Luck selected to lead Harrington

BHARRINGTON — The city has a new mayor.

Mayor Pro Tempore Nathan Luck was officially selected to lead the city as mayor during a 6 p.m. virtual meeting Thursday, April 2.

He was selected on a 2-0 vote of the council, with former Mayor Justin Slack and Councilman Levi Shenk supporting the nomination.

Councilmen Peter Davenport and Luck himself abstained from the vote.

The decision followed some discussion and apparent confusion of parliamentary procedure.

Luck was selected over applicant Desina Holling.

“I have chosen to abstain because I am a little unclear as to whether we have proceeded in a proper fashion or not,” Davenport said. “It appears to me that we have failed to consider a candidate who seems to be well-qualified for the position and highly motivated.

Questions over the selection process related to the timeliness of applications.

Holling had submitted a leter of interest prior to a previous deadline established by the council. Luck turned his letter of interest in late, a fact he readily acknowledged.

“We had put an ad in the paper and had a day that we wanted those letters of interest,” he said. “I had put mine in after that date not realizing that I had. So, I have since pulled that letter of interest out of the file. I didn’t want any conflict.”

With Luck having pulled his letter, he said that left only one letter of interest — from Holling.

“That was submitted to the city before the date that we had in the paper,” he said.

Davenport sought confirmation from Luck that the one application the city received before the Feb 28 deadline was from Holling.

“That is correct, yes,” he said.

Davenport then asked Holling about her background and experience.

She said she had a variety of positions, interests and skills.

“Pretty broad background, it sounds,” Davenport said. “Sounds like you have a lot of good experience, your background seems to be as broad as my own.”

No other council members had questions for Holling.

Slack asked whether the council had to appoint someone who had submitted a letter, or if it could select another individual.

Luck said the city had asked that question of the Municipal Resource and Service Center.

“They told us that we could, in fact, appoint someone else, that we did not have to submit a letter or anything formally,” Luck said.

Davenport noted that in his conversations with the organization, he was advised the issue wasn’t so clear.

“In order to be able to legally consider an applicant who submitted letter of application or letter of interest after the published deadline, we would have to find those parties who had submitted letters of interest prior to deadline unfit for or inadequate for the position,” he said. “But in my view, we are not able to do that in this case. We have an applicant who has uh impressive credentials for the job, it appears to me.”

As the discussion continued, Luck said he would abstain from voting to avoid a conflict of interest.

Ultimately, Shenk moved to appoint Luck.

“Are we going to nominate candidates and vote after all are nominated,” Davenport asked. “What is the proper procedure here, because I am prepared to nominate Desina Holling for the position of mayor.”

That’s when Luck called for the vote on Shenk’s motion.