Wakefield Town Meeting

Why Vote to Lose with Charter Review?

Why would you choose to vote to deny current and future voting rights for you and your children? Who is advocating for less voting rights? These questions are something I do hope the reader considers for the run up to the November 5, 2018 Wakefield Town Meeting.

These are general questions to what is trumpeted by Town Hall’s instrument “The Charter Review Commission”. The nine member Commission has articles 27-38 for Town Meeting. My letter focuses on two. Here, the Commission managed to attack two of the most important issues between an individual and government, Property Taxes and Voting rights. The Commission’s proposals take authority away from the individual, and give it to Town Hall.

Article 29 changes the Board of Assessors to be appointed by the ‘appointed’ Town Administrator, rather than continue to be elected by the voters. This board of three oversees three town employees, the Director, Assistant Assessor and office administrator. They “assess all property at its full and fair market value as of January 1 of each year for the purpose of taxation “.

I have no concern with the department and personally believe they provide an excellent service for the town. I do sympathize that some of the Board may be averse to going thru the process of being ‘elected’. Consider that Wakefield has 24,426 citizens with $4,519,822,372 in property, funding a $95,000,000 town budget for 954 town employees, 108 appointed officials, and 52 elected officials. I do not personally benefit from reducing the elected positions from 52 to 49. My greatest concern is that this increases Town Hall’s authority as they would choose the Board that influences assessment of our properties. By taking the voters out of the process, candidates could not run for election and voters could no longer select or throw out, assessors who effect our taxation.

Article 28 diminishes the voter’s opportunity to re-consider at a Town Wide Ballot, an article that was approved at Town Meeting. Currently a citizens ‘Referendum Petition’ must be completed within ten business days of a Town Meeting vote. Article 28 ‘increases’ that to twelve calendar days. While seated during Town meeting, expect a ‘sales pitch’ that this increase of two days is a benefit for all. But do remember that town hall closes early on Friday, and petitions may only be delivered during the Town Clerk’s working hours. This seemed benign to me until I looked at a calendar. So, if Town Meeting was Tuesday the 1st, then under current law the petition would be due Tuesday 15th 4:30pm (13 days x 24 hours+16:30)=328.5 hours. With Article 28 the due date would be Friday 11th at 12:30pm (9x24+12:30) =228.5 hours. The ‘pitch of gaining two days’, is actually a loss of 100 hours, plus a valuable weekend, for citizens to write the petition and gather certified signatures. This is a 32.8% loss of available time.

Article 28 also increases the current requirement of 200 certified signatures to 5% of registered voters. So, with 18,654 Registered Voters, that requirement would be 933. That’s a 367% percent change in the requirement. These changes are like a restaurant manager telling his chef who prepares 200 meals in an 8 hour day, to speed it up, now make 933 meals in less than 6 hours!

How does the citizen’s ‘referendum petition’ effort generally go? Promptly after an affirmative Town meeting vote, one or more voters believes that if the same article was presented at a town wide ballot, it would be rejected by typically 2,000-7,000 town wide voters instead of the 150-275 attending Town Meeting. Next draft the petition to ensure that neither the Town’s Attorney nor Massachusetts Attorney General can reject it - even after voted on. Then concerned citizens gather signatures in compliance with all local, state and Federal Law. When presented to Town Clerk expect perhaps 20% of the collected signatures to be rejected. This is a big effort with an unknown outcome. If all requirements are met, then Town Council has ballots printed for a town wide vote within 30 days. In a future letter I plan to present my findings on the requirements and history of referendums and property assessment in Wakefield. More information is warranted to understand where we’ve been, how we got here, and why would you vote to deny your voting rights?

Sincerely,

Robert Mitchell