Panel Raises Inconsistencies Between Council Rules And Charter

By John Voket

After referencing the issue during several previous meetings, Charter Revision Commission (CRC) Chairman Al Cramer had the perfect audience for his concerns about inconsistencies between the existing charter and certain voting criteria put forth in the Legislative Council’s policy document.

On Tuesday, Mr Cramer had the opportunity to bring the issue to light, as acting council chair Timothy Holian appeared to discuss and take questions about the council’s roles and responsibilities before the CRC.

“Your voting on the Legislative Council is a humongous mess,” Mr Cramer pointed out with a smile. “Let me elaborate: redistricting…you need seven affirmative votes; [hiring] a town attorney…you need nine affirmative votes; reducing the budget…it could be four votes, five votes, six or seven votes, because it’s a majority of a quorum; accepting the budget proposal, same thing; increasing the budget…eight affirmative votes; special appropriation…eight votes; adopting rules of council operation…nine affirmative votes…”

Mr Cramer continued, saying emergency action required eight affirmative votes, ordinances require a majority of at least six votes, while emergency ordinances require eight votes, and regulations require a majority of six affirmative votes.

“Tim, I think we should recommend you have two-thirds voting when we require eight affirmative votes, and a majority of at least six affirmative votes [on all others],” Mr Cramer said.

Mr Holian replied that he wanted to review each section of the charter one by one, joking that Mr Cramer “just fired a shotgun,” at him.

“Some of these say a two-thirds majority of the entire council, some say a majority of a quorum,” Mr Holian said. “Our rules say we can never have a vote pass with less than half of the council so you can have a quorum of seven but the vote better be six to one, it better not four to three.”

“Then you’re violating the charter — how does that happen?” Mr Cramer asked. “It’s horrendous that you have to go through so much to remember the voting rules.”

Commissioner Guy Howard asked if the charter overruled the council’s policies.

Mr Holian said the charter should prevail, adding that the rules should be consistent with the charter.

Commissioner Carolyn Signorelli observed that the rules appear to improve democracy versus reducing it, noting the rules stipulate the council cannot pass anything with an affirmative vote of four or five.

Mr Cramer referenced language that seemed confusing.

“That language is horrible. That language says: ‘A vote of the Legislative Council members present and voting.’ You need seven for a quorum because you need seven to hold a meeting, but if only five vote because two abstain isn’t the majority three? That’s horrible, we have to work on that!” Mr Cramer said.

The CRC chairman said he could see where two variations could serve, a majority of at least six affirmative votes and two-thirds of those in attendance as long as the meeting is legal with a quorum.

Mr Holian said luckily, in his nearly ten-year tenure, he has never seen most of the situations come before the council that were reflected in the inconsistencies Mr Cramer referenced.

Town Meeting                  And Other Issues

Earlier in the meeting, Mr Holian also tendered his support to greatly reduce or eliminate the town meeting provision in the charter, saying the practice was antiquated.

“The town meeting is something that has seen its day, something that has been immortalized in Norman Rockwell paintings,” Mr Holian said of the process, adding that he was speaking for himself and not on behalf of the council.

On the matter of the council’s right to choose whether to authorize legal defense of the town or any of its agents, Mr Holian said he never recalled a situation where there was less than unanimous support to defend anyone working or volunteering for the town, when legal action was threatened.

“It should be a given that we vigorously defend our employees and volunteers,” he said.

Turning the CRC’s attention to a charge regarding authorizing prosecution against town employees or agents, Mr Holian suggested that action be evaluated on an individual case basis.

“It’s something we should try to do based on a cost-benefit analysis,” he said.

Ms Signorelli then asked if Mr Holian thought the decision should be relegated to the Board of Selectmen or the top elected or appointed executive to handle, or if he thought the council should continue to have some or exclusive ruling on the matter.

Mr Holian answered that since the council should serve as a check and balance entity, that the council should remain an active consultant and/or participant in the decision to prosecute a town employee or agent.

Moving on to the question about the elimination of voting districts in favor of a council nominated at large, Mr Holian noted that he has never seen a situation where the council faced a particular challenge that was pursuant to a single legislative district.

“I don’t believe this is a front-burner issue,” he said.

Charter commissioner LeReine Frampton pointed out that in the event extra candidates were available in one district, while a shortage existed in another, the elimination of the district rules would allow one or more willing candidates to be shifted to open slots on the ballot, when needed.

“It would also save taxpayers money, because we could close [and consolidate] some of the polling places,” Ms Frampton added.

Other discussion centered on the required subcommittees of the council, especially justification for a finance subcommittee in the wake of the creation of a Board of Finance.

Mr Holian defended the need for the full range of council subcommittees, saying the formerly inactive public safety panel was ramping up to become much more active again under the leadership of David Brown, who has concerns about several public safety issues going forward as the town’s population continues to expand.

The acting council chair then noted a situation this year where the finance subcommittee served a crucial role between two of the budget referenda, when due to time constraints, the panel was positioned to make and endorse further budget cuts when passing them back to either the Board of Finance or the entire council without expert advice might have been more perilous.

“I’m glad we have both the Board of Finance and the finance subcommittee,” Mr Holian concluded. He also defended the Capital Improvement Plan (CIP) process, saying the finance board’s insistence on publishing and prioritizing future capital spending was critical, and that the CIP served as “…a vehicle by which we never get sandbagged…the council doesn’t want to be surprised,” by big ticket capital requests during any budget deliberation process.

After some additional discussion, Mr Cramer reminded the CRC members that next Tuesday’s meeting (August 22) would provide further opportunity to learn about the town’s financial machinations as Finance Director Ben Spragg appeared to answer questions and discuss his duties.