Charter question faces vote

Written by Justin Reynolds
Wednesday, 28 October 2009 12:58

On Tuesday, in addition to choosing their town government officials, Wiltonians who go to the polls will be asked two questions: should package stores be allowed in town, and should the revised town charter be approved.

But what exactly does approving the revised town charter mean?

“The main thing people probably ought to know is what we haven’t changed,” said Bob Russell, chair of the charter commission. “We’re sticking with the town meeting form of government because it’s worked well for 207 years.”

Mr. Russell said the commission decided to double the length of selectmen’s terms from two to four years and stagger them, making them consistent with terms on the Boards of Finance and Education and the Planning and Zoning Commission.

“We don’t want the first selectman or members of the Board of Selectmen to be running for office almost constantly, like the U.S. House of Representatives, instead of doing their jobs,” Mr. Russell said. “It gives them more of a chance to get settled in and learn what they’re doing. Two years is a very short time to understand the complexities of Wilton government.”

Staggering the terms, Mr. Russell said, allows for continuity for the board, as two of the selectmen will be up for election every other year.

The commission, which met 31 times between May 2008 and September of this year, also chose to add term limits on selectmen.

“We’ve added term limits for Board of Selectmen members, but no term limit for the first selectman,” Mr. Russell said. “If people don’t like the incumbent, they can run somebody else against him.”

Under the proposed charter, the race for first selectman will be separated from the races for Board of Selectmen, so that if a candidate loses the race for first selectmen he or she does not get seated on the Board of Selectmen.

The commission also decided to allow a supermajority on the Board of Selectmen (four out of five votes) to overrule a Board of Finance line item reduction, Mr. Russell said.

As it is now, the financiers can tell the selectmen exactly where they think a potential cut in the town’s budget should be made.

“What does change, if [the financiers] want to make a specific cut — the bottom line cut must be adhered to, but the selectmen can decide where to make the cut,” Mr. Russell said. For example, if the financiers suggest cutting from the library’s budget, the selectmen can decide to instead cut from another department’s budget.

Another proposed change in the charter requires the signatures of 2% of registered voters on a petition in order to call a town meeting. Currently, 50 signatures are required.

“Other than that, there was a lot of clean-up and clarification of terminology,” Mr. Russell said.

The commission was composed of five Republicans and four Democrats, he said.

“We had a lot of fun. We worked together well, there were no real partisan arguments,” Mr. Russell said. “Sometimes Republicans and Democrats were on both sides of every issue that came up. We were divided by issue, but not by party.”

Mr. Russell said he was proud of the commission’s final product.

“We did a very thorough job of looking at other alternatives on the way Connecticut town governments could be structured,” he said. “We looked at all of them and concluded what we have works well. Of course, we’re always frustrated because more people don’t turn out for elections or budget votes, but we think the system works well the way it is. We could not think of a way to get more people to turn out and vote.”

Mr. Russell said if the revised charter is approved, the changes won’t go into effect until the election of 2011.