Letter: Perpetuating the Peculiar System in Stonington

To the Editor:

On November 3, Stonington residents will go to the polls, not just to elect candidates, but to decide whether to alter Stonington’s form of government.

We will not just pick who we elect, we have a chance to decide how we elect some of our candidates. Stonington voters have been constrained by an archaic 1933 provision inserted by the Legislature into our Charter that prevents meaningful contests for the Board of Finance, and also keeps members of that Board in office longer than any other office in Town.

The existing Charter thus perpetuates the peculiar system in Stonington where whether or not a candidate received more than a single vote they were seated on the Board of Finance, since each party is only able to nominate one candidate and there are two seats each election.

The United States correctly criticizes sham elections when they take place in other countries, and they should not be permitted to continue here, long after waves of democracy have swept the rest of the world.

The changes Stonington voters can decide on came about because a group of citizens, independents, Democrats and Republicans, feeling ignored by the Board of Finance, circulated a petition to create a Charter Revision Commission to create parity between the Boards of Finance and Education.

The Commission (the first one in Town history created directly by the people) held public hearings at the beginning and end of its tenure, took suggestions from members of the public and came up with six recommendations, which the voters will have the opportunity to accept as one question.

The key changes are to add one member to the Board of Finance from 6 to 7, to shorten their terms from 6 to 4 years, so that the Board and the Board of Education are treated identically in the Charter (and to create the possibility of a competitive race between candidates for the Board of Finance) and “soft” term limits for both Boards (3 terms on (with the “clock” starting with this election), followed by one term off, followed by 3 terms on).

Some people have suggested that the changes to the Charter are inappropriate somehow. This suggestion is misguided. The current Board of Selectmen approved the recommendations and placed them on the ballot, and at the candidate debate all four candidates supported the changes.

The Charter has been revised several times, but always at the request of the Board of Selectmen. (Our neighbors in Norwich are voting on 18 charter revision proposals, but their Commission was called by the Council, not the citizens).

The American form of government contemplates changes not just to who is in office, but to how we govern ourselves. As Thomas Jefferson said “Some men look at constitutions with sanctimonious reverence, and deem them like the arc of the covenant, too sacred to be touched. They ascribe to the men of the preceding age a wisdom more than human, and suppose what they did to be beyond amendment.

I knew that age well; I belonged to it, and labored with it. …But I know also, that laws and institutions must go hand in hand with the progress of the human mind. As that becomes more developed, more enlightened, as new discoveries are made, new truths disclosed, and manners and opinions change with the change of circumstances, institutions must advance also, and keep pace with the times. We might as well require a man to wear still the coat which fitted him when a boy, as civilized society to remain ever under the regimen of their barbarous ancestors.”

I don’t know what rationale led the legislature to decide decades ago that Stonington’s voters shouldn’t be granted true choice in their elections, but whatever the reason it has outlived its purpose. Stonington voters should bring Stonington’s forms of government out of the early 20th century and into the 21st, , and vote yes for Charter Revision, so they can vote on the candidates of their choice in the future.

Matthew G. Berger, who notes he was the Chair of the Charter Revision Commission

Pawcatuck