Council Meeting Disrupted By Anti-Semitic Comments

The Sept. 27 City Council meeting was disrupted when a Zoom participant calling himself “Ray Sizgoy” unmuted himself and began spewing anti-Semitic comments. He was quickly cut off, Zoom access was temporarily suspended, and the Council took a break after the outburst.

“It was obviously very disturbing,” Mayor Jack McCullough said. “He kept unmuting himself, so we had to shut things down.” He said the Council practice at future hybrid meetings will be changed so that participants will have to use the “raise hand” function in Zoom and can only be unmuted by the mayor or whoever is running the meeting.

The city issued a press release the next day condemning the incident. “The City has operated on the honor system regarding allowing individuals to unmute themselves during Council meetings and has had a strong track record of respectful behavior at hybrid meetings,” the release said. The honor system will now be dropped.