Copeland, a police commissioner in the lakeside resort town, was the eye of a media superstorm late last week, after residents protested his use and defense of a racial slur in reference to President Obama.
Yesterday, he ceded his post, writing an email to commission Chairman Joseph Balboni Jr. that stated simply, “I resign.”
Balboni said he spoke with Copeland on Sunday night and urged him to step down.
“He was very nice, very polite. I said, ‘Bob, you’ve gotta step down, everybody says you have to resign,’ ” Balboni said. He kept saying, ‘I’ll think about it,’ and I said, ‘Bob, we gotta be serious now.’ ”
The town of Wolfeboro does not have any provision for removing elected officials other than their voluntary resignation, said Town Manager David Owen. Copeland was one of three members of the police commission, which hires, fires and disciplines officers, and sets their salaries.
“I wish he would have resigned a lot earlier, and it would have caused a lot less anxiety around the community and everywhere else,” Owen said.
The story went viral online and was picked up by national news outlets after more than 100 people attended a meeting Thursday night to call on Copeland to resign.
They were upset with remarks he made in a restaurant in March, shortly before he was elected to his second three-year term on the commission.
He called the president “that f------ n-----,” and was overheard by a resident who complained to the town manager and later the rest of the commission.
In his response to the complaint, which was later printed in the local weekly paper, Copeland wrote, “I believe I did use the ‘N’ word in reference to the current occupant of the Whitehouse (sic). For this I do not apologize – he meets and exceeds my criteria for such.”
