AUBURN — An appointment to the Planning Board has become the subject of controversy again, and the city will restart the process after an attempt to make an appointment last week failed.

Current member David Trask and several members of the City Council argued that Trask was being passed over for political reasons, and that the nomination of Maureen Hopkins to replace him would leave Ward 5 without any representation on the board. Trask’s term expires Dec. 31.

After a lengthy debate, the council ultimately voted 4-3 against appointing Hopkins and will restart the process.

During the discussion, Trask said the nomination in front of the council would place a fourth voting member in Ward 3, and that six out of seven voting members would live in two wards. There are no rules concerning ward representation on the committee, but city staff has previously said mixed ward representation is desired.

Trask argued that as the city moves forward with new policies impacting the Agriculture and Resource Protection zone and a new Comprehensive Plan, Ward 5, which has the most land in the agricultural zone, should have representation.

“Not having representation is a liability,” he said.

He also believes that previous policy disagreements with the mayor and those politically aligned with him are at play.

“Throughout my two-year term on the board I have not always seen eye to eye with Mayor Harmon,” he said in an email to the Sun Journal. “I’ve stated many times during meetings that we are not an extension of the City Council and that our responsibility is to be nonpartisan and review agenda items against the ordinances and comprehensive plan. This view has not gotten me in his favor or the favor of his closest allies.”

During the meeting, Councilor Steve Milks said “everybody that’s got eyes understands what’s happening, and it’s a shame.”

“You’re losing a good person, an honest person that’s very nonpartisan, and who will look at the facts,” he said, referring to Trask.

Milks also added that he believes the decision is “about the (agricultural) zone.”

“I can’t tell you how disappointed I am in this body,” he said.

When reached this week, Harmon declined to comment on the appointment discussion.

Rick Whiting, who serves on the three-member Appointment Committee, took issue with the accusations that it was a political move. He said during his first two years on the council, when Jason Levesque was mayor, he would refer to the committee as the “disappointment committee” due to its decisions.

He said with the decision to nominate Hopkins, he was partly thinking about the current lack of women serving in Auburn government. He also added that he has in the past “reappointed people who I disagreed with a lot.”

Former longtime Planning Board chairman Evan Cyr also spoke on the issue, arguing that keeping Trask on the committee “would be retaining a positive asset for the city.”

“He’s one of the few folks who can make an argument and also be swayed by an argument,” he said.

Cyr was the subject of a previous controversy surrounding Planning Board appointments at the start of the current City Council term in January. At the time, he said his “fear is that they turn the Planning Board into something political and it shouldn’t be.”

Cyr was among three appointments to the Planning Board made by the previous council prior to the end of its term, which were then rescinded by the new council after officials argued the appointments were made out of precedent.

At the time, Trask criticized the new council’s process for making the appointments, pointing out that the vote to rescind the initial appointments was made without public notice.

“Is precedent important, or only important when it serves you?” he asked.

Harmon told the council that if Hopkins’ appointment were to fail, the city clerk would repost the seat, and applications would come back to the Appointment Committee.

The council ultimately voted 4-3 against the appointment, with councilors Milks, Ben Weisner, Leroy Walker and Adam Platz voting against.

Platz, who serves on the Appointment Committee, said he didn’t “appreciate some of the comments” surrounding the process, but said he wanted to “turn down the heat on this.”

“Hopefully we can dial it down a little bit,” he said.