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09/22/2017 12:00 AMAfter an evening of bickering, insults, and accusations, the final form of the Republican Board of Selectmen (BOS) slate is unclear. At a Republican Town Committee (RTC) meeting on Sept. 21, Ken MacKenzie, who secured his place at the top of the ticket after defeating Bob Hartmann at the primary, asked current selectman and RTC-confirmed candidate Charles Havrda to leave the ticket.
MacKenzie said moving forward there are questions about who will be loyal to him. After reading comments in the paper by other members of the RTC slate endorsing Bob Hartmann, MacKenzie said he needs to know where people are going to place their support.
“We need to identify who wants to run as a slate,” he said. “For me to just embrace the full slate that put a full page ad in the paper and said they didn’t want to work with me and that they wanted to work with Bob, for me to just all of a sudden act like we are just ‘Kumbaya,’ I’ll be honest is just not entirely true. Do I think we can iron out a lot of our difference? Absolutely, but wounds were created and wounds take time to heal…I think we can get over much of it, but maybe not all of it.”
“Not all of it” seems to include Havrda. MacKenzie said after the primary he spoke with Havrda and asked him to step down due to his close alignment with current First Selectman Joe Mazza, telling the committee that he thought it would be better to have a slate that was more aligned with him going into the general election. However, Havrda declined to step down.
“Charlie said he was unwilling to step down and as far as I know we cannot force Charlie to step down,” MacKenzie said. “It would have to be on his own volition to do so. Had the vote been closer than it was, I would not have entertained such a thought, but I do believe that the magnitude of the vote last week was such that frankly I would have expected Charlie to offer to step down.”
MacKenzie defeated Hartmann 733 votes to 295.
Havrda cannot be forced to leave the ticket, but if he chose to step aside, MacKenzie said he would like to see current BOS member Cindy Cartier, who had previously indicated she would not run again, join him on the ballot. RTC Committee Chair Gloria Nemczuk indicated that MacKenzie cannot unilaterally fill a vacancy on the slate. Nemczuk also asked MacKenzie if he understands what asking Havrda to step down means.
“I do and I think he should step down,” said MacKenzie. “I do understand how you feel. I want Cindy in that seat next to me.”
Havrda said he was taken aback by the request when MacKenzie first asked him, but said he is not prepared to walk away from the slate.
“I am not going to step aside, simply because there are some things that we have started in the last eight years that I want to finish,” he said. “It is as simple as that...I have been very supportive of Joe [Mazza]. I am not ashamed of it and I am actually very proud of it and I understand Ken’s position. I don’t have a problem and I can’t change it, but neither am I going to change my decision at this point in time.”
Havrda said he was also encouraged by residents to stay on the ticket and not be “bullied” out of his seat. When asked by some members of the RTC at the meeting if he would support MacKenzie in the campaign, Havrda said “Yes,” but also said that it is not easy seeing as MacKenzie has openly stated that he doesn’t want him.
“I know he doesn’t want me, but maybe that will evolve—I don’t know—but he is the top of the ticket and at this point in time we are the slate and that is the way it is,” Havrda said. “Do I agree with everything that Ken has ever said? No. Do I agree with everything that Joe has ever said for the last eight years? No. Cindy and I have had our disagreements, but I don’t think that is the end of the world, I think that is healthy, frankly.”
While MacKenzie offered no further comment as to his position on Havrda, fellow BOS nominee Sue Renner said she had some concerns as well, pointing out that Cartier had invited all of the candidates for a private meeting after the RTC meeting, but neglected to invite Havrda or herself.
However, in an effort to move forward, Renner said she would like to see MacKenzie retract his request of Havrda and to stop criticizing the current administration, pointing to some of the successes over the past eight years.
“You have asked people if they want to join you, but I think it is about you joining us…I think it is about you joining us or all of us working together, which is what I would like to see,” Renner said. “I think that would be the best chance for all of us going forward and the best chance for all of us in November, which is why we are all here.”
Primary Wounds
While the meeting was intended to focus on what happens next, a fair amount of the meeting was spent rehashing the primary campaigns. Audience members argued about the role of social media in the campaign and Nemczuk told the room that people should be ashamed of how they conducted themselves online during the primary.
“It was a terrible primary campaign and a lot of you should be ashamed of what you put on Facebook as Republicans,” she said. “What do you think the Democrats and anyone else is looking at? They see everything on Facebook.”
MacKenzie went over certain statements made about him during the primary that he said are untrue. He said he never wanted to close a school, did not speak against the senior tax freeze program, and did not say he wanted to gut the budget. MacKenzie also said that comments made to this paper suggesting that the party is divided were inappropriate.
“I would argue that the party is not divided—the RTC is divided,” he said. “The party came out and overwhelmingly endorsed something that my group of people represent and that could be pro-me, it could be anti-Joe [Mazza], it could be anti-establishment, it could be in favor of a reduction of spending and taxes.”
MacKenzie also said that Hartmann and Mazza are going to back the Democratic candidate Matt Hoey in November and said they have made statements in the paper to that effect. Both Hartmann and Mazza responded by asking MacKenzie to produce the articles in which they said they would support Hoey.
Mazza then took the floor to address some of MacKenzie’s comments. Mazza said he did say that it would be hard for the party to unite and that he still believes that to be true, saying it is unlikely the party will come together under MacKenzie’s leadership. However, it was MacKenzie’s request of Havrda that clearly upset Mazza.
“I think it is really brazen of you because you have won such a large majority—and I congratulate you for that, I have never won with a majority like that—but that doesn’t make you a dictator,” he said. “To ask the candidate to step down because he supports me…There are many, many people who supported me in two elections—are you going to ask them to turn their backs on me? Charles was duly elected at a caucus and to ask him to step down, one of the most outstanding members of this community, I think is foolish of you. And to say this in front of the press I think is also foolish of you, so, my friend, you have a lot to learn. It is just advice, you don’t have to take it.”
MacKenzie said he is not a dictator and is going to have a big team behind him going into November that is looking to bring change to town.
“This little cabal we have had here, it is not working,” he said. “The people don’t want it, so it is over and it is time to move on and those who want to work together, work together. I am not looking to hurt anybody. I am not doing this for power or money—I am doing what I think is right for the town.”
The general election is less than six weeks away—Tuesday, Nov. 7.