There was much less behavior that could be called "petty, ugly, and vile." Instead, last night was what I call our "honeymoon period," that period of time after violent outbursts when everyone tries to make nice. In Town Meeting this means statements made by many, imploring us all to just try to get along.
There was an astonishing amount of confusion, in spite of which, Town Meeting did it's job.
Maybe I shouldn't be so careless tossing around comments about how confused people were, as I'm now going to attempt to describe the motions, substitute motions, amendments, and final actions circling Article 11, the formation of the Community Preservation Committee, and to be fair it wasn't a simple thing to follow.
We began on Monday with a motion before us from the Board of Selectmen to establish the committee, how many members it would have (9), who 5 of the members were required to be under state law, who would identify candidates for the remaining 4 members, who would approve those appointments, how long a term on the committee would be, as well as other stuff (you can read the proposed language from the Board here, beginning on page 6).
If my memory is correct (I don't have the documents in front of me as I write this), there was one substitute motion and four amendments immediately in line to be considered. All but one amendment were aimed at revising who the appointed members would be, or who would appoint them. The other dealt with establishing term limits for members of the committee.
Two of the proposed changes were withdrawn by the person proposing them, realizing that others had already sought to accomplish more or less what his two proposals were aimed at.
Then another member re-submitted one of those, as he felt it did a better job of dealing with the original issue than the first two.
That's where things were left at on Monday night. Four proposed changes to the bylaw, one dealing with term limits and the other three with committee membership.
At the beginning of our second session, the three dealing with committee membership were withdrawn. Proponents of those three amendments put their heads together, and submitted one single substitute motion that they felt encapsulated what they each wanted to accomplish in their different amendments before. Henceforth, this new substitute motion was referred to as the Trifecta substitute.
Then a substitute was offered to the Trifecta, changing the composition of the appointing committee.
A bit of debate ensued about the merits of the different options, and whether or not it might be better to just stick with the original motion from the Board of Selectmen.
The specter of the committee being made up of members of a nebulous population referred to as "The Usual Suspects" was made by all sides in explaining why members ought to vote a particular way.
Finally, some member decided we'd gone on long enough, a motion was made to terminate debate, it passed, and it was time for Town Meeting to vote.
Now is when folks got truly confused.
We have before us the original motion of the Board of Selectmen, the amendment to establish term limits, the Trifecta substitute, and the amendment to the Trifecta substitute.
Here's how you vote in this situation:
- Vote Yes or No to the amendment to the Trifecta substitute
- Vote Yes or No to the Trifecta as it exists following Vote #1 (it was either amended, or it wasn't).
- Vote Yes or No to the amendment to establish term limits, which will be placed on whichever the main motion is at this point (either the Trifecta Substitute, or the original motion of the Board of Selectmen).
- Vote Yes or No on the final bylaw, as amended or substituted in the preceding votes, establishing a Community Preservation Committee.
That said I saw members that I'd consider turning to for help if I were confused about something, entirely confused about what we were voting on.
Attempts were made to explain it all. Confusion still held the floor. Doug Heim, the Town Attorney, got up and gave a very clear description, at the end of which most people I think understood, and some others I imagine decided they'd just try to get through the best they could.
We progressed (painfully) through the votes. Vote #1 failed. Vote #2 failed. Vote #3 passed.
Now we were at Vote #4. This vote would establish the Community Preservation Act committee as originally proposed by the Board of Selectmen, amended to impose term limits on the members of that committee.
One of the chief proponents of the Trifecta substitute stands and I paraphrase what he asks "just to clarify things, it's true that if this fails the committee is formed just consisting of the 5 members prescribed by state law, right?"
At which point I nearly fall out of my chair in astonishment. There can be no town committee without a vote of the town to create it. If Town Meeting doesn't pass this last vote, there's no committee. CPA funds are still collected, but cannot be expended until such a committee is formed.
I decide right then and there that there must be something going on. A gas leak of some kind or something that is making everyone entirely incoherent.
Nonetheless, Town Meeting passes Vote #4, and the Community Preservation Committee is formed. In spite of our best efforts, We got it right in the end.
