SOUTH PORTLAND – As the race to a vote on an ordinance designed to keep tar sands out of South Portland enters the home stretch, concern has begun to mount that the increasing toxic divide could leave a scar on the city as permanent as any fuel spill.

At Monday’s City Council meeting, opponents of the Waterfront Protection Ordinance for the first time solidly outnumbered members of the anti-tar sands advocacy group Protect South Portland. That was due in part to a pre-meeting rally in Mill Creek Park at which the South Portland Working Waterfront Coalition announced its latest endorsement, from the United Steelworkers union. However, proponents of the ordinance, bolstered by members of environmental group 350Maine, who passed out fake bills before the meeting to demonstrate that locals “can’t be bought off by big oil,” made a significant impact.

Several residents, including one former town councilor, rose to criticize five members of the ruling body for issuing a letter last week declaring their formal opposition to the ordinance proposal “as written.” The letter, signed by city councilors Linda Cohen, Gerard Jalbert, Melissa Linscott, Alan Livingston and Michael Pock, calls on the voters to defeat the ordinance and for convening a subsequent forum of all parties interested in protecting both the local environment and South Portland’s business climate.

Jalbert, who circulated the letter, took it to each councilor individually, to avoid running afoul of Maine’s Freedom of Access Act, which requires meetings of three or more councilors to be held in public. Amid criticism at Monday’s meeting, Jalbert said he also drafted the letter on his personal computer, rather than his city-issued iPad, and circulated it using a specially created email address rather than his City Council mailbox.

“There’s such a strong feeling of impropriety with how elected officials in this room are acting,” said Margaret Donahue. “I’m really angry about it.”

Donahue called for the resignation of City Attorney Sally Daggett “for unethical behavior” for advising Jalbert how to accomplish his goal without violating Maine’s open meeting law.

“South Portland taxpayers deserve a higher standard of lawyer behavior for the money we spend on legal counsel,” said Donahue.

City Manager Jim Gailey said, per council policy, he was advised of and approved Jalbert’s consultation with Daggett, although Daggett is paid $165 per hour. Jalbert said his phone call with Daggett lasted 8 minutes and, as such, should not generate a bill to the city.

Jalbert said the joint letter was issued because Mayor Tom Blake, a vocal proponent of the Waterfront Protection Ordinance from the time he publicly signed the petition that got it on the November ballot, had essentially forced his peers to weigh in with his advocacy.

“The neutrality just wasn’t there. I received questions [asking], ‘Is Tom Blake speaking for the entire council?’” Jalbert said.

Cohen said she felt unable to stand on her Aug. 19 vote when the council, in a 5-1 decision, refused to accept the petitioned ordinance or offer an alternative, effectively sending it to referendum.

“I said that night I did not support the ordinance,” she said. “I thought that was enough. Well, since that night, Mayor Blake has come out quite publicly stating how he felt. What I was getting for phone calls was [the question], ‘Is he speaking for all of you?’ It was impressed upon me that it was time to come out and say something.”

Jalbert lamented that he and Blake, high school classmates and members of the school’s 1970 state championship track team, have had interpersonal difficulties recently.

“Even though we are still on speaking terms, we, too, have found our relationship cool a little bit, especially within the last two weeks,” said Jalbert. “I’m sorry that happened. This has been divisive, no doubt about it. There has been tremendous divisiveness on this issue. It’s a horrible thing to see neighbors in some cases not speaking to each other any more.”

However, in a case of politics making for strange alliances, former City Councilor Rosemarie De Angelis rose to defend Blake’s position, if not Blake himself. The two have been at odds since he refused to support her 2010 bid for mayor, and a subsequent yearlong battle regarding the council’s health insurance benefit.

“I am not a personal fan of Mayor Blake, so no one can accuse me of defending him out of friendship. We are not friends,” she said. “But I will defend him because he is entitled to his position.”

De Angelis said there “was no error” in Blake signing the WPO petition, or speaking in support of the measure. The “abominable behavior,” she said, was Jalbert’s circulating a letter to be signed by his fellow councilors “without a public meeting or a public discussion.”

“You were wrong, Mr. Jalbert,” said De Angelis. “This action does not come close to passing the test of appropriate ethical standards. This warrants further investigation and a legal opinion, which I request as a taxpayer and a citizen.”

After the meeting, Jalbert said that other options, such as him and the majority of the council adopting a resolution or issuing individual letters of support, weren’t agreed to “because a group letter has more impact,” he said.

“We had so many meetings, including Aug. 19 where we all voted, but it was strange, how we voted against the document, but somehow that didn’t seem to get heard,” Jalbert said. “It seemed like the only message that got out was that it was going to the voters.”

While some councilors did speak against the proposed ordinance at that August meeting, held at Mahoney Middle School to accommodate a record turnout – including Cohen, who said it was poorly worded and fraught with “unintended consequences,” and Blake, who voted no only because he thought it should go to referendum – Jalbert did not offer an opinion at that time.

Councilor Patti Smith, the sole councilor to vote for immediate adoption of the WPO on Aug. 19, left her seat to speak from the podium during the public comment session of Monday’s meeting. Choking back tears, her voice cracking with emotion, Smith said, “I look forward to Nov. 6 when we can call witness that our lives will move forward.

“I know, it’s been pretty hard these last couple of years,” she added. “We’ve had to climb out of tough economic times, but, honestly, I think we are all super lucky to live in this great city. I think we have a beautiful city full of hope and greatness.”

South Portland City Councilor Jerry Jalbert speaks against the anti-tar sands Waterfront Protection Ordinance during a United Steelworkers rally in Mill Creek Park, prior to Monday’s City Council meeting.