Salina Voted To Mayor Position Again

After a swearing in ceremony in the rotunda at Berlin Town Hall Tuesday night of all the newly elected officials, the Berlin Town Council voted 4-1 to make Adam Salina the Mayor of Berlin for his fifth straight term.

Newcomer Eric Buhrendorf nominated fellow Republican David Evans for Mayor in his first Town Council meeting. In years past, the Mayor is usually the top vote getter from the majority party.

Democrat Rachel Rochette nominated Salina saying that he went above and beyond the job responsibilities of the Mayor. Neither the Mayor nor Town Council members receive a salary or stipend.

"I am humbled and excited to have another two years as Mayor of Berlin," Salina said. "I love this town and the fact that I get to represent my friends and family and neighbors in hopefully a positive way similar to the last eight years is a great responsibility."

Salina said he was surprised that Evan was nominated.

"I guess I was surprised," he said. "The Mayor is usually the highest vote getter from the majority party. I remember Joann Ward was the leading vote getter one year but she was in the minority so she was not nominated to be Mayor.

"The history has been that the council is united even for this first meeting to show that we can work together. I was surprised that Mr. Buhrendorf made the nomination and spoke about Mr. Evans the way he did in the first council meeting. He had been to exactly one meeting but said that Mr. Evans gets along with the staff and works well with them. He said Mr. Evans is respected and would be a great Mayor. Well, how would he know that?"

Salina and Evans abstained from voting so the four remaining Dems voted for Salina and Buhrendorf voted for Evans. When nominating Evans Buhrendorf said Evans, "refused to agree with business as usual."

Salina then picked Steve Morelli, who had the lowest number of votes for the Democrats, was selected by Salina to be the Deputy Mayor.

"Steve has been a strong advocate for the town for the last six years and the last four years as deputy mayor," Salina said. "We talked about in our caucus and everyone agreed, Steve was the person we wanted in that position. Sometimes in that position you have to take people to task and call people out and he has no problem doing that. We want him to continue to fight hard for the town of Berlin and we know he will do so."

Salina said he is excited about the year ahead and its economic growth.

"Residents are going to see a cross between manufacturing, retail and a broad spectrum of economic development in 2012," he said. "There are a lot of projects that we have been working very hard on over the last two years that are going to come to fruition in 2012."