Lethbridge - With Dar Heatherington prevented from taking on the role of deputy mayor, Mayor Bob Tarleck hopes council will be able to return to the job of running the city.
Heatherington, a first-term alderman who has been at the centre of controversy since she disappeared from Great Fals, Montana in May and reappeared in Las Vegas days later, won't be able to take a turn in the deputy position after her council colleagues changed a bylaw to keep her out of the rotation.
She was to start her four-month turn as deputy mayor, attending civic functions in the absence of Tarleck, next week. The vote to change the bylaw was 7-1, with Heatherington voting against. She refused comment afterwards.
"I don't think there's any question at all that this whole issue has been a major distraction," Tarleck said. "I think council felt it would be unfair to the city, under the present circumstances. There's just too many distractions.
"We're operating a business and we need to be as business-like as possible."
Tarleck says the motion wasn't vindictive, and that putting Heatherington into the spotlight again, in the deputy mayor role, wouldn't be fair to her.
Also on Monday, Heatherington's lawyer entered a not guilty plea for her, on a charge of public mischief. The Lethbridge Police allege that she made up accusations that she was being stalked.
That accusation followed a charge in Montana, where police there alleged she had lied to them about her disappearance from Great Falls May 3. Heatherington went missing after a meeting in the city, then turned up in Las Vegas three days later, claiming to have been drugged, abducted and sexually assaulted.
After interviewing her, Great Falls police said she changed her story and that she went to Nevada with a man she'd met along the city's bike paths. They charged her with making a false statement to police. Prosecutors allowed her to plead not guilty to the charge and will drop it after one year, on the condition she receive psychiatric counselling.
Heatherington insists she is not guilty, and that she was abducted, drugged and sexually assaulted.
