Proposition 2 1/2, qualities of a town administrator, and how to clean up unsightly buildings were among the topics discussed at Wareham Community Television's first ever Board of Selectmen candidates debate on Thursday, March 29.

Moderated by WCTV Executive Director Jay Heard, the debate featured questions from a panel of journalists from the Standard-Times, the Wareham Courier, and Wareham Week.

Selectmen-hopefuls Amit Johar and Peter Teitelbaum, who are vying for the two-year seat vacated by resigned Selectman Michael Schneider sounded off, along with three-year Selectmen candidate Alan Slavin.

Three-year candidate Bruce Sauvageau was recently released from the hospital after an illness and could not attend, Heard explained. Three-year candidate David Smith was called into work, Heard said.

Here's a summary of the questions and responses. The candidates' answers were listed in the order they were spoken.

A few of the questions from the panelists:

An outgoing Selectman has said that he and his family were harassed and persecuted because of his political viewpoints in his service to the community. Did you consider that before deciding to run and does it concern you going forward? - Steve DeCosta, Standard-Times

"Not in the least. With regard to the past situation that we've heard about, if this did happen, I regret that it happened. However, I was a bit disappointed that the charges were made, but yet not reported. And by that I mean, I would have hoped that the outgoing Selectman would have told the school administrators about the problem ... and set it up so that this could be dealt with to avoid such bullying incidents in the future. Personally, I grew up in this town. As far as bullying goes, I was in the Wareham Public Schools with a funny last name, I was a chubby kid, and I wore glasses. So, I've already had my bullying at that age. Got it out of the way when I was a kid and I'm not too worried about it now." - Peter Teitelbaum

"Anybody who runs for public office is going to be under a lot of scrutiny and it's really open season. You have to basically accept that as part of the job. If you're thin-skinned, it's not something you need to do. You basically know who you are and what you are and you have to deal with it. This is a problem that's existed not for the one Selectmen that's just left. This also goes on currently for one of the Selectmen in place with their children. It's been effect for awhile. It's unfortunate, but you have to be able to deal with it." - Alan Slavin

"I think it's unfortunate that in ... 2012, we're running into such situations. I think the Board of Selectmen, since we are the leaders of the community, we have to step up and be able to condemn this and [be] a role model for a lot of those situations that are happening under the scenes. I'm pretty familiar with this issue. I've been harassed. As you can see, I'm the first generation from India. I've dealt with a fair amount of discrimination in my lifetime and I can tell you it's unfortunate, but at the same time, I understand there's all sorts of viewpoints that are out there and as a leader we need to be able to put that aside and set an example for everybody else because not everybody thinks the same exact way." - Amit Johar

The School Committee has proposed a Proposition 2 1/2 override to avoid teacher layoffs and Proposition 2 1/2 debt exclusions to fund textbooks and technology, school buses, a feasibility study for repairs to Minot Forest Elementary, and to repair the high school roof. How do you feel about these Proposition 2 1/2 proposals? Are they necessary? Are they other solutions that we should be looking at? - Jaime Rebhan, Wareham Week

"The School [Department] basically is going to be funded at a level less than what they asked for, which is $27 million. I believe the figure now is already down to $25 million, ... which is over two-and-a-half-million short of what they were looking for. The School Department has decided to go through with these particular procedures in order to make up some of the difference that they need. These particular items are going to have to be made by the decision of the electorate, basically Town Meeting is going to vote whether or not to bring them forward and I, as a Selectman if I'm in that position would definitely vote to go ahead and put it on the ballot and let the people make the decision. This is a critical decision about the educational system of the town and this is probably the beginning of dismantling of an education system depending on what we do. This is the future of Wareham and the future of the children." - Alan Slavin

"I've said it over and over, I'm absolutely against this option right now. We're not sitting in the '90s folks, the reality is the price of gas has gone up to $4 bucks, everything is expensive at this point. Now to load up more in [the] form of taxation on the taxpayers whose students could potentially not be utilizing the services just doesn't seem like a fair system to me. So, my position on this is absolutely not for the time being. We can't just tax our way out of this problem. This problem exists because we didn't plan appropriately. ... We should have prepared for this in advance. Any good planner can tell you this, you always look five years ahead. ... As far as raising this, you know what, if this was in the '90s I would have agreed to it, I would have been open to it, but at this point it's an absolute no. ... We need to work on our economic development so we can afford to fund the schools." - Amit Johar

"I think everybody acknowledges that we are in a very difficult economic climate, a particularly difficult one for the School Committee to be coming to Town Meeting and requesting overrides. That said, I think that ... to treat [the proposals] as a blanket, one-step proposal really isn't the way to look at them and I'm glad that they've come with different proposals because I think that the different proposals have different merits, possibly. I don't understand at this time why we're looking to buy more school buses. I understand that we have a ... bus needs study committee. I'm waiting for that report. .. I don't see the point in buying buses if we don't even know we're going to stay in the school bus business. ... I'm concerned that we are looking to fund curriculum through an override. I would much prefer to go into Town Meeting and work on that. That is a basic structural component of education. That's not an exceptional circumstance." - Peter Teitelbaum