We then went on to take up some articles further down the Warrant, dealing with the Capital Budget, as the chair of Capital Planning will be out of town next week.
The issue of unaccounted water came up.
We ultimately got a fair amount of real work done, and concluded the evening hearing the introduction of Article 7, pertaining to signs. For more background on this issue, read what the proponent has to say in his posts covering the 2015 Town Meeting, night's one and two (and presumably also three).
I hope all this confusion is behind us now, and the rest of the meeting starts to go more smoothly than it has so far.
Thanks very much for describing a Wednesday evening at Town Meeting that had more twists than an Alfred Hitchcock plot and more confusion than an Antonioni film.
ReplyDeleteDespite the clarifications, I am fairly certain many people did not vote in their best interest on Vote 1 (Vote Yes or No to the amendment to the Trifecta substitute). Since Votes 1 and 2 failed overwhelmingly, one might conclude that the first preference of Town Meeting was the Selectmen's recommendation, the second preference being the Trifecta substitute, and the third preference being the amendment the Trifecta substitute. But that makes little sense, because the Amendment was, if anything, a compromise between the original and substitute motions.
ReplyDeleteI think the true preference of town meeting was Selectmen's recommendation > amendment to the trifecta substitute > trifecta substitute, in which case the logical way to vote is YES on vote 1 and then NO on vote 2 to shoot down any substitute. I think that people so overwhelmingly favored the original Selectmen's recommendation, they thought: let's reject all substitutes. But voting YES to the amendment to the substitute does not mean you prefer it over the original motion; only that you prefer it to the substitute.
Well, that's how I voted (Yes to the amendment to the trifecta sub, No on the trifecta sub, Yes on the Selectmen's recommendation). It's near pure speculation, but I didn't think that very many people liked the fact that the amendment to the trifecta sub make the appointing committee smaller. I personally thought that it made it smaller but more balanced, but that view did not prevail. I agree that the majority favored the original recommendation from the Selectmen over both the trifecta sub and the amended trifecta sub (as did I). Whether or not a majority preferred the amended trifecta sub over the original trifecta sub would require polling the members again.
DeleteA couple of points about the Article 11 CPA committee hubbub:
ReplyDeleteThere were many proposed amendments to the Selectmen's motion, and Brian Rehrig's amendment to an amendment, but no substitute motions. A substitute motion would have proposed throwing out the Selectmen's motion entirely, and replacing it with another motion: that wasn't offered to the meeting.
The understandable confusion on the floor when it came to voting was worsened by the Moderator allowing questions from the floor before he had composed and finished instructions to the meeting on how the voting would proceed. Also, anyone watching the TV coverage would have heard little of the questions as none of the questioners took or were compelled to take the microphone. The Moderator needs to require all speakers to take the microphone, even for questions and points of order. Also, some sort of way for the Moderator to draw a quick flow chart which would display on the big screen in the hall would have helped him clarify things.
To me, who believes there are no stupid questions, only stupid answers, all the questions were legitimate, even the one which nearly caused Wes to "fall out of my chair in astonishment."
I'd have to review things when I get home, but I won't as I believe you if you say they were all amendments. Come to think of it, while the Trifecta motion deleted much of the Selectmen's, if it didn't actually replace it then it was an amendment.
DeleteWell, that makes me feel a bit foolish. Oh well.
I should also clarify that I believe people should definitely ask questions when they have them.
My observations were meant to be about how the whole body seemed overly confused, and I don't understand why. This includes people that voted the same way I did, and people that voted differently than I did, both last night and last year during the CPA debate.
For much of the night it was as if half the hall had suffered a collective lapse in coherency.
I hope things go smoother next week. I still don't understand how so many were so confused. Without a clear excuse, I do think members need to step up their game, and pay a bit closer attention. We need to be better on top of things if we are going to consistently do our duty as members.
But that's just my opinion. I clearly can't keep the difference between a substitute motion and an amendment straight, so take of it all what you will.
You're in good company: the Moderator, who should have these things locked down cold, sometimes confuses amendments and substitute motions! I guess one could define a substitute motion as the ultimate amendment.
DeleteI was more shocked that town meeting imposed term limits considering the political demographics of the town...
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