b'Pandemics Dont Come withBlueprintsVillage President Sheena Collum andMayor Frank McGehee forge a powerful leadership bondBY DONNY LEVITW hen President Franklin D. Roosevelt gave his inaugural address in 1933, he did so in the midst of the Great Depression. He urged the country to recognize the need for what he called amutualallianceamongstcom-munities, states, and institutions in order to handle the economic and social crisis. It is the insistence, as a first consideration, upon the interdependence of the various elements in all parts of the United States, said FDR. It is the way to recovery. It is the immediate way. It is the strongest assurance that the recovery will endure.For South Orange Village President Sheena Collum and Ma-plewood Mayor Frank McGehee, the interdependence between the two towns has played a crucial role in leading the communities through the initial stages of the COVID-19 crisis. While the path-way to recovery is still extremely unclear, the two leaders spoke with us in early July 2020 to reflect upon how they handled the first months of the pandemic.MayorFrankMcGehee,whohasservedonMaplewoodsof conversations with his township commit- Village President Sheena Collum, who is cur-Township Committee since 2016, was sworn in as mayor on Janu- tee colleagues, McGehee decided to call arently serving her second term in the position. ary 1, 2020. He certainly couldnt predict that hed be presidingstate of emergency for Maplewood. I spokeThe gravity of how big this situation was go-during a pandemic eight weeks after his first day on the job. to Sheena and she was thinking the sameing to get for us still had not resonated with It was the week of March 9th when information really startedthing. We called the state of emergency atme.Iwaseatingfromthebuffettableand to come in, says McGehee, who uses Mayor Frank as his email11:00 p.m. on March 12th. We were theshaking hands with hundreds of people, liter-signature. [New York Gov. Andrew M.] Cuomo had started tofirst township in Essex County to do so. ally in a span of ten days before we brought all mention locking down New Rochelle in a quarantine. I beganThe week before we declared a state ofof our department heads in for a kind of town talking with our health officer [Candice Davenport] and I calledemergency for South Orange, I was present- wide briefing.my brother, whos a physician in Portland, Oregon. After a seriesingatthreedifferentconferences,recallsWithout a previous blueprint for addressing 22/ matters magazine / school 2020'