Recall Committee Stumbles on Technicality in Bid to Oust Fall River Mayor Paul Coogan

Organizers of the effort to recall Mayor Paul Coogan hit a stumbling block after the city’s attorney deemed the petition invalid.

Corporation Counselor Alan Rumsey said he was asked by the city clerk to give an opinion on whether an affidavit with the required minimum of 10 registered city voters was legal.

At issue, according to Rumsey, was the paperwork delivered to the City Clerks office Monday morning did not contain a sworn statement of facts.

The group, the Committee to Recall Mayor Paul Coogan, had a laundry list of complaints against the mayor, from his handling of February’s monster snowstorm to the constant changes in leadership in the School Department and the Fall River Police Department.

“We are bringing issues to the table,” said Nelson Vasquez, chairperson of the committee. “This city has been mismanaged for quite some time. It’s been a constant theme with the Coogan administration.”

School Committee member and one of the group’s founders, Collin Dias, said two more years of a Paul Coogan administration “is detrimental to the city.”

That’s why its necessary we move now,” said Dias.

If the recall committee can submit a valid affidavit, they have 20 days to collect over 3,100 signatures, 5 percent of registered voters, to force a recall election.

Fall River is familiar with efforts to recall the city’s mayors, and if the group is successful, it will mean the third time a mayor has faced a recall election. 

Former mayor Will Flanagan, and Dias’ uncle, was recalled in 2014, the first recall in the city’s history. Former Bristol County District Attorney Sam Sutter would replace Flanagan and finish his last year in office.

Former mayor Jasiel Correia II was recalled in 2019 with 61 percent of voters voting to unseat the city’s youngest mayor. However, on the same night he won the special election allowing him to stay in office. He would later be found guilty in federal court for fraud and government corruption.