City Councilor Julie Hoy, who is mayor-elect, and Councilor Deanna Gwyn were publicly censured Tuesday by their colleagues for participating in a public hearing on a land use appeal and then a vote that benefitted a major campaign donor.  The censure vote passed 6-2 with Councilors Vanessa Nordyke, Micki Varney, Virginia Stapleton, Linda Nishioka, Trevor Phillips and Mayor Hoy all voting in favor of censuring the two councilors for breaching the city charter.  Julie Hoy and Gwyn voted no, and City Councilor Jose Gonzalez was absent.  “It brings me no pleasure whatsoever to bring this motion,” Mayor Hoy said leading up to the vote. “It is not something I want to do. I feel a duty to bring this motion…I feel that part of my oath as mayor requires me to bring this motion forward.” A censure carries no penalty. Mayor Hoy, who is not related to the mayor-elect, brought the motion on Tuesday, Nov. 12, after an Oct. 14 vote of the two councilors to grant an appeal for a Salem development project that involved a company owned by Larry Tokarski. Tokarski is a prominent Salem developer and major political donor who gave tens of thousands of dollars to Gwyn and Julie Hoy for their campaigns. Tokarski is an owner of Salem Reporter. Hoy said campaign contributions to Julie Hoy and Gwyn from Tokarski and Don Lulay of Don Lulay Homes, the developer of a subdivision which benefited from the appeal vote, should have led the two to recuse themselves based on the city charter. The mayor reminded the council that the charter says councilors should consider recusing themselves from votes involving donors who contributed more than $501 in the past two years.  Tokarski donated $20,000 to Hoy’s mayoral campaign and Mountain West Investment Corp. gave her about $19,000. Mountain West gave Gwyn’s campaign $3,000 for her council race in 2022.  Both disclosed a potential conflict of interest prior to voting, but participated in the vote. Lulay and his company, The Lulay Group, also contributed to Hoy and Gwyn’s campaigns. Records show Gwyn received $700 from Lulay in 2022, and Hoy received $500 from The Lulay Group for her mayoral campaign in 2024. In 2022, Hoy received $200 from Lulay for her city council race.  The October land use decision passed 6-2 granting an appeal on the 11-lot subdivision on behalf of Creekside Golf Course LLC and the land’s buyer and developer, Don Lulay Homes. Creekside is managed by Mountain West Investment Corp. and Tokarski is Mountain West’s president.  The council’s decision, according to Lulay, spared his project $216,000 for sidewalks required by the Salem Planning Commission.  Lulay said the land deal with Creekside was contingent on getting the needed land use approvals. He said his firm would have been responsible for the sidewalk costs, not Tokarski’s company.  Julie Hoy said Tuesday that she felt the censure was an attempt to bully and silence certain council members. She said the notion that her vote can be bought by monied interests was nothing more than a personal attack on her.  “Elected leaders should never use their platform to impugn the motives of others. One of the large roles of the mayor is to run our meetings efficiently and to create a space where productive work can be accomplished,” Hoy said. “In my opinion, that is not happening equally for all councilors.”  Julie Hoy told Salem Reporter via text message that her “stance remains the same,” following the vote to censure.  Gwyn called the censure an attempt to further divide the council rather than foster collaboration.  “It is unfortunate that rather than focusing on the work that we were elected to do, energy is being devoted to feuling unnecessary conflict,” Gwyn said. “Our community deserves a council united in service, not divided by baseless actions.”  Prior to the censure vote Gwyn asked City Attorney Dan Atchison if she could abstain. Atchison said she was required to vote unless there was a conflict of interest.  Council President Nishioka said Tuesday night that she was surprised when her colleagues did not recuse themselves ahead of the public hearing and vote on Oct. 14. She asked if there could be a redo of that vote to give Julie Hoy and Gwyn a second chance to recuse themselves, she said. She said she was told that was not an option.  “I was surprised how they interpreted what seems to be a very clear ethics issue, and we had been told over and over again that we need to be mindful of this,” Nishioka told Salem Reporter after the vote. “They were both guided to recuse themselves, except they wanted to take it one step further.” Nishioka said part of her role as council president is to keep the peace among councilors but she said she didn’t have the choice of sitting out on the vote to censure.  “The council president’s role is to try to be Switzerland. But at the same time I don’t get to be Switzerland in the sense that I get to abstain from tough votes. It is tough and I am happy that I have this role,” Nishioka said. She agreed with Nordyke’s assessment the council was split. “We are a divided county, we are a divided Salem. We represent what is out there,” Nishioka said. “We have to figure out how to work together and it’s going to be a challenge.”  Nordyke called for civility prior to the vote and pointed out the division which characterizes the council.  “I have served in various committees, task forces and so on since I was a teenager, and this is the most divisive body I have ever served on,” she said.“ Over the last couple of years, but especially since the payroll tax, I have watched my colleagues trading barbs at each other this entire time,” Nordyke said. “I understand the need for accountability but I also feel that this council has not been able to agree to disagree on a lot of the fundamental issues that we face.” Councilor Phillips said he agreed with the censure to make clear the importance of the city charter. He also said it is important to avoid any perception that wealthy interests can influence local government.  “There is a deep concern in society that there are two different ways to access power and that people with money have more access,” Phillips said. “I am not saying the individuals that are being censured are corrupt, I’m just saying there is a reason why we had these rules written down. To say that this is politically motivated. No. We think that there are rules that we would like you to follow moving forward.”  The last public censure of a councilor was in 2016, when then-councilor Daniel Benjamin was cited for posting inappropriate content on social media, according to Trevor Smith, city public information officer. Disclosure: Larry Tokarski is a founder and an owner of Salem Reporter. He is not involved in news coverage produced by Salem Reporter. Read more on that here. Contact reporter Joe Siess: [email protected] or 503-335-7790.A MOMENT MORE, PLEASE – If you found this story useful, consider subscribing to Salem Reporter if you don’t already. Work such as this, done by local professionals, depends on community support from subscribers. Please take a moment and sign up now – easy and secure: SUBSCRIBE. The post Councilors Hoy and Gwyn publicly censured for vote on land use appeal appeared first on Salem Reporter.