Framingham's Stefanini & Cannon Teach a Master Class in Bad Government

Usually, the last Framingham City Council meeting of its term is a quiet affair, in which loose ends are tied up, proclamations made, minutes approved, departing Councilors farewelled, and new business sensibly referred to the next incoming City Council.

Not so this year.

The City Council meeting on December 19, 2023, was a classic example of how government should not proceed. It provided more alarming sniping at the departing Chief Financial Officer (CFO), an attempt to rush through new business without proper review, a high degree of friction between Councilors, and an oddly adverse warning from the Mayor to the Nobscot neighborhood.

The meeting first went sideways after the Mayor’s update, when following a question from Councilor Steiner on the plan to fill the departing CFO’s position, Councilors Cannon and Stefanini trashed the CFO’s reputation, with comments like: “serious deficiencies”, “right that ship”, “there’s a lot to clean up” and “significant transgressions”.

Councilors Steiner and Mallach countered this reputational assassination by noting that this pattern of over-the-top public criticism has forced good staff to leave and is especially dangerous, as it dissuades good candidates from applying to fill staffing vacancies.

It’s worth watching this exchange, as it shows the battle going on in the City Council, which will greatly affect Framingham’s future. Here is a video showing key moments in the exchange:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-vGbTY54KPg&list=PLRA4dn42ikTZWXK6zZROIQKI-fioTUsMg&ab_channel=TheFraminghamObserver

John Stefanini’s criticism of the CFO is especially egregious, as he tries to make out that paying bills from the prior financial year is a CFO ‘transgression’, whereas it is commonly done at this time of the year, as it was done last year at this time with no concern, and is largely due to late invoicing by vendors.

In my view this is unforgiveable misinformation.

It was encouraging to see Councilors Steiner and Mallach defend the departing CFO, who has been so heavily criticized by a group of Councilors: King/Cannon/Stefanini/Ottaviani, after she had battled for two years dealing with a shortage of city tax revenue caused by that very same group of Councilors.

Witness the dressing down she got from Council Chair Ottaviani in the November 9, 2023, City Council meeting, prior to her resignation:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rGE92jN-Ha4

Happily, in the meeting being discussed here, Ottaviani did not pile on with Cannon and Stefanini, but the fact that a departing CFO can be publicly and persistently attacked in such a manner shows that the City Council needs better leadership.

After this Cannon-Stefanini/Steiner-Mallach exchange, the meeting settled down until it went sideways again in a quite different manner, when it addressed City Council meeting agenda item 6, which was the superficially innocuous Order 2023-111:

“Upon request of the Coburnville-Tripoli Neighborhood Association, a referral to the Ordinance and Rules Subcommittee asking that designation be made as a Neighborhood Area Group.”

On face value, we all want to see active neighborhoods and citizen engagement, as that moves the city forward, and there is an ordinance, passed by the City Council 7-4 on May 18, 2021, designed to promote neighborhood groups by creating the Neighborhood Area Group designation:

https://www.framinghamma.gov/DocumentCenter/View/42499/Order-2021-015-002-Approve-Neighborhood-Advisory-Groups-Ordinance?bidId=

However, as the discussion proceeded in the City Council, a number of issues came to light.

First, although the enabling ordinance had been on the books for more than 2 ½ years, with no action, suddenly at the last meeting of the current City Council term, the ordinance popped into view, to enable a City Council stamp of approval for the Coburnville-Tripoli Neighborhood Association.

As Councilor Stewart-Morales pointed out, introducing new business in the last meeting of the City Council term was highly unusual. But there were other major problems with the application:

1. The ordinance requires at least 150 signatures, but the number of unique signatures only totaled 61 because, on close inspection, multiple signatures were duplicates, and meeting attendance sheet signatures were included in the submission. Those meeting attendance signatures cannot count, and included signatures from the Mayor, Janet Leombruno, Mary Kate Feeney etc. who don’t reside in the area in question.
2. The date on the petition is January 18, 2022, so all of the submission data is almost 2 years old, including all the signatures.
3. The entire leadership of the Coburnville-Tripoli includes John Stefanini and his major political supporters.

Further, Councilor Stefanini wanted the City Council to waive all the rules in the ordinance, and approve the application immediately, claiming that the ordinance provided for such a waiver.

What he did not say is that the waiver spelled out in the ordinance does not apply to the rules governing the establishment of the Neighborhood Area Group. These establishment rules include:

1. At least 150 signatures verified by the City Clerk.
2. A public hearing prior to City Council approval.

Again, this is egregious misinformation from Stefanini.

Tracey Bryant, sensing correctly that this business was being rushed, and that it required due diligence to make sure the ordinance was followed, exercised her power under the charter to postpone a vote on the matter to the next City Council meeting. She was supported in this by Councilors Steiner and Alexander, but Councilors Stefanini and Cannon, supported by Leombruno, were unhappy with this, and I would say engaged in a bit of ‘genteel bullying’ on the matter.

Our thanks should go to Councilors Bryant, Steiner, and Alexander, who voiced their clear opposition to an important matter being rushed through at the last minute, violating clear stipulations in the applicable ordinance, and creating an official Neighborhood Area Group stacked with Stefanini supporters, with just 60 residents given official license to hold sway over an area with almost 3,000 residents.

This whole issue of Neighborhood Area Groups needs a thorough review, and an upcoming article will examine the matter thoroughly and propose a City Charter change to support such groups in a much more comprehensive and equitable manner.

The final issue of concern in this meeting surfaced during the Mayor’s update, when the Mayor seemed to be irritated with the Nobscot neighborhood’s quite reasonable concerns about commercial overdevelopment. The Mayor seemed to have a surprising lack of empathy for a large, active group of voters who need to be listened to. Here is the clip:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R3DbXkeLNUg

Quite the meeting to close out the year!

References:

1. The Coburnville-Tripoli Neighborhood Association submission letter detailing its request:
2. A copy of its by-laws and a petition:

https://legistarweb-production.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/attachment/pdf/2335982/CTNA_letter_December_11__2023.pdf

https://legistarweb-production.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/attachment/pdf/2335643/CTNA_bylaws_and_petition.pdf