Newtown voters were not of a single mind on the subject of change on Election Day. When it came to selecting personnel to run their local government, they did not want much change. When it came to the shape of government itself, they did.

Voters went mostly with incumbents when given a choice. First Selectman Herb Rosenthal was elected to a third term because his Republican challenger, Owen Carney, had failed to convince the electorate that there was a need for a change. We would like to congratulate Mr Rosenthal, Mr Carney, and their respective parties for running campaigns devoid of rancor, invective, and disinformation. The conventional political wisdom that the best way to get elected is to smear your opponent does not seem so wise these days. People are sick of it, and Newtown’s political leaders are enlightened enough to understand that. The few persistently negative political figures in town who still do not get it are finding themselves increasingly marginalized.

Those candidates who were elected now face a challenge. The town budget for 2001-2002 must take shape under a completely new review process, which includes a newly created Board of Finance. The advantages envisioned in the Board of Finance/Legislative Council pas de deux prescribed by the approved charter revision will be hard to refine between now and the spring budget season. The Board of Selectmen, which was not even supposed to exist in the model proposed by the Charter Revision Commission, will have to appoint a finance board, which will then have to establish its own rules and procedures. Town attorneys will have some work to do in reconciling the voters’ decision not to invest the first selectman with veto power with a budget process that anticipated that authority. In the meantime, the Board of Education will have to figure out what the approved charter changes will mean to its budgeting deadlines, which have already been the focus of complaints by school administrators. It is going to be hectic.

We hope that all involved in the changes and challenges ahead will do their best to help the system work. We trust the Legislative Council, returning incumbents and new members alike, will live up to their pre-election pledge to recommission a charter revision panel to finish work in reshaping Newtown’s government that was left undone, at least partly through error and oversight. In the weeks and months ahead, all elected town officials must remember that the difficult steps they must now follow have been choreographed by their bosses – the people of Newtown. Voters call the tune in our system of government, and now the chosen players must dance – we hope with some measure of grace.