City Council Elects Galluccio New Mayor

After stretching for over seven hours and into the wee hours of the morning, and with votes changing by the hour, the Cambridge City Council finally elected a mayor for the city.

Shortly before 1:30 a.m., Anthony D. Galluccio was elected mayor of Cambridge by a 6-3 vote of the council, capping a wild night of secret negotiations and switched allegiances.

Earlier in the evening, the council had failed to elect a mayor on two separate occasions, driving the Valentine Day's meeting well beyond its expected length.

Unlike most municipalities, the council--rather than the people of Cambridge--selects the city's mayor. This year's mayoral battle had been going on since the new council was seated in January, with Kenneth E. Reeves '72 serving as acting mayor since he is the senior member of the council.

Complicating the mayoral vote was the unusually high amount of regular council business due to the cancellation of last week's meeting because of the Feb. 4 death of former mayor Thomas W. Danehy.

"We have two meetings in one," Reeves said. "There is a lot on the agenda."

In between its three rounds of voting for mayor, the council heard two hours of public testimony, deliberated for one hour on a "curb cut" on Kinnaird St. and unanimously approved a downzoning petition for the Linear Park area of North Cambridge.

But the highlight of the night was the dramatic maneuvering for the mayorship.

The council took its first vote for mayor in five weeks at about 8:30 p.m., with Reeves and Marjorie C. Decker switching their votes to Reeves, leaving then-front-runner Kathleen L. Born with three votes. Michael A. Sullivan, Galluccio and Reeves had two votes. Born kept smiling, even as Decker switched allegiances from her to Reeves.

The council then agreed to "recess" the voting for mayor until later in the meeting.

"For the viewers at home, this is so we can maintain our high viewership through the duration of the meeting," Reeves quipped to the television cameras.

At 11 p.m., after two and a half hours of slow council business and behind-the-scenes wheeling-and-dealing, the council took its second mayoral vote of the evening and fourth overall since its inauguration Jan. 3.

Surprisingly, Jim Braude then switched his vote from Born to Reeves, catapulting Reeves into the lead with three votes--still two short of the needed majority.

Born, who had come into the evening in the lead with four votes, could only manage a weak smile as Braude changed sides.

At the time, Galluccio still only had two votes, his and that of steadfast supporter Timothy P. Toomey, Jr.

But after a final recess shortly before 1 a.m. featuring numerous conversations between council members on the grand stairwell and in the back rooms of City Hall, Galluccio had amazingly rallied four more councillors to his side.

In a shocking turn of events, Galluccio garnered the additional support of Henrietta Davis, David P. Maher, Sullivan and Braude, catapulting him to the mayor's seat.

Galluccio will now act as chair of both the council and the School Committee and serve as the most visible leader of Cambridge government.

He had served on the council since 1995, and had served as vice mayor, a mainly ceremonial position, during the 1998-99 term.

The 15 audience members who had remained to the end broke out into enthusiastic applause.

Not everyone was pleased with the outcome, however, as Born and Decker spoke heatedly in the center of Sullivan Chamber while Galluccio was being sworn in.

"I'm just disappointed," Born said after the meeting. A fourth-term councillor, she had hoped to follow in the footsteps of her mentor and Cambridge's last mayor, Francis H. Duehay '55.

Born finished with three votes, as Decker and Reeves--who had abandoned her earlier in the first vote of the night--switched back to Born in the concluding round.

But for Galluccio, a North Cambridge native, it was a joyous moment.

"I'm totally beside myself," he said as he thanked his family and supporters.

In its final act of business for the night, the council also elected Maher vice mayor, completing the seven-and-a-half-hour marathon.

"I think it's great we have a timely resolution to this, even though it's 1:30," Maher said.