Why you should fear Political Power Consolidation in Wareham - Part 3 of 6
In the first two parts of this article I explained how the Wareham Board of Selectmen has a plan to grab power in April through their handpicked Charter Review Committee. If successful, this consolidation of power will take from you, the Wareham voter, the power to enact legislation and the power to control your tax dollars. The proposed charter change will limit information, limit debate, and place all real power in the hands of just a few individuals. In this installment I will describe how another source of useful information was ignored by the Charter Review Committee.
This information was found in the Citizen Petition Charter Amendment Articles that were on the Warrant of two town meetings. On the first occasion, these warrant articles were not considered because Moderator John Donahue misrepresented the vote on a motion made by Selectmen Brenda Eckstrom to dissolve town meeting before the articles could be considered. Eckstrom's motion to dissolve was defeated by a vote of 149 in favor and 154 against. However, Moderator Donahue falsely announced the count as 159 in favor and 154 against. (Actually, the motion by Selectmen Eckstrom should never have been allowed. The moderator should have ruled it out of order because such motions are contrary to the requirements of Town Meeting Time, one of the governing procedural documents that Wareham is supposed to be using at its town meeting.) Of course the ethical thing to do would have been to reconvene a special town meeting to consider these articles, once the error was pointed out. Moderator Donahue never called for such a meeting. The incident was documented in the Wareham Courier, and the story can be found online at
wickedlocal.com: Town-Meeting-ends-after-marathon-debate.
At the very next Town Meeting, Charter Review Committee Chairman Alan Slavin stood before the legislative body on May 11, 2009, and said,
"Alan Slavin, 36 Oak Street. Chairman, Charter Review Committee. I would like to ask if the moderator would consider moving articles 45, 53 ahead of schedule please. ... I have a motion for that." ... "Thank you. Thank you to the town meeting for considering this. Ah, what we wa [would] like to do is basically take 45 through 53, which are all basically charter review items that the Charter Review Committee is presently working on and we'd like to put these all for further study. That's my motion."
It was at this meeting that Moderator John Donahue again prevented the articles from coming before town meeting voters (also known as the legislative body). He did so by preventing any debate on the issue and quickly (and improperly) moved for a vote. Robert Brady, who sponsored the articles, was ignored as he attempted to reach the microphone to argue against the motion. This action can be viewed on YouTube at Wareham Town Meeting 11 MAY 2009.
Mr. Slavin stated that night that the warrant articles were items the Charter Review Committee were presently working on. In fact, those articles had never been discussed. This false statement allowed Mr. Slavin to gain enough support by the confused electorate to pass the motion. (Technically the motion was never properly moved, just one of many problems that occurred at that town meeting that night.) It also should be noted that the Charter Review Committee never authorized Mr. Slavin to make any such motion at the town meeting.
In spite of Chairman Slavin standing before the town meeting body and speaking for the Charter Review Committee, we find the following recorded in the Charter Review Committee minutes for May 14, 2009, 3 days later, regarding the Chairman and the Citizen Petition Charter Warrant Articles:
"He stated that we are not obligated to look at them, but out of courtesy we should take the time to review them no matter what they are."
In addition to his dishonesty about the obligation placed on the committee by his actions, in fact, only one article was ever discussed by the committee. That was the article disliked intensely by Selectman Jane Donahue and Moderator John Donahue. The article in question would have prevented both Mr. and Mrs. Donahue from serving in elected positions at the same time.
The actions I have just described, which prevented debate, limited information made available to the public, and misled the public through false statements, are in opposition to our democratic ideals. As we have seen, it has been Chairman Alan Slavin of the Charter Review Committee who, along with Moderator John Donahue, has used a position of power to subvert democratic ideals during the very process being used to consider charter changes. That is why, at least for now, it would be so dangerous in Wareham to trust elected officials with legislative powers.
In the next installment of this series, I will explain why the "Special Acts" route was chosen as the means to change the charter rather than other, more democratic, means.
Why you should fear Political Power Consolidation - Part 1
