Mecklenburg County Commissioner Harold Cogdell's chairmanship is barely a week old and already some of his fellow Democrats are trying to strip him of power — at least within the party.

Lloyd Scher, a Democrat and former county commissioner, filed a grievance against Cogdell according to The Charlotte Observer.

The paper reports:

Scher's letter to the state Democratic Party says Cogdell met secretly with other Republicans for weeks. It also asserts that Cogdell shouldn't be classified as a "Democrat in good standing."

At last week's commissioners' meeting, Codgell unseated former chair Jennifer Roberts.
Cogdell and Roberts are both Democrats, and members of the same party haven't traditionally crossed party lines in a battle for power. Moreover, Roberts has been the board's chair since 2006, having received the most votes — 6,000 more than Cogdell in the last election — which is normally how the chair is chosen.

Cogdell won the position with four votes from the Republicans on the board. That angered Democrats on the board and those in attendance.

Scher said this to the Observer:

"It would be inappropriate for someone who doesn't support Democrats to stand there next to the president of the United States," said Scher, a member of the Mecklenburg Democratic Party's Executive Committee.

Ouch.