I find it unfathomable that the council members from district 1-4 feel its acceptable to exclude Ray Mueller, the council member from district 5, from participating in the nomination and selection of his replacement. Council member Mueller has served district 5 for 10 years and best knows the perspectives, goals, and priorities of the district.

We have 10 days until council member Mueller leaves office for his new role as county supervisor. I can't envision any reason that the council can't find an hour or two in the next 10 days to complete the process they publicly committed to do on Wednesday, but then changed their mind at the last minute during the meeting and with the process that they designed and agreed to, specifically to ensure that council member Mueller would participate.

If you're a Menlo Park district 5 resident and feel that council member Mueller should participate in the selection of his replacement, please send an email to city.council@menlopark.gov and express your thoughts.

Can one imagine this Council excluding Cecilia Taylor and saying she wasn’t necessary to vote whom to appoint to represent District 1?

Of course not.

Mayor Wolosin and City Manager Murphy have been reaching out to the rest of the city council to schedule a special meeting to select the new D5 council member before Councilmember Mueller leaves office, and 3 city council members have affirmed their availability, 2 have said that they can't participate. Which 2 councilmembers are unwilling to participate and why? Can the city council have a special session with just those 3 members so that Councilmember Mueller can participate in the nomination and selection of his successor?

Not only did the council not execute the process that they agreed to by selecting the replacement last Wednesday, they further reneged on their commitment to complete the process by the end of December as communicated to the candidates in the email from Judi Herren of Dec 20th. In that email, the following document was included (Web Link which stated on page D2.3:

"Should the City Council defer the appointment of a District 5 City Councilmember, by vote of the City Council, shall continue this agenda to a time and date certain. Potential meeting dates are:

• Thursday, December 22 at 6 p.m. (hybrid)
• Friday, December 23 at 6 p.m. (virtual only)
• Monday, December 26 at 6 p.m. (virtual only)
• Tuesday, December 27 at 6 p.m. (virtual only)"

Not including Councilmember Mueller in the selection of his successor is an insult to him, his years of service, and most importantly to all district 5 residents whose representative would be selected by no one elected to serve the district. All efforts should be taken to ensure Councilmember Mueller participates in this process.

Why is anyone surprised that Nash and Taylor are the blockers here.

Bothof them are obstructionists and MPK needs to rid ourselves of them.....

Roy