On Tuesday, Dec. 19, a new Jamestown Town Council was sworn in and the incumbents and new members began conducting business as usual.
However, the new council is different from all the Jamestown Town Councils that came before it in two ways. For the first time ever, the Jamestown Town Council has a black councilmember, and, also for the first time ever, the council is all female.
Jamestown Mayor Lynn Montgomery will lead the man-less council, which now consists of previously elected Town Councilmembers Rebecca Mann Rayborn and Martha Stafford Wolfe, along with newly elected Town Councilmembers Sarah Glanville and Pam Burgess.
By the way, Glanville and Burgess beat out two men in the November election to take their seats on the council.
Burgess made a little history all by herself. She became the first black person to ever serve on the Jamestown Town Council.
Originally from New Jersey, she moved to Jamestown a quarter of a century ago. Over the years, she’s worked in the investment and telecommunications industries. Now past the age of 60, she told a local newspaper earlier this year that she was “semi-retired.”
That may be but, she’ll have plenty of things to work on as one of the newest leaders of Jamestown. The town of 13,000 residents has been growing fast and right now town officials are working on efforts to protect the water supply, in the middle of a road paving initiative, and are attempting to deal with growth in the town while holding the negative consequences of growth to a minimum.
