Everett city councilors suggest first Black female colleague should resign after technical difficulties lead to tension
The 31-year-old Councilwoman Gerly Adrien has been attending recent meetings by Zoom due to health concerns during the COVID-19 pandemic.
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When Everett’s first Black city councilwoman said she was not able to attend council meetings in person due to health concerns during the coronavirus pandemic, but would join using Zoom, her colleagues reportedly hinted at her resignation.
Aside from living in a city that has been designated a hot spot for COVID-19 cases in the past and is currently at high-risk with a 4.3% positivity rate, the 31-year-old Councilor Gerly Adrien also lives with her father who is more susceptible to COVID-19 due to having diabetes, the Boston Globe reported.
Data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has also shown that Black Americans face two to three times the risk of coronavirus infection as white Americans do, and are more than twice as likely as white Americans to die from the disease.
Wary to sit in a room for multiple hours with members who don’t reportedly wear masks, Adrien said she has provided a doctor’s note explaining why it’s ill-advised for her to attend in person, the Globe reported.
But at last Monday night’s meeting, council members grew irritated with Adrien’s virtual attendance after technical problems with the city’s equipment made it impossible to hear her, local news outlets reported.
Councilor Peter A. Napolitano suggested Adrien reconsider her membership on the council if she couldn’t show up.
“There are four or five members in the Chamber over 60,” the Everett Independent quoted Napolitano as saying. “Most have health issues and we’re here. I respect the councilor’s health concerns … But if you aren’t able to do the job, don’t take the assignment. We all have health issues. I have high blood pressure … We’re here because we took an oath to the residents of Everett. If you can’t do it, you have some decisions to make.”
Council President Rosa DiFlorio echoed her concern over the situation as well.
“We need to go back to the old fashioned way. If the Internet goes off, then come on. We have a job to do,” she said, according to the Independent. “To the extent an individual does not want to be here, that’s their decision.”
Though Adrien said the dispute and request for her resignation, which she attributed to “prejudice and microaggression,” according to the Globe, didn’t seem to be about technology at all.
“I think they’re just sick and tired of me being on the council,” she said, according to the newspaper. “And they just want me out.”
Footage of the councilors’ comments made during last week’s session has since been erased from the city’s broadcasting system, sparking a criminal inquiry into the video’s disappearance, the Globe reported.
Meanwhile, DiFlorio told WBZ NewsRadio that she doesn’t want Adrien to resign and plans to stop by City Hall on Monday to figure out how Adrien can continue to virtually attend meetings without technical glitches getting in the way of her work.
“We need to all get along and stop this,” DiFlorio told the station. “This is about doing our jobs for the residents of Everett.”
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