#MiddleburyCT #SpecialElection #Selectman
By MARJORIE NEEDHAM
Middlebury will have a special election to fill the vacant selectman’s seat caused by Jennifer Mahr’s election to first selectwoman. Mahr announced on February 2, 2026, in a Facebook post that the required 345 validated signatures on petitions for a special election were collected. She said the date for the special election will be set at the February 9, 2026, Board of Selectmen meeting. Town Clerk Brigitte Bessette said, as with a regular election, this one will take about 120 days.
As has been explained before, the job of filling the vacancy was to be done either by the two remaining Board of Selectman members or a group of five electors. When the remaining selectmen could not agree, the task moved on to the five electors. Once an appointment was made, however, the option remained for a special election. Shortly after Shaban’s January 13, 2026, appointment, petitions calling for a special election began circulating due to the appointment being made by five people rather than the voters.
Meanwhile, it turned out there was a problem with the minutes of the electors’ January 13 at which Shaban was appointed, and those minutes consequently had to be revised. First Selectwoman Mahr said in a January 21, 2026, press release that deficiencies in the minutes of the January 13 special meeting prevented verification of how each official voted. She said the Connecticut Freedom of Information Commission recommended filing amended minutes that disclosed each elector’s vote. The five town electors were Middlebury Town Clerk Brigitte Bessette, Treasurer Ralph Barra, Democratic Registrar of Voters Francis Barton Jr, Republican Registrar of Voters Nancy Robison, and Tax Collector Cindy Palomba.
The revised special meeting minutes were filed with Bessette Tuesday, January 20, 2026. The revised meeting minutes state Barra voted for Sally Romano, Bessette voted for William Stowell, Palomba voted for Shaban, Robison voted for Shaban and Barton voted for Shaban. This gave Shaban three votes and Romano and Stowell one each.
Mahr’s press release stated, “Although amended minutes were filed, I believe that approach violated the spirit of the law. Elected officials are required to vote on the record in real time.” She said she would bring up the vagueness of the state statute with Middlebury’s state delegation. She also said she supports a special election, has signed the petition calling for a special election, and encourages others to do the same.
Selectman Brian Shaban, who was appointed to the position January 13, 2026, issued a January 24, 2026, press release objecting to Mahr encouraging residents to sign the petition for a special election. In it he stated people circulating the petition were falsely claiming an “illegal meeting” took place. He said the minutes had been amended “fully curing any perceived issued under Section 1-225.” He called Mahr’s action “petty political maneuvering which undermines due process and prioritizes politics over what’s best for our community.” He said a special election would waste taxpayer dollars and encouraged those who signed the petition “under false pretenses” to rescind their signatures before the January 28 petition deadline.
Mahr responded to Shaban’s comments by saying she was unaware of anyone claiming the meeting had been illegal. As for her support of a special election, she said, “My support for a special election is because I support voters’ right to support their ultimate representative.”
She said had she and Selectman J. Paul Vance Jr. been able to agree on a selectman, anyone unhappy with their choice could have petitioned for a special election and she would have supported them in that effort.
“This is not a short appointment,” Mahr said. “It’s for two years, and people deserve to have the person they choose, not a person chosen for them.”
As for the issue with the meeting minutes, Bessette said when she researched the requirements for the elector’s meeting, she spoke to a staff attorney in the state’s election division and FOI Director of Education and Communications Russell Blair and read through state statutes, Middlebury’s charter and Robert’s Rules of Order. The staff attorney told her the vote could be either by voice or paper ballot and said the statute doesn’t detail the procedure so officials may choose the manner with which they are most comfortable. Blair told her Bethany was dealing with a similar situation and forwarded an email on that matter, but no one and no source stated each person’s vote needed to be made public.
That information, Mahr said in her press release, is in Sec. 1-225 of the Connecticut Freedom of Information Act. We spoke to Blair on the telephone Wednesday, January 21, 2026, and he explained the issue was that the group acted as a public agency by noticing their meeting, publishing an agenda, and having the meeting open to the public in person and on Zoom. Sec. 1-225 states, “The votes of each member of any such public agency upon any issue before such public agency shall be reduced to writing and made available for public inspection within forty-eight hours and shall also be recorded in the minutes of the session at which taken.”
Blair said the situation Middlebury found itself in was “such an usual thing,” but if you treat the meeting as a public meeting, you must record in the minutes how each member voted. The votes also must be public during the meeting just as they are at regular meetings of boards and commissions where those in attendance can see which members voted aye and which members voted nay.
