote for mayor.

Simmons hypothetically suggests instituting a deadline by which the city’s leader must be chosen every year.

But Simmons reinforces the importance of the acting mayor as a fallback position. The role is always filled by the senior member of the Council—Reeves, in this year’s case.

This system, Simmons says, explains Cambridge’s ability to stay afloat for so long while it chooses a permanent captain.

This year was not unique in the difficulty of its mayoral election process. Since Cambridge adopted its current form of government in 1940, many of the biannual deliberations that have chosen new mayors for the city have been similarly tortuous.

In 1948, unlike this year, councillors took scores of votes each time they met, hoping to resolve the selection process as efficiently as possible. Despite these efforts, the election of Mayor Michael J. Neville required over four months and more than 1,300 ballots.

More recently, in 2000, councillors came to their decision in a six-and-a-half hour meeting on the night of Valentine’s Day, after a six-week impasse.

—Staff writer Xi Yu can be reached at xyu@college.harvard.edu.

—Staff writer Julie M. Zauzmer can be reached at jzauzmer@college.harvard.edu.