Steve Thurston (2021)
Matt Marshall addresses the Saratoga Springs City Council on Dec. 22, 2021.
For one last time, BLM supporters sparred with this particular Saratoga Springs City Council, during the council’s final meeting of the year. It is also the final meeting for the foreseeable future of Mayor Meg Kelly and three commissioners: Robin Dalton, Public Safety; John Franck, Accounts; and Michele Madigan, Finance. Four new council members will join Commissioner of Public Works, Anthony "Skip" Scirocco on the board in January.
The rancor is nothing new, as BLM Saratoga members have shown up to berate the city council at just about every meeting since July 20, when the city council chambers exploded in a furious back-and-forth between BLM supporters and the council.
Lexis Figuereo, the leader of BLM Saratoga, was charged with disorderly conduct after that meeting, though many people on both sides of the dais were shouting.
[Read our coverage of that night here.]
BLM supporters have told FoothillsBusinessDaily.com that the pressure is intentional, that they plan to keep it up fearing that this or the next city council will quickly forget BLM Saratoga’s list of demands, including that the city form a Civilian Review Board to oversee police operations and to be a conduit for complaints, and that the city more fully investigate the death of Darryl Mount, a black man who died after being chased by police in 2013.
During the meeting Tuesday evening Dec. 22, the BLM supporters once again taunted the city council, with language sometimes profane. Despite the mayor’s own rules that say the public discussion should be aimed at the board in general and not at individual commissioners, and that it is not a dialogue, often city council members respond and have gotten into a back-and-forth with BLM supporters.
Tuesday evening was no different in that regard.
The tension started when Kelly, who runs the meetings, attempted to close the public comment just a few seconds after it opened when no one stood immediately from their seats to address the council.
When people yelled at her to wait, she responded: “I’m being patient here.”
A number of people spoke, but Samira Sangare read a litany of complaints as a reminder to the outgoing board of their incompetence over the past two years, she said, complaints that the group hopes will lead to charges from the state Attorney General’s office which is investigating the Saratoga Springs Police Department for civil rights violations.
Among the events that Sangare found troubling: the use of pepper bullets during a 2020 protest, the arrests of people who protested in 2021 and the threat of arrest during a city council meeting when people said, “Mmm-hmmm” to agree with speakers during public comment. She had a long list.
It devolved from there as Madigan told protesters “to have your fun” by lecturing the council, and disregarded them to eat her dinner. People responded that getting arrested for citations, which are not crimes, is not fun.
Nedra Hickenbottom, mother to both Figuereo and activist Chandler Hickenbottom, both of whom have been arrested, told Madigan that having your children arrested was not a joke. Madigan countered that she never said, "joke." (Later on Figuereo brought up the arrest of Madigan's son on felony charges and wondered why they could talk about BLM arrests but not other arrests.)
The most heat came when Figuereo drew a comparison between two sisters, his own and Mayor Kelly’s sister.
Figuereo’s sister is a professional caretaker for Kelly’s sister.
Kelly grew emotional, saying, “You have a hell of a nerve...That’s the lowest blow that you can give anybody.”
In an angry back-and-forth, Kelly told Figuereo not to bring her “disabled sister” into the discussion.
Figuereo countered that when he brings up what has happened to his family—he has said one of his children was hurt during the arrest of their mother, and both children were traumatized when their mother was taken away—the board ignores it and thinks of it as insignificant, but when he brings up the mayor’s sister, he gets pushback from the entire board, he shouted.
Matt Marshall of Albany attempted to calm the waters, late in the public comment period, saying: “I think one of the problems going on here is this is not fun for the people that are here.”
“It’s not fun for the people who are here either,” Kelly interrupted, indicating the board. Then referring to what Marshall had just said, Kelly responded: “I don’t need to hear that, do you have a comment.”
“Whether you guys like their tactics or not, they care enough about the community to be here. They don’t have to be,” Marshall said of the BLM supporters, adding that he recognized that the council also cares for the community enough to be there.
He added that the board can get something done to help in the three days left of their terms–
“We have 10 days, but that’s OK,” Kelly said.
Marshall acknowledged his mistake and said commissioners “are beholden to the public whether they are agreeable or disagreeable, not to anybody else, not to yourselves…You have 10 days left,” a frustrated Marshall said, “don’t be a failure as you have been the last two years.”
Of the members of the council who are leaving, Kelly, Franck, and Madigan did not run for office during the November election, and Dalton chose not to run for Public Safety then lost a bid to be mayor.
Dalton hinted at the end of the meeting that she may run again, but said that when the attacks from the public get personal, she thinks it discourages others from running. She said that after two years of “abuse” in office, she would not encourage others to run.
“I don’t think people understand what we go through,” she said.