I can’t understand why the Lewiston City Council would censure Mayor Carl Sheline for writing a letter of support — one which he never sent — to a nonprofit organization dedicated to transitioning people away from homelessness on the grounds that he did so without getting prior council approval.

The censure was proposed and passed by a vote of 4-3 on Feb. 21.

Sheline’s draft letter was addressed to Project HOME. The Portland-based nonprofit, according to its website, is a “supportive housing tenant management service that partners with landlords to rent to tenants who have experienced homelessness and housing insecurity.”

It “assists landlords by managing all aspects of the tenancy related to tenant duties, leasing-up and move-in details, rental assistance program navigation, physical maintenance of the unit, and repairs/damages” and “also helps tenants access community resources related to food, healthcare, education, and employment.”

In his letter, Sheline wrote that, “on behalf of the City of Lewiston,” he was “delighted to voice our support” for the organization’s grant proposal to expand their initiative. But based on feedback he received, he withdrew and never sent it.

The council’s censure was couched in procedural terms. It faulted Sheline for having violated its protocol, which states that the mayor is supposed to coordinate with the council in representing views on major issues of community importance to the media and other levels of government.

Several city councilors, notably Rick LaChapelle and Lee Clement, pressed for the censure. They’re part of a faction that has intermittently attacked Sheline since he took office in 2022.

I suspect their real beef with the mayor is that he has advocated a more active city role in assisting the homeless, while they see such an approach as a budget buster and a magnet for undocumented aliens.

This is bolstered by LaChapelle’s own comments about the letter: “The primary goal of [Project HOME] is to find housing for as many people [as] they can …, meaning they would send people to live in places like Lewiston and pay for the first month of rent and then stop,” after which “it becomes Lewiston’s problem, and we must pick up the long-term tab for them.” LaChapelle also complained about the increase in the city’s general assistance costs year over year, which he attributed to a recent influx of “asylum seekers, aka illegal aliens.”

I realize that helping the homeless has been a hotly controversial topic since the biblical prophet Isaiah exhorted, “bring the poor and homeless into your house” (Isaiah 58:7) and Jesus delivered his Sermon on the Mount. But censuring the mayor for drafting a letter on the issue is really over the top.

It brings to mind the 2002 movie “Minority Report,” a dystopian sci-fi thriller about a specialized police force that identifies and apprehends criminals based upon misconduct they’re contemplating but haven’t yet committed.

Even if Sheline had sent the letter, so what?

I presume this was the kind of letter of recommendation routinely sought by non-profits to bolster their chances of snagging a grant through foundations and other funders. It wouldn’t have contractually bound the city to any obligations.

There’s certainly nothing in the Lewiston Charter which forbids the mayor from voicing opinions on issues of importance to the city, whether through the media, over the internet or in a letter written on municipal stationery.

The major’s express job under the Charter is to preside over council meetings, cast a tie-breaking vote when the council is deadlocked, appoint members to boards and committees and perform ceremonial functions. He is barred by the Charter and state statute from controlling the city’s day-to-day operations or personnel, because that’s the city administrator’s job. However, there’s nothing expressly or impliedly in the Charter that authorizes the council to muzzle the mayor.

Besides, it’s unrealistic to expect the mayor to be nothing more than a neutral moderator of City Council meetings. The mayoralty is a political office even though ballots don’t list the parties of those running for the position.

Candidates for mayor typically campaign on promises to keep taxes down, attract more business, improve housing stock, increase school funding, enhance recreational programs, beautify public parks or fill roadway potholes. I’ve yet to hear a candidate run on a promise to do a better job of sticking to Robert’s Rules of Order.

Previous mayors, in Lewiston and Auburn, have taken an expansive view of their right to employ what President Theodore Roosevelt called the “bully pulpit.”

Robert Macdonald, Lewiston’s mayor from 2012 to 2018, and Jonathan LaBonte, Auburn’s mayor from 2011 to 2017, frequently, and at times obnoxiously, voiced their views on hot-button topics without first consulting members of their respective councils. Laurier T. Raymond, Jr., while Lewiston mayor, touched off a firestorm of controversy in 2002, when he unilaterally published an open letter to the Somali community asking them to slow their immigration into the community.

Jason Levesque, Auburn’s current mayor, advocates forcefully for the expansion of housing and is often at odds with members of his council as to how to get there (for example, by changing development standards in the agricultural zone or allowing greater density in neighborhoods close to the city’s core). Whether or not you agree with Levesque, it’s hard to deny that he’s identified a genuine problem and sparked a valuable public debate as to how to solve it.

So here’s my message to LaChapelle and Clement: If you have a problem with Sheline’s agenda, then vote against it or, alternatively, run for mayor in the next election (on a curmudgeonly platform of keeping Lewiston safe from the homeless).

But don’t try to prevent Sheline from doing what mayors should do — speak his mind!

Elliott Epstein is a trial lawyer with Andrucki & King in Lewiston. His Rearview Mirror column, which has appeared in the Sun Journal for 16 years, analyzes current events in an historical context. He is also the author of “Lucifer’s Child,” a book about the notorious 1984 child murder of Angela Palmer. He may be contacted at epsteinel@yahoo.com

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