By David Fortier
The mayor and city council heard a request to have former Mayor Ken Cockayne’s portrait removed from the gallery of mayors’ portraits in the city hall chambers at Tuesday night’s council meeting.
“In light of these posts, I feel it’s in the best interest of the City of Bristol to remove the picture of former Mayor Cockayne,” Mike Erosenko said. “Someone with that mentality and views should not be acknowledged on the wall of council chambers.”
Erosenko shared copies of recent screenshots from Cockayne’s personal Facebook page with the mayor and council. The copies included seven screenshots, several of them featuring the late George Floyd, who in a confrontation with police died from asphyxia after a police officer knelt on his neck for as much as 9 minutes, ignoring Floyd’s pleads for help.
One of the images shows Floyd’s image along with a black power sign on the side of a white sneaker with the caption, appearing as a news headline, reading “Nike announces new ‘Nike No Air’ shoe as a limited edition, another with Floyd’s image and the words “Happy Black History Month” above it and across the center, “I had a dream–Dr. George Floyd.”
“To mock the murder of an unarmed black man who was begging for his life–and calling for his mother–is the ugliest type of hate,” Erosenko said.
In another image, a young boy holds the handles of a seatless bicycle. The comments read, “yes…I’m going to hell for this but to (sic) funny not to share” with emojis tears from laughing above “Every day, poor Nabib has to travel 6 miles for fresh water on a bike with no wheels or seat … For a one time donation of $12, we will send you the DVD … it’s f***ing hilarious.”
“I hope we can all agree that these posts are ugly and do not reflect well on the values of Bristol as an all-heart city,” he said. “I feel it is in the best interest of the city of Bristol to remove the picture of former Mayor Cockayne.”
Erosenko said that this was not a free speech issue because it comes under government speech and he asked that the mayor bring forward a motion to condemn this hate mongering from someone who once held the office of the mayor and to remove hate from city hall.
“Mr. Mayor, I’ve heard you say over and over that hate has no place in our all-heart city,” Erosenko said. “Let’s all agree for once that’s it is in the best interest of the city not to honor individuals with this type of mindset.”
In response, Mayor Jeffrey Caggiano said that earlier in his administration in May of 2023, working through the charter revision process, the charter was changed to allow the mayor and council to remove elected and appointed officials for malfeasance. He said that he did not know if this situation applied.
“I hear what you are saying,” Caggiano said. “I am not sure we have the authority to go backwards, because I think the intent of that was to handle local issues, but I appreciate what you are saying, and I appreciate your coming to city council.”
In addition to this request, residents in neighboring towns asked the mayor and council for help to address noise emanating from the Covanta plant off Lake Avenue.
“I have been going through a terrible situation for the past year and a half,” said Michelle Allaire from Southington, “and wasn’t aware that it all came down to the Covanta plant and the high frequency noises that are penetrating from it.”
Others who commented, called it a mental health issue and asked for reports from Covanta regarding its monitoring and timelines for permits allowing the burning of medical waste.
“If you have to go through this it is a total nightmare,” she said. “It’s like a torture. It’s like dripping water on your head every night.”
She said that she did contact Bristol-Burlington Health director Rocco Palmieri who responded and said that he was working on the situation, but that is complicated.
Palmieri was at the meeting, and he reiterated that he was working on the situation with experts and that he needed time to complete the studies.
In other business, a new cannabis packaging facility on Cross Street was approved as well as $1.4 in funding for roadway reconstruction and drainage work by Tabacco & Son Builders. The council also approved a salary increase of $5,000 annually for the city’s emergency management director, retroactive to Jan. 1, and salary and insurance increases for non-bargaining employees, effective July 1.
The recently disbanded Mayor’s HIV/AIDS Task Force received acknowledgment for its contributions.
Overshadowing these, however, was the announcement from Police Chief Brian Gould that he would be retiring in early April. See separate story for his announcement by clicking here.
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