Allegations of sexism came up at the Planning Board meeting on Monday when board member Eileen Marum mentioned that since August, some of her meeting minutes have been edited by the board chair to remove emotional language.
Marum said in the past, she has been ignored by male members of the board. As the board clerk, she has been composing minutes and since August, when some meetings have been contentious, she has noted it in the minutes.
Board members, including Ryan Burke and Chairman Andrew Daniel, dismissed allegations of sexism. They mentioned that board minutes should not reflect emotional language, and Daniel was not trying to dismiss any concerns raised by Marum.
The board ultimately voted 3-0 to have the administrative assistant, Danyca Filatreault, take over the duties of composing meeting minutes. Marum and fellow female board member Allana Nelson, the board’s vice chair, abstained from the vote.
Town Planner Doug Guey-Lee said the issue of town officials writing meeting minutes and subsequent controversy over biased or emotional language is not isolated to Marion.
He recommended that the administrative assistant conduct the minutes – a more common practice across town governments nationwide. Guey-Lee said that an administrative assistant usually is someone staffed by the town with no political “stake” in the game.
“Everywhere else I look, it is typically the administrative assistant who has the best chance of being objective and impartial,” Guey-Lee said.
“It is hard for board members to write the minutes when you have a stake in the discussion,” Guey-Lee said. “The administrative assistant is a staff person, and they have no skin in the game.”
Marum said that the controversy began last August when contentious issues came forward, including possible open meeting law violations or alleged issues of board members not reviewing important materials before the start of a meeting, she alleged.
Marum said that there has been a history of sexism against her, with board members ignoring her questions or not acknowledging her raised hand for input. She said Chairman Andrew Daniel editing her wording is a different form of “harassment.”
Marum said she expected that Daniel would write an addendum to the minutes but not remove her language that expressed the emotional tenor of the discussions.
“It (the harassment) has taken a different twist, and the chairman has decided he will remove my words from the minutes. So, it is just a different form of harassment,” Marum said.
Nelson said that Marum for more than three years has written objective and accurate minutes, and these last few months have just been an “ugly pimple” on her mostly impeccable record of writing minutes.
Some board members took umbrage with Marum’s claims.
“It is so insanely out of line,” member Ryan Burke said of the sexism claims. “It is disgusting.”
Members agreed, however, that complaints about the minutes and the emotional language have distracted the board from other issues – including talks about short-term rentals in town.
In other business, the board delayed hearings on two separate housing developments as the applicants are preparing more information – FSJ Marion Realty on Wareham Street and Mark Zuker’s proposed affordable housing development on Wareham Road.
Marion Planning Board
By Jeffrey D. Wagner