Council President Jerry Narsh pushes for civility in Lake Orion village governance

By Megan Kelley
Review Writer
LAKE ORION — During the Lake Orion Village Council meeting on Aug. 14, the council voted to receive and file correspondence from Councilmember Carl Cyrowski calling for sanctions against Councilmember Michael Lamb.
In an email dated Aug. 2 – which was sent to village Manager Darwin McClary, Council President Jerry Narsh and Councilmember Ken Van Portfliet – Cyrowski levied several allegations against Lamb, calling his behavior at a previous closed-door special meeting “insubordinate” after Lamb allegedly tore up a letter given to council by the village attorney Mary Kucharek.
Because the council didn’t take further action on the item, other than to receive and file, there is currently no plan to formally sanction Lamb, who says that the allegations are either false or lack context.
“I tear up my papers and throw them away after every meeting,” Lamb said. “Nancy Pelosi ripped up the State of the Union speech from the president.”
According to Narsh, Councilmember Nancy Mosier and Lamb both refused to sign a non-disclosure agreement during the closed session and when asked to return an opinion drafted by the attorney, Lamb ripped his in half before giving it back to the attorney.
“Mr. Cyroswki requested and demanded that that letter (he wrote) be included (in the council packet). He was very upset about things that he has been seeing and observing and just thought it rude and inappropriate of a council member, those behaviors. I asked Mr. Cyrsowski if it was his intention of requesting a censure agenda item from council and he said no to the effect of that he just wanted that publicly known and that this time, he was just upset as an individual councilman,” Narsh said.
Cyrowski also mentioned a meeting earlier this year where Lamb, Mosier and former Councilmember Sarah Luchsinger all voted no on approving village bills, resulting in a failed motion.
The decision caused the village to pay several bills late and incur late fees, said McClary.
Lamb has consistently voted no on approving bills. A council member voting no on approving bills is not in violation of federal or state law or village charter, Lamb said.
“The reason I voted no on the bills was because it’s my position, as stated during the budget hearings, that it’s the village manager’s responsibility to pay all the bills based upon the approved budget. There’s nothing in the charter suggesting that the village council should have to approve the routine daily bills,” Lamb said.
“I think if you go to a city, township or village where every agenda item and month after month, all seven people always agree, there’s something wrong. There’s something off. I don’t like the smell of that,” Narsh said. “I’ve never been a believer that we have to agree all the time. No, we don’t.”
Cyrowski wrote that he felt Lamb “constantly disrupts council meetings with false information, comments which consumes a lot of time and in some cases money.”
“Other councilmembers are upset. They’ve said it to me and I think even publicly they’ve confronted Mr. Lamb. They believe that some of his actions are harmful to the community and the council by not paying bills. I know the reason he does it, but is that the correct way? By costing the village money? Narsh said. “I had a conversation with him and I told him, I said, ‘Mike, you may have a message and you may believe your message is important but you can’t get the message out if your tone is confrontational, loud and argumentative and impolite.’ If you interrupt everyone to get your message out, no one is going to hear your message.”
Cyrowski added that “if some of (Lamb’s) friends address the council at the next meeting with information from our closed-door session he should also be sanctioned for giving out that private information.”
Because of Cyrowski’s allegations that Lamb may provide confidential information to residents, Lamb suggests that maybe Cyrowski be sanctioned instead.
“Maybe he should be sanctioned for being disrespectful to me and making unfounded, unsupported allegations about council people in public correspondence,” Lamb said.
Narsh said if the council did do anything it would be a censure, not a sanction.
“There are no sanctions for a boardmember. It’s only a censure and a censure is basically me saying ‘sit up straight, eat your vegetables’ and I say it publicly. That’s the entire effect of it. If someone were to be censured, it doesn’t change their ability to vote, to comment, to act as a council member. There’s no penalty, no fine, just a public censure. And you might say, what good is that? But would you want to be publicly censured?” Narsh said.
“I’m not trying to beat (Lamb) up at all. What I’m trying to do in the short time that I have any influence on council is pass all the right things that, in my experience in governance, that we need to do for clarity and for purpose but at the same time do it civilly so people all respect and trust the process,” Narsh said. “People don’t trust anybody and we’re certainly not furthering that agenda of trust by having these volatile, interrupting, confrontational meetings.”
The council did not have discussion on the item during the meeting, however, Mosier did raise an issue with the correspondence during her closing comments because in Cyrowski’s emails she was referred to, not by name or position, but as Lamb’s wife.
“I’m very offended by this. I feel that this is not acceptable. Just because we’re married, we don’t always vote the same way so I find that extremely offensive,” Mosier said.