The Medford City Council has distanced itself from the mayoral administration’s retreat from defending the Values-Aligned Local Investments Ordinance in a lawsuit it currently faces in federal court. The council passed a formal declaration setting out its position during its Sept. 15 meeting in a 6–1 vote.
The city council’s declaration states that the city administration, led by Mayor Breanna Lungo-Koehn, has supported a motion for a preliminary injunction to prevent the divestment ordinance from being enforced — without the approval of the council.
The lawsuit was filed by residents Zachary Chertok and Eliot Jokelson. They are backed by the Gevura Fund and the National Jewish Advocacy Center.
“The City of Medford hereby stipulates and agrees that it will not enforce, implement, or [attempt] to enforce or implement the Values-Aligned Local Investments Ordinance,” a stipulation submitted on Lungo-Koehn’s behalf by the municipal law firm KP Law reads.
The ordinance prohibits the city from investing in any company that is “directly, knowingly and over time contributing to severe violations of human rights and international humanitarian law as determined by international legal and humanitarian bodies and conventions.”
The resident plaintiffs allege that the divestment ordinance — still in effect following a November 2025 override vote — violates state and federal laws because “no Massachusetts statute authorizes municipalities to mandate divestment based on political, moral, or ideological criteria.”
In her stipulation, Lungo-Koehn states that the city wished to minimize any further expenses related to the litigation due to constraints in the 2027 fiscal budget.
City Council President Zac Bears does not see this as a valid excuse.
“We, at multiple occasions, have brought forward pro bono or low bono counsel to represent the city, to defend the ordinance, to minimize the cost, and really at every turn the mayor has kind of delayed, or outright rejected, our efforts to work with her to get this case wrapped up,” he said.
Both the council’s declaration and the mayor’s stipulation state that at least $35,000 has been spent by the city to defend the ordinance. In an April city council meeting requested by Lungo-Koehn, the council voted that the mayor allocate $75,000 toward litigation costs in the ordinance lawsuit.
“That was for expenses when I was told by the council that they had a pro bono attorney. I believe that pro bono attorney was Micah Kessleman[sic] from OR,” Lungo-Koehn wrote in a statement to the Daily. “In my opinion they decided not to go with him as their pro bono attorney because he stated in a people power/safe Medford meeting that he wanted to throw me off a cliff. (I filed a police report).”
Bears, in a separate statement to the Daily, noted that Kesselman was not the pro bono attorney they had offered.
“The City Council was never empowered by the Mayor to ‘pick’ anyone to serve as pro bono counsel for the city, and to my knowledge, Micah Kesselman never offered to represent the city,” Bears wrote. “The Mayor and KP Law refused or ignored my repeated requests to connect them with a pro bono attorney who was not Mr. Kesselman.”
Kesselman is jointly serving as counsel with a group of proposed intervenors in the lawsuit.
Lungo-Koehn also wrote that when the council informed her that it had found an attorney for $300 per hour, she told Bears that the city would have to allocate about $500,000 more in legal fees to hire the attorney.
Bears refuted this account.
“The attorney who offered the discounted rate of $300/hour never quoted a total cost anywhere near $500,000 when I spoke to him,” Bears wrote. “That number appears to be another fantasy pulled out of thin air to justify the Mayor’s decision to refuse to enforce and defend Medford’s city ordinances.”
The city council’s declaration states that, prior to the stipulation, the mayor had not given the council updates on litigation expenses. Had they been informed of the $35,000 in expenses, the declaration reads, they would have told Lungo-Koehn that such expenditures did not justify abandoning the lawsuit by supporting the preliminary injunction.
Lungo-Koehn declined to comment on any other further matters relating to the ordinance lawsuit.
The declaration also supports a motion from Medford residents to intervene as defendants in the lawsuit. The proposed intervenor residents are working with the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee, referred to as ADC.
Jennifer Younes, president and legal director of the ADC, said the ADC and the intervenors are looking to rebuff efforts from the pro-Israel lobby to shut down an enacted municipal ordinance.
“We’re arguing it still needs to be litigated, and we should be able to intervene as defendants and defend the ordinance against the Zionist group,” Younes said.
The ADC and the proposed intervenors believe that with the mayor’s stipulation, their argument for intervening is stronger.
“I think it completely solidifies our claim that we need to intervene and defend the ordinance because the mayor’s not going to do it,” Younes said.
An attorney from the Gevura Fund did not provide comment to the Daily by publication.
