ash doesn’t ordinarily concern herself with local issues, but this matter captured her attention. To her it’s a study of human behavior, the psychology of the players which drives the story.
Mayor Davlin may or may not have been quoted correctly in the deposition of his former chief of staff Letitia Dewith-Anderson. If the statements attributed to him – that he would not meet with more than three African Americans and “your people just attack me” – are accurate, I suspect at the heart of the dispute lies the old standby “taken out of context.”
Since it’s difficult to imagine Ms. Anderson pulling Mr. Davlin’s terrible-sounding remarks from nowhere, I presume Mr. Davlin did make them in the framework of his experience with organizations he perceived as hostile whose leaders happened to be Black. Had he been referring to a women’s advocacy group, for instance, or a Republican/conservative cause, by now he would have admitted having voiced his complaints encompassed in an elaborate explanation that he was exasperated, that his outburst was spontaneous, and that his problems were with the group’s aggressive manners, not its representatives per se.
But with race remaining the most volatile issue in American society, Mr. Davlin apparently made the political calculation that rather than take the weak, defensive, if more honest position – yes, I basically said it, but not verbatim as reported by Ms. Anderson, so it’s not as bad as it seems, a few other caveats, and, by the way, I apologize to anyone I may have offended – he would rely on “he said-she said” tactics which in this case translate into “Here’s my story; you can’t prove otherwise.”
True enough. As long as no irrefutable evidence surfaces to move the investigation beyond a conversation between two people, Mr. Davlin is not only safe in his story, he’s stuck with it. After all, how would it play to the public to backtrack now? More damming*, one assumes, than his alleged tirade.
That’s my guess, and that’s all it is. I also speculate that Mr. Davlin is dug in for the long haul. It’s too late to revise his strategy.