Bangor City Councilor Wayne Mallar will face the city’s ethics board again after he was caught on a hot mic last month complaining about a proposed school department budget hike and programs for “illegals” in local schools.
This will be the second inquiry this year into Mallar’s conduct after the ethics board found he violated city code by inappropriately using his position as a city councilor to attempt to influence a city commission, one episode in an unusually active period for the board.
Mallar’s fellow councilors voted 5-3 Monday to open a new inquiry over his comments during a break in the ethics board meeting that had convened to discuss his first inquiry.
“The school department’s asking for a 10% increase. As far as I’m concerned, they get no increase,” Mallar said. He could then be heard discussing the department’s spending on multilingual teachers and services for students learning English.
“They can’t speak English, read English, or write English. It’s not a disability. We do not have to furnish. They’re probably all illegals anyway. That’s what the cultural center is supposed to be doing,” Mallar said. His complaints were broadcast as part of the city’s livestream of the ethics board meeting.
The council order requesting an ethics inquiry noted that Mallar’s comments did not come with a disclaimer as to whether he was speaking as a private citizen or in his official capacity as a councilor.
The ethics board will determine whether Mallar violated parts of city code regarding maintaining public confidence and impartiality, prohibiting discrimination and using disclaimers.
Councilors were split on whether it was worth sending the issue to the ethics board, with councilors Susan Deane, Carolyn Fish and Susan Hawes voting against and councilors Michael Beck, Daniel Carson, Susan Faloon, Joe Leonard and Angela Walker voting in favor.
Deane and Fish said they disagreed with Mallar’s comments but did not believe another ethics inquiry was a good use of resources.
“I think it was in poor taste. I wish it hadn’t been said. And I wish there had been an apology,” Deane said. Still, she noted, “I don’t think we should continue to send all of our councilors to ethics when they make statements that we do not agree with.”
Several residents called on Mallar to resign during public comment at Monday’s meeting, and discussion in the council chambers devolved into shouting among residents after Mallar’s daughter, Hilari Simmons, spoke in defense of her father.
Mallar attended the meeting by Zoom, and Simmons said during public comment that he was in Boston for cancer treatment.
In addition to launching the ethics investigation, the other eight councilors voted unanimously to issue a resolve Monday saying that Mallar was not speaking on behalf of the city or the council. The resolve said that “the statements made by Councilor will in no way impact each Councilor’s individual vote on the School Department’s Budget.”
School Committee chair Timothy Surrette previously condemned Mallar’s comments, calling them “false, hateful, and deeply harmful to our multilingual learners and their families here in Bangor.” The school department is required to teach English language learners, per state and federal law.