Hooper leaders hope to move beyond discord as mayor rebuffs critics' charges

KEY TAKEAWAYS

Hooper Mayor Sheri Bingham and City Councilwoman Debra Marigoni hope to move beyond the discord that has marked city leaders' relationship.
Still, Marigoni said if conflicts reemerge, city leaders will contend with them.
Bingham, meanwhile, disputed charges her critics have levied against her.

HOOPER, Weber County — Detractors of Hooper Mayor Sheri Bingham say she's repeatedly violated city and state codes in leading the Weber County locale.

But one of the critics says in the wake of a meeting last week, when city officials debated her future as Hooper's leader, that she's inclined to let bygones be bygones, at least for now. If problems pop up going forward, city leaders will be forced to contend with the matter, said Debra Marigoni, one of three City Council members who voted to strip Bingham of her powers during a discussion last week on the issue.

"But as for right now, I think we're going to turn the page and move on and hope that things go for the better, just for the city's sake," Marigoni said.

Bingham, for her part, also expressed a desire to move beyond the discord that has marked the relationship between herself and City Council members, a rift that publicly emerged at a City Council meeting in February and has simmered on. "That's what the residents want. They are tired of the contention. They want our community to do better," she said.

Still, she sharply disputes charges levied against her by her critics that she has violated city and state codes numerous times in her tenure as mayor, which began in January 2024. "I would like nothing better than for the residents to understand that these are not truth. There is not truth to this at all, and the people that know me will know that that is right. The people who don't like me, no matter what I say, are still not going to like me," she said.

The differences between Bingham and the City Council were focus of discussion at a Feb. 25 meeting, when the council debated a proposal to strip the mayor of most of her powers and make her the "ceremonial head" of the Weber County locale. The officials tabled action, saying they would try to resolve their differences, but revisited the proposal at the July 17 City Council meeting. A majority of the five-member body actually voted in favor of the measure, 3-2, but a unanimous vote is required for such proposal to pass, according to state law, and it failed.

Significantly, one of the City Council members who had voted in favor of stripping Bingham of her powers, Bryce Wilcox, also accused her of violating Hooper codes 36 times and state codes on 31 occasions. He didn't detail them, and the issue was left largely unaddressed at the meeting; however, a printed list of the allegations apparently circulated among some at the meeting, according to Bingham. The list also made its way to a Facebook page that serves as a forum for discussion about issues in Hooper.

Wilcox didn't respond to a query seeking comment, but Bingham, who received a copy of the listing after the July 17 meeting, addressed the allegations when contacted by KSL.com. She also lamented the way the charges were first broached, in a public forum without any sort of forewarning to her.

"That doesn't appear to me like anybody that's trying to work with anybody if you just sabotage someone," she said.

Marigoni, who had voted in favor of stripping Bingham of her mayoral powers, said she doesn't know who compiled the unsigned list of 67 alleged code violations, but she's familiar with some of the charges it contains. People who watch city matters, she said, have been taking note when Bingham commits what they believe to be violations of city and state ordinance.

At any rate, Marigoni doesn't think the issues have been brought to the attention of anyone with prosecutorial powers in Weber County.

Bingham, for her part, said she would seek feedback from the city's legal counsel on procedural matters when conflicts emerged between her and the City Council members to make sure she was handling city matters properly. She brought the issue up with him again after the allegations emerged at last week's meeting.

"If we're doing something wrong, then they will direct us on what we need to do to have it be right," she said.

Among other things, the list circulating in Hooper, which Bingham has seen, accuses her of obstruction in determining what does and doesn't get placed on City Council agendas and in obstructing functions of the City Council, the Planning Commission and the city recorder. The varied allegations characterize her as a heavy-handed leader who has used manipulation and pressure in her dealings as mayor and maligned other city officials in the course of her duties.

Bingham rebuffed the negative characterization, saying it was "upsetting" to her and not representative of her personality or demeanor. She also charged that the meaning of the ordinances she's accused of violating has been "twisted" and misinterpreted by the critics lodging the accusations against her.

The Key Takeaways for this article were generated with the assistance of large language models and reviewed by our editorial team. The article, itself, is solely human-written.