The Demopolis City Council and mayor were sworn in yesterday morning before a capacity viewing crowd at Rooster Hall to open their four-year terms of office.

Newly elected members of the city council included mayor Mike Grayson and District 2 representative Mitchell Congress and District 4 representative Bill Meador. Incumbents to the Demopolis City Council were District 1 representative Thomas Moore, District 3 representative Melvin Yelverton and District 5 representative Jack Cooley.

The mayor and council members were sworn in by Marengo County District Judge Wade Drinkard.

After being sworn into office, the mayor and council sat down to the business of organizing the new council.

Moore — who said he had been on the council for more than 17 years — was elected as the chairman pro tempore for the council, acting as chair when the mayor is unable to. Moore served as the chair pro tempore at the special meeting on Sept. 24.

The council kept the current meeting date, time and place for its regular meetings. Demopolis City Council meetings will take place on the first and third Thursdays of the month at 5:15 p.m. at Rooster Hall. The council also adopted Robert’s Rules of Order as its rules for procedure.

The council voted to postpone the naming of committee members until its first regular meeting on Thursday, then turned to the appointments and salaries for administrative officers and employees, which includes the police chief, fire department chief, city attorney, city clerk and city judge.

“Since the mayor and half of the council are new, we will need some time to determine these positions,” Grayson said, making a motion to postpone action to the regular council meeting.

Congress said that he would like to vote on the matter at yesterday’s meeting and felt that there was no reason to wait.

A vote was taken for Grayson’s motion, and it was split 3-3, with Congress and Moore voting against it. Yelverton originally passed, then voted against the motion.

City attorney Richard S. Manley then told the council that state statutes recommend making those decisions at the first regular council meeting. A vote was taken on the motion again, and it passed 6-0.

The council then voted to continue using Robertson Banking Company and BankTrust as the financial depositories for the City of Demopolis, and adopted a resolution allowing Grayson signatory powers on checking accounts, debt obligations and authority to obtain necessary information in the course of duty.

Each council members was then allowed a time to talk about the issues they will work with in this term. Grayson then said that he and the other council members are looking forward to working towards a unified Demopolis.

The audience was allowed a time to speak, and Linda Brown asks about signage for the downtown stores. Grayson said that would be brought up at Thursday’s meeting.

The next regular Demopolis City Council meeting will be on Thursday at 5:15 p.m. at Rooster Hall.