Cambridge residents expressed mixed feelings toward the Cambridge City Council last week after it failed to elect a mayor for the seventh time during its latest meeting.

After seven weeks of City Council meetings, none of the top three candidates—Councillors David P. Maher, Kenneth E. Reeves ’72, and Henrietta J. Davis—have yet mustered the necessary five votes to win the mayoral elections, though Maher has managed four votes over the past four election sessions.

Cambridge resident Minka vanBeuzekom, who ran unsuccessfully for City Council in 2009, said that there is a problem with the voting system under which the Council currently operates.

In an open letter to city councillors earlier this month, vanBeuzekom called on them to justify the votes they cast for mayor. The current election procedure does not require the councillors to give any explanation of their votes.

“The people must demand an era of transparency and accountability in all our elected officials,” the letter said.

VanBeuzekom contrasted a December 2009 editorial by new City Councillor Leland Cheung, in which he stated he would evaluate the mayoral candidates “on equal footing,” based on “their ideas, experience, and track record,” with the current election situation.

“What happened to the resolve displayed in that thoughtful article?” vanBeuzekom wrote.

In recent meetings, councillors have acknowledged that it is crucial to elect a mayor, as he or she would be responsible for appointing chairpersons of other government committees. Councillors have also repeatedly alluded to the mayor’s responsibility of chairing the Cambridge School Committee.

But local pundit Robert R. Winters said that some of the councillors vying for mayor may be exaggerating the implications of not having a mayor.

Winters, who teaches at the Harvard Extension School, said that the Council’s lack of other agenda items makes the mayoral issue appear more pressing than it really is.

“It’s a red herring,” he said. “The consequences [of not having a mayor] are virtually none.”

School Committee member Marc C. McGovern said that despite the stalemate over the mayoral election, he does not want people to have the impression that the Committee is not doing its work, as it is currently presided over by Acting Mayor Reeves.

“It does make it more of a challenge when we don’t know who will occupy that seat permanently,” McGovern said. “[However], we have too much stuff to do to wait for the City Council to get their stuff together.”

The next City Council meeting will take place on Feb. 22.

—Staff writer Joanne S. Wong can be reached at joannewong@college.harvard.edu.