Isle of Wight County supervisors made an excellent choice in Thomas Distefano to fill the District 2 board seat left vacant by the death of the Rev. William McCarty.

During his time on the Isle of Wight County Planning Commission, we’ve observed Distefano to be smart, informed, prepared and, perhaps most important, an independent thinker amid way too much group-think by elected leadership on the topic of residential growth.

Unfortunately, his soon-to-be colleagues did him, themselves and citizens a huge disservice by cloaking in secrecy the process leading to his nomination. It’s an unforced error that could come back to haunt the board and, sadly, Distefano should he choose to run in this November’s special election. 

By invoking a Virginia Freedom of Information Act exemption that allows, but does not require or even encourage, secrecy surrounding political appointments such as this one, the four current supervisors – Joel Acree, Rudolph Jefferson, Don Rosie and Renee Rountree – stand alone among local governing bodies with their lack of transparency. Not only did they go behind closed doors to discuss Distefano’s appointment; they refused to make public the names of others who applied or were nominated.

By contrast, in 2021, the Isle of Wight County School Board publicly identified other candidates it considered before appointing Renee Dial and Michael Vines to fill vacant seats. 

Likewise, the Smithfield Town Council in 2023 made public not just the names but full applications and resumes for 20-plus applicants for two board vacancies. We’ve chided the then-council in this space for unofficially making their choice of Jim Collins and Raynard Gibbs before the application period had even closed, but at least citizens could see for themselves whom the council had available to choose from.

We’d like to see elected boards go even further when they have vacancies and, after reasonable winnowing of applications, publicly interview the top candidates, allowing citizens to listen and even ask their own questions.

Such openness would engender more trust and confidence in their ultimate selections. The Isle of Wight County Board of Supervisors did the opposite here by fostering distrust and skepticism about an appointment that should have been a point of pride and accomplishment.

The highly qualified Distefano shouldn’t have been burdened with that cloud. We wish him well as he fills the shoes of the beloved Pastor McCarty.