Malden City Inaugural Ceremony is held to start the New Year

City Council and School Committee members are sworn into two-year terms

Special to The Advocate

The 2026 Malden City Inaugural Ceremony was held on Monday, and members of the Malden City Council and Malden School Committee were sworn into their two-year terms. Members of the two municipal governing bodies were either elected or reelected to their new terms in November’s final city election.

As part of the evening’s event, a recess in the Inauguration was declared, and formal meetings were held to elect from within a City Council President and a School Committee Vice Chairperson for the 2026 calendar/legislative year.

Malden Mayor Gary Christenson addressed the Inauguration audience and expressed gratitude on behalf of the City of Malden to Ward 6 School Committee member Joseph Gray and Councillor-at-Large Craig Spadafora, both of whom are not returning for the 2026-2027 term. Both were also presented with tokens of appreciation on behalf of the City of Malden and their respective colleagues.

Gray had served for three terms in Ward 6, while Councillor Spadafora owns a piece of Malden history as the longest-consecutive serving Councillor-at-Large in municipal history: 11 terms and 22 years. Both gave brief parting remarks.

Sworn into new, two-year terms were City Councillors Peg Crowe (Ward 1), Paul Condon (Ward 2), Amanda Linehan (Ward 3, Council President), Ryan O’Malley (Ward 4), Ariane Taylor (Ward 5), Stephen Winslow (Ward 6), Chris Simonelli (Ward 7), Jadeane Sica (Ward 8), Karen Colón Hayes (At Large), Michelle Luong (At Large) and Carey McDonald (At Large). All of the Councillors were reelected to their terms except Councillor-a-Large Luong, who is in her first term.

Sworn into new, two-year terms for the Malden School Committee were Michael Drummey (Ward 1), Robert McCarthy Jr. (Ward 2), Jennifer Spadafora (Ward 3, Vice Chairperson), Dawn Macklin (Ward 4), Elizabeth Hortie (Ward 5), Peter Piazza (Ward 6), Keith Bernard (Ward 7) and Sharyn Rose-Zeiberg (Ward 8). All of the School Committee members were reelected to new, two-year terms except Piazza, who was elected unopposed to the open seat in Ward 6.

Elected unanimously as City Council President for 2026 was Amanda Linehan, who has served in that role for about half of 2025, when she elected to serve out an open seat since early June. Elected unanimously to serve as Vice Chairperson was Ward 3’s Spadafora, who has served for the last several years in that role as well.