People who live in Jennings are making a demand. They're calling on city leaders to put their differences aside.
It comes after an emergency meeting Thursday, called by five city council members who did not show up to last month's regularly scheduled council meeting.
It was an opportunity for those council members to tell their side of the story and take action of their own.
“Nobody's trying to block progress in the City of Jennings. We just want to make sure we have a fair and open discussion before we make a decision. We can't just make a decision just because one person says this is what I want to happen. It shouldn't happen like that,” Jennings councilman Terry Wilson said, sounding off before a room of neighbors who showed up for an emergency meeting.
He's one of the five council members who planned to take a vote of no confidence towards Mayor Gary Johnson, claiming he's abusing his power. But they didn't show up to last month's council meeting.
"The reason we didn't come to the last meeting is because we had items for the agenda and they were not put on the agenda,” Wilson said.
Councilmember Nadia Quinn questions recent terminations and hirings the city council approved, per the mayor's recommendation.
"We did not have enough votes to pass what we said passed…We needed to redo that vote,” she said.
When some council members gathered for a different emergency meeting last month to reverse the vote, the mayor filed suit against those council members, claiming the meeting was illegal. Thursday, the five council members met again anyway, without the mayor and three other council members.
They voted to rescind a recent stop order from the mayor for a city construction project and to search for a new attorney, different from the one the mayor recently brought on. They say she doesn't have city government experience.
"Each of you need to try really hard to get along with each other… This reminds me of the senators in Washington, D.C.,” a concerned neighbor told city leaders. "A house divided against itself cannot stand."
The council members say they’d like to request a meeting with the full council and the Mayor in public to discuss how to move forward.
Johnson told 5 On Your Side he was not at the meeting because it was not properly organized or advertised. Johnson called it "another attempt to cause a disturbance."