The Manufacturers Association of the Southern Tier continues to question the methods of city officials.

During a meeting of the Jamestown Local Development Corporation Tuesday, Todd Tranum, MAST executive director, questioned why the board hadn’t approved the appointment of a new MAST member to the development group.

Earlier this year, Justin Hanft, Chautauqua County Education Coalition director, had to resign as the MAST representative on the JLDC board because he moved out of the city of Jamestown, which is a requirement for sitting on the board. In May, Tranum wrote Stephanie Wright, city economic development coordinator, to inform city officials that the MAST board had selected John Zabrodsky as their new representative on the JLDC board.

Tranum, during the JLDC meeting, said MAST deserves to have a voice on the board and would be an important part of their decision-making process. He also said that revisions passed by the JLDC board to their bylaws will hurt organizations like MAST.

During the meeting, JLDC members accepted the new revised bylaws. Following the meeting, Sam Teresi, Jamestown mayor and JLDC president, said the bylaws have been revised for the first time since the creation of the group in 1981. He said it is normal for organizations like the JLDC to update and clarify their bylaws, especially seeing that it had not been done during the last 36 years.

Teresi said one example of the revised bylaws is the filling of a vacancy. He said, for years, it was the practice of the mayor of the city, who is the president of the JLDC board, to ask for recommendations for a representative on the board and then make the appointment. However, Teresi said the former bylaws didn’t address the filling of a vacancy on the board, but the new bylaws have been revised to state what had been in practice for several years.

Tranum said the former bylaws provided more options for an organization like MAST to select their representative on the JLDC board. He said the new bylaws now provides the mayor with more power to determine who MAST must select to sit on the JLDC board.

“This is a continuation of Mayor Teresi’s and (Department of Development) Director Vince DeJoy’s attempts to limit the voice and input of the business community,” Tranum said in an email to The Post-Journal Wednesday. “The mayor and the director of development’s methods are not business friendly, inspire distrust and undermine efforts to improve the local economy. The business community will not be silenced.”

During the meeting when the JLDC board was trying to go into executive session to discuss personnel, possible litigation and a JLDC loan to a city business, Tranum asked if he could stay during the executive session to represent MAST. Teresi said only sitting board members, staff and legal counsel could remain in the conference room during an executive session. Tranum asked the board two more times if he could remain for the executive session before he was told two more times he could not stay. He then voluntarily left the mayor’s conference room where the meeting was taking place.

During the executive session, Tranum told The Post-Journal not being able to represent MAST during the JLDC executive session, “Furthers our concern of transparency by city officials.”