When West Windsor Councilwoman Linda Geevers declined her nomination for council president made by Bryan Maher at the January 3 council meeting, Kamal Khanna was the de facto winner of the seat that Geevers felt she should have rightfully held this year. The lone “no vote” to approving Khanna’s back-to-back terms as council president came from Maher, but Geevers felt that having a vote was irrelevant at that meeting.
“I wanted to be council president as it was my turn, but the reality was that I wasn’t going to get it. Repeatedly, from November’s election onward, I spoke with Kamal and other council members about being president. I felt very strongly about the rotation each year, it was tradition, and we had just had two years of Democratic leadership for both the presidency and vice presidency,” Geevers said.
There wasn’t much deliberation on this behind the scenes. Geevers simply states it as “the votes weren’t there.”
“I wasn’t going to get it because Kamal wanted to stay on and he had the votes — George Borek’s and presumably Kristina Samonte’s. It was basically a partisan decision even though West Windsor’s literature says we do not make partisan decisions. The first vote of the year was a partisan decision to stay with Kamal,” Geevers says.
Councilman Borek sees the situation differently. “Linda did a marvelous job when she was council president [in 2006]. Kamal did a good job last year, and certainly being in the position of council president takes a lot of time and effort. We have two new council members and we needed to have some continuity. I wouldn’t take anything away from Linda, but in nominating Mr. Khanna my idea was to not rock the boat. Let’s keep the continuity and go from there to concentrate on things that are important to the township,” he said.
Well ahead of council’s re-organization meeting, Khanna approached Geevers about being the vice president. It was then that she decided to withdraw herself from the nomination for president and be restrained at the meeting, “just saying what I have to say.” Geevers’ focus turned to accepting the nod for council vice president because there was still a partisan divide to consider.
“What if they turned around and made George or Kristina the council vice president? Then it would be all Democrats once again, and I wouldn’t be in a leadership position,” she said.
