Accusations fly following election

SOUTH PORTLAND — In her final regular meeting as a South Portland city councilor last week, Rosemarie De Angelis called out her peers whom she claims conspired to drive her from office.

Reading from a seven-minute-long prepared speech, given, she said, despite a risk that, “you never know how the media will portray you,” De Angelis accused councilors Alan Livingston and Jerry Jalbert, outgoing Councilor Maxine Beecher and Mayor-elect Tom Blake of “aggressively recruiting” and promoting her opponent, Melissa Linscott.

The real estate broker and political newcomer bested De Angelis handily to represent District 3 (which includes the downtown Knightville area), 7,146 to 5,516. It was the only contested municipal race of five on the Nov. 6 ballot. The reason for the loss, claimed De Angelis, was that “fear is a powerful thing, causing many to act in hateful and damaging ways.”

“You see it in countries fraught with genocide,” said De Angelis, “[It’s] the fear that somebody might threaten something you have or something you want, fear that you might lose power, influence or somehow be exposed, fear that there is not enough for everyone.”

De Angelis was first elected to the City Council in 2003. Defeated in 2006, she sat out a term before winning her way back onto the city’s governing body in 2009. In this year’s race, her fellow councilors sought out and promoted Linscott, De Angelis said, because of her willingness to act as a veritable quorum-of-one on the council, opposing her peers this past year on everything from traffic configuration to fringe benefits.

“[Mine was] a voice that would gain public support and needed to be squashed,” said De Angelis. “Four councilors worked together with one mission: To silence the voice that questions.”

On Monday, Jalbert acknowledged that he, Beecher and Livingston did appear at the polls to shake hands “as friends of Melissa.” On the weekend before Election Day, he said, the trio went door-to-door to help distribute Linscott flyers.

“It was what I’d call a bare-knuckled campaign in the last week,” he said. “I must have handed out about 250 flyers and I think Maxine did, as well. I think Al must have handed out over 500. He was unbelievable.”

However, despite the late intervention, Jalbert theorized he and his fellow councilors were not the deciding factor in driving De Angelis from office.

“We probably had very little effect in the early voting, yet even then Melissa was ahead of Rosemarie,” he said.

The official vote tally certified by City Clerk Susan Mooney shows that Linscott led De Angelis by a mere 20 votes on absentee ballots, 2,066 to 2,046. That total includes mailed ballots as well as in-person absentee voting at City Hall in the weeks before Nov. 6. The cut-off date to request an absentee ballot was Nov. 1, the Thursday before the vote. It was in voting on Election Day where Linscott stomped De Angelis, racking up a 59.4 percent margin, 5,080 to 3,470.

Broken down by wards, the Election Day break for Linscott ranged from a 57.9 percent total in combined voting for Districts 3 and 4, to 62.8 percent in District 2. Perhaps ironically, District 2 is represented by Mayor Patti Smith, the only council member to publicly support De Angelis.

Immediately after De Angelis’ speech, just as the council was entering executive session for a hardship abatement, Beecher said she was “proud” to have supported Linscott, although she refrained from criticizing De Angelis. Livingston could not be reached for comment Monday, while Blake, in Arizona during the contest’s final week, refused to confirm what role, if any, he played in unseating De Angelis.

“I really can’t comment. There’s no story there,” he said. “I bet in the course of a year I ask 20 people why they don’t run for pubic office.”

However, Jalbert, away on vacation during De Angelis’ speech, did watch the Internet broadcast and said of it via email, “De Angelis teaches a class in personal growth at Southern Maine Community College, yet showed little personal growth in her losing bid for reelection. Instead, personal attacks were the theme.

“There is a lesson all of us in this and it is not a new one,” wrote Jalbert. “The lesson is, ‘You reap what you sow.’ Maybe it is from this lesson that the term ‘sour grapes’ came from.”

De Angelis appeared to see that critique coming during her speech, given during the council’s closing “round-robin” period, following a brief parliamentary tussle over who would get to speak last, she or Beecher.

“Let those who wish to try and discredit me or report sour grapes have at it, I will not leave in silence,” she said. “I have won elections and I have lost them. That is democracy. However, this election was different. It was grounded in fear, fueled by hatred and intolerance.”

De Angelis accused the contingent of “calling everyone they knew in District 3 with some name recognition,” until finally settling on Linscott after three others she named declined to run. She said Blake, a retired firefighter of 26-years’ service to the city, tried to sway his brothers to support Linscott. “But knowing that I am a strong union supporter, they were not swayed,” she said.

De Angelis then took aim at Linscott’s sales pitch for a spot on the council, given in newspaper interviews and at an Oct, 25 debate – that she would be a “fresh set of eyes.” That, along with Linscott’s stated reason for running, that she felt competition for office was a good thing, became talking points for her supporters. But De Angelis said both rhetorical bullets rang hollow. Why, she asked, had no one touted a need for fresh eyes during Beechers’ nine years on the council? Why, she wondered, was competition not lauded in any of the other one-horse races for the City Council in recent years?

