The court, of course, will decide whether any of the many commissioners' efforts (including my very small role in asking others to consider a candidate being overlooked) violated the sunshine law. If such a thing happens, the remedy would be to void all the acts of Black Wednesday.

I will point out that the commission majority opted for a closed and insider system--no call for enabling legislation for a special election, no referendum to determine public preference, no formal commission meeting where candidates could state their cases and commissioners could ask questions of them. I supported all those ignored options.

I disagreed with the commission majority that those who were term limited could exist in a nebulous state where they were not present for the purpose of a vacancy, but could be present to vote on their successors.

Later I even sponsored a resolution for a consent agreement and "do-over" response to the McElroy lawsuit.
(Here's the (link...))

I voted for open process every time, and put together a well-attended candidate forum, the details of which were posted at length on this site.
(Here's the (link...))
(Here's another (link...))

All the best, Mark Harmon