HOLYOKE — Just six days before Indigenous Peoples Day, the Holyoke City Council voted 9-3 Tuesday to replace Columbus Day with the holiday, a change supporters called a long-overdue recognition and opponents criticized it as a divisive break from tradition.

City Councilors Michael Sullivan, Linda Vacon and Howard Greaney Jr. voted against it.

The proposal first went before the council’s ordinance committee on Sept. 17, where it advanced to the full council on a 4-1 vote. Vacon cast the lone dissenting vote.

During Tuesday’s meeting, City Council Vice President and ordinance committee Chair Meg Magrath-Smith said many of the same arguments raised during the committee hearing resurfaced during public comment.

Supporters wanted the holiday to focus solely on Indigenous peoples, while opponents argued Columbus Day should remain alongside Indigenous Peoples Day to recognize Italian American heritage.

Magrath-Smith said she understood the issue was one people “take to the heart,” but urged councilors to consider the committee’s recommendation.

Councilor Michael Sullivan said he supports recognizing Indigenous Peoples Day but opposes removing Columbus Day from the city’s calendar.

Sullivan argued that the city lacks the authority to replace both a state and a federal holiday.

“If we want to do that, take that sign up there, take it down and put in ‘Breakers of law,’ not ‘Makers of law,’” Sullivan said.

Sullivan said painful chapters of history should be taught rather than ignored.

“These are factual pieces of history,” he said, arguing that history’s “good and bad” chapters helped shape the nation, and that “omissions in history should be corrected.”

Sullivan also questioned whether the debate reflected the council’s priorities.

“Our focus should be on attracting industries, providing better jobs and broadening our tax base,” Sullivan said. “This is not what we were elected to do.”

Greaney said the world’s largest statue of Christopher Columbus is in Puerto Rico and noted that the holiday continues to be celebrated there.

He acknowledged that Puerto Ricans suffered under Columbus, but argued that many immigrant groups, including his Irish ancestors, also endured hardships after arriving in the U.S.

“They had all kinds of problems, but we developed, we overcame. We became Americans,” Greaney said. “I accepted the tradition of Columbus Day. I was born with it, raised with it.”

Greaney said the city should recognize both Indigenous Peoples Day and Columbus Day, rather than replace one with the other.

“I see no harm in using both Indigenous Peoples and Columbus Day as the holiday,” he said.

Greaney said the proposal was divisive.

“No matter which way you look at it or say it, it is divisive,” he said. “It’s an American tradition. Let’s stick with it.”

Councilor Juan Anderson Burgos, who is Puerto Rican, sharply disagreed.

“I’m not going to allow someone that’s not Puerto Rican speak for my people. How in the world would you know what my people celebrate and disown?” he said.

Anderson Burgos rejected the idea that Columbus discovered America and described him as “treacherous.”

“If it was up to me that so-called huge Columbus statue that’s in Puerto Rico would be in rubble right now,” he said.

“There should be a new word for the kind of actions he did back then,” Anderson Burgos added. “I can’t even think of one. I just know it’s horrible.”

He said supporting the measure was his way of addressing that history.

“If I have to make this right, this is the way I do it,” he said.

Vacon said President Franklin D. Roosevelt championed Columbus Day as a national holiday “for us to remember our heritage.”

“We cannot go back to 1492 and fix things that happened then,” she said.

Vacon noted that more than 50 residents signed a petition asking the council to keep Columbus Day, while also recognizing Indigenous Peoples Day; about 38,238 residents live in the city.

“They both happened. It’s reality of our history, and I encourage us to embrace it fully,” she said.

Councilor Israel Rivera said people have learned different versions of history.

“For some of us, this was an endeavor; whereas for others, they’ve learned after the fact that it wasn’t, that it was more of the beginning of a genocide,” Rivera said.

Rivera said replacing Columbus Day with Indigenous Peoples Day was an attempt “to repair some of that.”

Councilor Richard Purcell rejected the notion that Columbus discovered America.

“He didn’t discover anything,” Purcell said. “It was a lost sailor that came on a land where 40 to 90 million people were already living.”

Purcell said Columbus’ arrival marked the beginning of “the genocide Indigenous people throughout the Americas and also paved the way for the trans-Atlantic slave trade.”

Purcell also challenged claims that replacing Columbus Day would be improper, noting that more than two dozen Massachusetts communities, including Boston, Cambridge, Newton, Amherst and Northampton, already recognize Indigenous Peoples Day.

Several residents also urged councilors to approve the change.

Orlando Izasza said Columbus Day originally helped combat discrimination against Italian Americans and Catholics but argued that Italy is not lacking recognition today. He supported replacing Columbus Day and also suggested recognizing St. Francis of Assisi.

Linda Pratt said recognizing Indigenous Peoples Day would not diminish the contributions of Italian Americans, while Christian Carde said Columbus caused significant harm in Puerto Rico and should not be part of the holiday.

Indigenous Peoples Day falls on Monday.

The land that became Holyoke was home to Indigenous peoples, including the Nonotuck tribe, before European settlement expanded into the area during the 1600s.

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