“Really, it was not about eyes,” said De Angelis. “It was about voice – a voice that questions, challenges and even pushes at times.”

De Angelis then ticked off the many issues during the past year in which she was the lone and/or loudest dissenting voice, including her opposition to a health care benefit for councilors, giving direction to the city attorney behind closed doors and a plan for one-way traffic and angled parking on Ocean Street. Left unmentioned was the often acrimonious wrangling with event manager Caitlin Jordan, in public and via email, over the location, promotion and management of the farmers market, which De Angelis helped create during her 2011 term as mayor.

However, De Angelis did note that Beecher “fought like a dog on a bone” to keep her from voting on a sign permit for the farmers market, based on that conflict, but then, two weeks later, led the argument to allow Smith to vote on a resolution supporting same-sex marriage, even though Smith was employed by the question’s statewide sponsor and leading proponent.

But it was not just 2012, De Angelis said, in which she faced “intolerance.” As evidence, she presented “the small-mindedness” of Blake, Beecher and Livingston, who voted against her as mayor. It was, she said, the only time in recent history – other than in 2009 when Jim Soule famously voted for himself a year after suggesting southern Maine succeed from the rest of the state – that a vote for mayor was not unanimous.

De Angelis termed the lack of unanimity for her mayoral candidacy “an act of hate.” A divided vote for mayor, she said, has “never happened before and it will never happen again.”

For her part, Linscott said De Angelis was correct that she did not pull papers to run for office until the last available day. However, this was because she had commiserated with her husband and business partner regarding the choice to run for elective office, and whether she should go for seat on the City Council or the school board. It was not, she said, because councilors came to her late in the game after others refused to step into the ring with De Angelis.

Many people approached her to run for office, including members of the council, said Linscott, although she declined to name names.

“I don’t feel ‘recruit’ is the right word,” she said. “I don’t think it really matters who approached me. It’s kind of moot at this point. What’s important is that my election wasn’t a decision made by the council, it was a decision made by the citizens of the city. That’s kind of the bottom line.”

“One great thing about America is we can support and vote for whoever we want,” said Blake.

“It was not about me against Rosemarie,” said Linscott. “I was running for me, as an opportunity to serve the city. I did try not to look at it as one person against the other, but just offering what I have to give the city as an option for the citizens.”

Linscott said she settled on a council run over challenging Richard Matthews for the District 3 seat on the school board because, “there’s more opportunity to serve and more opportunity to do good on the City Council.”

The biggest potential fallout from De Angelis’ speech, said Linscott, is the idea that she is fated to be a lapdog on the council. That, she said, is a notion that will be quickly and easily dispelled.

“I think the thing that is a little disconcerting is the idea that I might not voice my opinion, that the people might not heard, or be represented any longer,” said Linscott. “I don’t thing any of these are the case. I think that will come to light as I sit on the council and do my job.”

In doing that job, however, Linscott said she does not intend to mirror what she calls a “disappointing” level of discourse on the South Portland City Council during 2012.

“We can disagree and stand up for out points of view without being unprofessional,” she said.

Meanwhile, Jalbert says he hopes De Angelis will view the council race in less partisan terms. Although councilors took sides – Beecher points out that Smith campaigned for De Angelis, too – it was more akin a party primary fight than a lynch mob, said Jalbert.

“Yeah, the incumbent’s not very happy about losing in that case, but eventually, from what I’ve seen over the years, he or she will come around and wish the winner the best,” said Jalbert. “The only thing I’m hoping for in the future is that Rosemarie would find it in herself to maybe contact Melissa and offer her congratulations.

De Angelis said via email Monday that concession calls are not the norm for municipal races.

“This is not Obama/Romney, where the press is standing by waiting to hear what was said,” she wrote, noting that she had spoken to Linscott while out collecting campaign signs and did not understand Jalbert’s expectation of anything more formal.

“That just didn’t even occur to me, but then I am not really a politician,” she wrote. “I am just a citizen who is committed to public service.”

De Angelis said she will continue to lead the city’s Bicycle/Pedestrian Committee, formed during her term as mayor. She hopes to also “support” the Farmers Market Advisory Committee, she said, but is uncertain whether it will continue into the Blake administration.

CLARIFICATION

An article in last week's edition of The Current misstated Rosemarie De Angelis' comments regarding the South Portland Farmers Market. De Angelis said she would continue to be supportive of the farmers market and that she did not know the status of the market's advisory committee. The article also incorrectly reported De Angelis' comment on a concession call. When De Angelis said in an email that she had encountered an opponent following the race, she was referring to a previous City Council race, not the 2012 campaign.