Council Accepts Charter Revision Proposal, Sends To Public Vote

By John Voket

After nearly an hour of discussion, the Legislative Council voted 11-1 to accept the recommendations of the latest Charter Revision Commission, and then voted unanimously to send those recommendations to a public vote on Tuesday, March 29.

To achieve the revision, 15 percent of the town’s registered voters — or about 2,400 individuals — must approve modifying budget ballots to request that each voter: (a) approve the budget, or (b) reject the budget because it is too high, or (c) reject the budget because it is too low.

Despite being challenged by Vice Chairman Mary Ann Jacob and members of the charter commission who attended on one of his points of opposition, Councilman Kevin Fitzgerald remained steadfast in his decision to oppose the recommendations. Mr Fitzgerald said he believed the proposed budget questions did not go far enough to clarify the intent of voters who cast No votes, and he was also not supporting the proposed revisions because the charter panel recommended against splitting or bifurcating the budget between the town and school sides.

“If we knew what a ‘No’ vote meant, we wouldn’t be here,” Mr Fitzgerald said. “Bifurcation would tell us how to act. Bifurcation would make it clear what voters want.”

Mr Fitzgerald also said during discussion that in a bifurcated budget, if the town side was approved and the school side was not, funds could be shifted from the town side to increase the school side. But Ms Jacob clarified that the only way that such a move could happen would be in a single budget scenario, similar to last year where after repetitive failed budget votes, the council agreed to add money back to the school side.

Mr Fitzgerald countered that he believed Ms Jacob was mistaken. But Charter Revision Commissioner Joe Golden spoke up from the audience endorsing Ms Jacob’s interpretation.

Council Chairman Jeff Capeci then asked Mr Fitzgerald to support the revisions saying they would give the council direction, and while ballot questions would not provide the level of detail Mr Fitzgerald wanted to see, it was significantly more detail than the council had in the past.

“Why not take this and see how it goes?” Mr Capeci asked, adding that if the council got through the upcoming budget process, and there were still issues about voter intent, he would entertain seating another charter commission to consider making further changes.

“We want the public to see [the current revision] has support,” Mr Capeci said.

But Mr Fitzgerald was not swayed.

Another council member, Gary Davis, appeared to change his mind after requesting a friendly amendment to the main motion, indicating the council would “accept” the charter revisions, versus “endorse” the proposals.

While no members of the public spoke on the issue, Democratic Registrar of Voters LeReine Frampton took the opportunity to remind the council of time line issues related to absentee ballots, as well as including explanatory text, which she said voters were asking for during the last charter revision referendum.

Later in the evening, Mr Capeci said absentee ballots would be available for the referendum on the charter changes, as well as for the first round of budget voting.

Then Mr Golden, and Charter Revision Commissioners Carey Schierloh and Eric Paradis all had an opportunity to speak about why they recommended against bifurcation.

Mr Golden said he came to the commission in support of bifurcation, but after speaking to elected officials in communities including New Milford and Watertown, he became convinced that splitting the budget caused the education sides to fail more often.

He also brought up the issue about how to fairly allocate shared services in a split budget, such as when parks workers plow school facilities. He also questioned how debt service on bonds for school capital project could be split since that debt service is carried on the town side of the spending package.

Ms Schierloh said her biggest concern was seeing multiple failed school referenda, which could put state education funding in jeopardy.

“I didn’t want to put the Board of Education through that,” she said.

Mr Paradis also explained his opposition to splitting the vote, particularly with the restriction against taking funds from an already approved town side to add funds to a failed school budget proposal. He also did not want to see increased taxation applied to meet the comfort level of staunch school supporters who repeatedly voted down school budgets to see more funds added.

Councilman Robert Merola said he would only support a split budget if it would substantially drive up voter turnout, but he was not convinced it would make enough difference in Newtown. And in regard to clarity on the wishes of budget voters, Mr Merola was convinced that “No means no.”

Councilman George Ferguson said he went through all the minutes of all the budget meetings from 2010, and he could not find a single request from voters to split the budget. And he agreed with charter commissioners that a split vote would “not be good for the town.”

Katherine Fetchick said the charter recommendation was a good compromise for the town, while James Belden said bifurcating “could hurt as much as it could help.”

Ben Spragg agreed, saying he supported the proposed budget questions and added that “bifurcation is divisive for the town.” He also supported seating another charter commission if the current budget questions did not end up serving the council well in the event of failed budget referenda in 2011.

The council recommendation of the charter revisions now go to the voters. If approved by more than 15 percent of local registered voters, the charter changes would be effective on April 5. This would leave enough time to include them on the first round of absentee budget ballots.