Plymouth’s Select Board, featuring two freshly elected members, on Tuesday chose Kevin Canty as its new chair and David Golden as vice chair.
Canty replaces Dick Quintal as the five-member board’s leader, while Golden succeeds Canty.
But in a clear sign of tension, Quintal cast the sole vote against Canty taking over his position. He gave no reason why after his vote and on Wednesday declined to comment.
Charlie Bletzer and John Mahoney, who were defeated in Saturday’s town election, frequently sided with Quintal on issues. The two new members, Bill Keohan and Deb Iaquinto campaigned as agents for change and are likely to align with Canty.
Bletzer, who served for four years on the board, spoke during the public comment section of the meeting to congratulate the winners and to thank his supporters and town employees.
“Every decision I’ve made has been grounded in one goal,” Bletzer said. “Doing what’s best for the people of Plymouth.”
He also issued a call for harmony.
“Let’s put Plymouth first, Bletzer said. “It’s time to move past division and partisanship. We owe it to our town and each other to work together with respect and unity.”
For his part, Canty on Wednesday appeared interested in moving forward, and made no reference to Quintal’s slight.
“I want to thank Mr. Quintal for his prior service as our chair and I look forward to working collaboratively with the entire Select Board over the next year to help improve Plymouth for all of our residents,” he said in a statement emailed to the Independent.
Keohan, former longtime Community Preservation Committee chair, and Iaquinto, who served on the Open Space Committee until her required resignation Wednesday, maintained a relatively lowkey presence during their first meeting after being sworn into office.
Near the end of the otherwise routine session, however, Quintal took the spotlight, bringing up the controversy over his April 29 lambasting of the nonprofit Southeastern Massachusetts Pine Barrens Alliance. The group leases a building from the town at 165 Center Hill Road.
At that April meeting, an irate Quintal stood at the podium – speaking, he said, as “a private citizen” – claiming the Alliance benefits from a “sweetheart deal” while at the same time suing it over the development of a business park at 71 Hedges Pond Road in Cedarville. In fact, the group taking legal action is the Community Land and Water Coalition, a separate entity.
At the May 6 Select Board meeting, attorney Meg Sheehan, who represents the Community Land and Water Coalition in its suit to stop the business park, demanded an apology, saying she and her organization did not want to be “dragged…into political attacks, such as what happened here last week.” At the time, Quintal did not acknowledge her comments.
In a later interview with the Independent, he conceded that he confused Save the Pine Barrens with the Southeastern Massachusetts Pine Barrens Alliance, perhaps because the Community Land and Water Coalition was formerly known by a similar name – Save the Pine Barrens. But he again declined to apologize for misspeaking.
On Tuesday, he maintained that stance.
“The apology thing, it wasn’t a big deal,” Quintal said during the meeting. “I would have done it in a heartbeat. I apologize whenever I have to. But I’m not going to have people standing at the microphone and dictating to me that I should apologize. I’m 66 years old and I think I have very good values.”
Fred Thys can be reached at fred@plymouthindependent.org