Oh, How I Wish...

Yesterday, upon the stair,
I met a man who wasn’t there
He wasn’t there again today
I wish, I wish he’d go away…

When I came home last night at three
The man was waiting there for me
But when I looked around the hall
I couldn’t see him there at all!
Go away, go away, don’t you come back any more!
Go away, go away, and please don’t slam the door… (slam!)

Last night I saw upon the stair
A little man who wasn’t there
He wasn’t there again today
Oh, how I wish he’d go away

– “Antigonish,” Hughes Mearns, 1899

It is becoming even more obvious that Tony Mack is Mayor of Trenton only in name, and not in fact. He is dead weight, drawing a paycheck with his sole objective being not to provide the public service and leadership he swore to give us on July 1, 2010, but to keep up what’s left of his household and personal life, and keep the wolves at bay as long as possible.

It’s not enough. After a night at City Council when one of his few remaining allies on City Council publicly called for his resignation, and a citizens’ group presented a resolution asking for a declaration of No Confidence in him (as good an idea as it was 26 months ago, although it has no legal standing), we read a news story asking, “Who’s Running the City?” and describing Mack’s empty work schedule for almost the entire time since July, when his house and City Hall were raided by FBI agents. Subsequently, the Mayor was arrested and charged with one count of corruption, and he is now awaiting an inevitable Federal indictment.What he is not doing is working.

The man is doing nothing as Mayor, and making no effort to convince us otherwise. In today’s Trentonian article by Sherrina Navani, the only person to speak on the record on his behalf sounded distinctly half-hearted. The best that Councilman Alex Bethea could come up with was, “I think since the stuff has hit the fan I think he has taken a lower key. I haven’t been in action with him since the incident occurred.” “Haven’t been in action with him” would be an OK way to phrase things if Mr. Bethea and Mr. Mack had been Flying Tigers together, but rather odd in this context, I’d say.

Even among the Executive Branch, no one was willing to stand up for him on the record. The best defense came from a Trenton Water Works employee “city hall employee who asked to remain anonymous,” who said “He is the leader of the city and it is his job to develop the vision for Trenton, he then hires staff to deploy and implement his vision, that is the job of his direct reports… The mayor still had to sign off on the paperwork.”

Wow. What a ringing endorsement.

Let’s face it, Tony Mack is wreckage. As a City, we need to move on. A No Confidence motion is well and good, but there are more effective measures Council can and should take.

As I suggested last month, Council can name an Acting Mayor to take on the powers and the duties of the office, under Article II, Section 2-4 E of our City Ordinances. Council can simply declare that “the Mayor shall have been unable to attend to the duties of the office for a period of 60 consecutive days for any of the above-stated reasons [defined just above as “absence from the City, disability or other cause].” [My emphasis – KM]

Might some members of Council or the public think that Mr. Mack has done just the bare minimum needed to avoid having an Acting Mayor named?

Fine! Let the matter be discussed at an open Council session. Let Mr. Mack appear, with his calendar and any supporting timestamps and documents to show that he “has come to work every single day” as his “anonymous defender” says.

To be clear, I am not asking Mr. Mack to defend himself against the criminal charges swirling around him. I am proposing that Council call him to publicly justify his continuing claim on a regular paycheck from taxpayers for doing nothing on the job. I think that’s fair, appropriate and long overdue.

And then, regarding Mr. Mack, “Oh, how I wish he’d go away”