Opinion: Town Council And Its Committees
Photo: needpix.com. Creative Commons
By Meg Gage and Michael Greenebaum
The following column appeared previously in The Amherst Bulletin
It’s election year in Amherst! On November 9th, all Town Council seats will be on the ballot. Important issues face the town and many are controversial: downtown development, school, fire station and DPW facility, funding the police, relationships among the various racial and ethnic communities that comprise our social fabric, and, in general, a sense of community that seems bruised in Amherst.
How do we make decisions in Amherst? And, perhaps, who is included in the “we” in the above sentence? This will be the first town election in which the success and efficacy of the Town Council/Town Manager form of government can be assessed. It will be the first time that individual councilors and their challengers can be compared and contrasted. It will also be the first time that voters will be able to express their opinions on the structure and operation of Town Council as a whole over the past three years, and while the structure and operation are not on the ballot, the assessment of them by candidates, both incumbents and challengers, will give voters vital information when they cast their ballots.
In this commentary, we raise issues about structures and operations that are within the purview of the Council and do not require changes in the Town Charter. We have serious concerns about the relationship between the Town Council, its committees, and the Planning Board. We have equally deep concerns about the process of appointments to boards and committees. Most important, we have grave concerns about the Council’s apparent desire to dampen dissent and to control the decision-making process by avoiding the checks and balances fundamental to democratic governance. Why would we not want legitimate differences of opinion reflected in our committees?
We think candidates for Town Council ought to be questioned about these things. For example, what is the rationale for the Council’s interference with the work of the Planning Board? The Planning Board is charged with bringing proposals to the Council for vote. It would seem appropriate for a Council committee to review such proposals and make recommendations to the whole Council. Indeed, this is what the charge to the Community Resources Committee (CRC) indicates. But this is not what the CRC does. Instead, it duplicates and diminishes the Planning Board in matters relating to zoning and the Master Plan. In effect, it determines what proposals will be presented to itself for review. Moreover the Council appoints the members of the Planning Board, so any semblance of independence is obliterated.
The Town Council is responsible for appointments to all appointed boards and committees. In theory, residents offering to serve on a board or committee fill out a form listing qualifications and experience and these forms create a pool of applicants from which candidates for appointment will be drawn. Originally, the Town Council created a committee to recommend appointments, but this committee grew afoul of the Council by recommending independent candidates so it was abolished. The Council wants candidates who agree with it on town issues. Since the majority of councillors are committed to positions on these issues long before motions come before it, they know what to look for. They can cite the need for experience if their desired candidate is already on the committee; they can cite the need for fresh faces if she is not. Their appointment policy is to minimize disagreement, dissent, and independence of judgment.
The Amherst public holds legitimate and reasonable differences of opinion on a variety of controversial issues; don’t we want those important debates held within our legislative bodies rather than between insiders and outsiders? What does it mean for a democracy if dissent is relegated to outsiders?
The concentration of power in the Town Council and the lack of checks and balances really means that our form of government tends towards autocracy and away from democracy. We are suggesting that the November election be viewed as a referendum on the concentration of power in a single body. Candidates for Council seats should be asked:
Do you believe in an independent Planning Board?
Do you believe in an appointment process that prizes diversity of opinion?
That would be a start.
Meg Gage is the now-retired founding director of the Peace Development Fund and the Proteus Fund, national organizations based in Amherst that organize within philanthropy to advance campaigns related to peace, human rights and democracy. She is a graduate of ARHS and taught at the high school. She served on the recent Charter Commission and is currently the Chair of the Participatory Budgeting Commission and on the Planning Team of the District One Neighborhood Association (DONA).
Michael Greenebaum was Principal of Mark’s Meadow School from 1970 to 1991, and from 1974 taught Organization Studies in the Higher Education Center at the UMass School of Education. He served in Town Meeting from 1992, was on the first Charter Commission in 1993, and served on several town committees including the Town Commercial Relations Committee and the Long Range Planning Committee.
Meg Gage’s and Michael Greenebaum’s invaluable op-ed highlights one consequence of the current Charter’s fundamental structural flaw. It has no separation of powers as between the legislative and the executive. The Town Council hires the Town Manager. The Charter, Section 3.2, “Executive and Administrative Powers and Duties,” provides: “The Town Manager shall be … responsible to the Town Council….” The Town Manager is not responsible to us.
This is not what the Massachusetts Town Meetings, and John Adams and the guys, had in mind in 1780. Article XXX of the Massachusetts Declaration of Rights, which is Part the First of our Constitution, provides in no uncertain terms:
“In the government of this commonwealth, the legislative department shall never exercise the executive and judicial powers, or either of them: the executive shall never exercise the legislative and judicial powers, or either of them: the judicial shall never exercise the legislative and executive powers, or either of them: to the end it may be a government of laws and not of men.”
Amendment 89 to the Constitution makes Article XXX applicable to municipalities. Yet we in Amherst now have a Town Council that exercises both legislative and executive powers. Another consequence: it is all but impossible for voters to hold the Town Manager accountable. We can do it only by not re-electing Town Councilors. Structurally, that is attenuated and ineffective.
This is not a criticism of the ethics, competence, public spirit, or diligence of Town Councilors and Town Manager. It is an observation that what our current Charter gives the Town of Amherst is a government of men and women, not of laws.
Thank you Meg, Michael and the Indy. Good summary of the failings of our current practice. I am one of the case studies. Since the Council began I have applied for ten vacancies on the Planning Board on four separate occasions. Running often for elected office, I consistently earned 30% to 40 % of the total vote. Would you not want someone on the Planning Board that is able to represent such a large section of the town. No, the “rush to get things done” overrides the imperative to be inclusive and open to diversity of ideas. Again and again this leads to delays, division, divisiveness, anger, resentment and less desirable outcomes. No surprise, witness government at all levels – it is both a structural problem and a people problem. It will not be easy to correct. We best keep trying.