Wareham needs a new town administrator. What qualities do you think are the most important? - Ashleigh Bennett, Wareham Courier

"Somebody who's going to be able to come in and be able to handle the books. Experience will be one of those critical items. Secondly, he's got to come in and hit the ground running. That means a lot of interaction with everybody else. You're not going to be spending time just behind the books, you'll also be talking with a lot of people trying to grasp a lot of information. ... I really hope he's a people-person. I hope he has a deep understanding of the finances. ... We can do without a manager. We cannot do without a leader. Somebody who's going to fit into those shoes has to be a leader, not just be able to manage." - Amit Johar

"In my view, the ideal town administrator is going to be somebody who's willing to work with the Selectmen in identifying the areas where we presently lack appropriate policies and procedures. I think a lot of our budget problems stem from the fact that I can't point to a single document that the Selectmen have created that says, 'we have this deadline here, we have this deadline here, we have that deadline there.' So we need somebody who's got some experience, who can guide the board and work with the board to develop those policies and then, as the town administrator, adhere to those policies. I think, too, that we don't have enough policy for managing our employees and I think that's something the town administrator needs to do. ... I would like to see us come up with some more concrete policies for how we hire, how we advertise, how we train, how we discipline, how we work with employees, and ultimately, how we terminate them." - Peter Teitelbaum

"The town administrator is going to be critical going forward. The town administrator can either make or break the whole process and how it works. He can make the Selectmen's job much easier, he can make everybody's job much easier. The basic town administrator is going to have to be able to do the day-to-day following the policies and understand the use of tax dollars and understand how to use those dollars efficiently. They're going to have to have an understanding of public safety, of education and how it effects economic development. They're going to have to understand what the critical role the infrastructure plays. ... One area where we really miss a lot is how to communicate. We don't communicate properly with the public. That's an area the town administrator is going to have to do a really strong job because he's going to have to sell what he does. So, communication is going to be extremely important and that includes the residents, the voters, the employers, and all town bodies. And the last thing is we need someone with proven experience. We can't get someone in that doesn't have the experience to make it work." - Alan Slavin

Do you believe that the current dual fire district system remains in the community's best interest or do you think that there might be a more economical way to provide fire and water services? - Steve DeCosta, Standard-Times

"It's interesting. We do have some duplication of services, but as a Selectman, that's really not our purview to get into. We have separate districts. The only way that we're going to see those separate districts merge as one or become under the town purview, become subject to the same administration as we have with our other town departments is for them to vote themselves out of existence. So, as a Selectman, it's really not going to be our purview to say to them, 'Well, you guys need to make yourselves go away' because that's essentially what we would be asking. ... They do a pretty darn good job of firefighting in this town and I don't know that voters would be really happy to abandon this sort of dual system that we have." - Peter Teitelbaum

"There's a long history. ... This is a question which I got into when we were discussing possible public safety complexes. ... Onset has expressed the feeling that they really want to stay separate. This is something that can't be forced on them. As a Selectman of the Town of Wareham, you can't. It's beyond your purview. This is something that everybody has to sit down and speak about sometime. If they want to do it, they'll do it. As of right now, the answer is no." - Alan Slavin

"The fact that we have dual systems working at once, I think this is more of a decision from a financial perspective to our town administrator. And secondly, like Alan said, there's already history in place. This is probably a decision that belongs in the Town Meeting as far as any decision making is concerned and ... this is not a simple cut decision that you can say 'consolidate and streamline the whole process." I think this one is something that belongs in the Town Meeting as well as between the town administrator." - Amit Johar

Panelists read questions e-mailed to WCTV before the debate. Two of those questions follow.

When our Town Charter was recently reviewed, we explored having a mayoral form of government with councilors instead of Town Meeting. What was your position when the matter was being discussed and how do you feel about the issue now?

"I don't know much about the charter review and I wasn't following it back then. Again, I'm a business owner. Not many people are observing exactly what's happening out there in terms of our Charter. You really have to be into it to be able to follow it. So I'm like any normal person out there. I don't know much about the matter and I have no position on that." - Amit Johar

"I didn't support it at the time and I wouldn't support it now. What we have in our Town Meeting is one of the last vestiges of a true representative democracy. Every citizen, every voter can be a legislator. The whole mayoral/city council thing, it puts you in the position as a citizen of not being able to perform any direct action. You can't go to Town Meeting and speak directly, you have to go to city council meetings and wait to be recognized, and then talk to your city council and hope that they listen to you. ... Our Town Meeting is the legislature. We are the 'Congress' of Wareham and I understand too that the Selectmen at Town Meeting are also citizen legislators just as the body is. They have no more power in Town Meeting, they have no less power. Everybody is equal. I prefer that as a true representative form of democracy and I would not want to change it." - Peter Teitelbaum

"As everybody knows, I chaired the Charter Review Committee. The Charter Review Committee when it was put together very quickly decided by the majority of six out of nine members ... that they wanted to go for a mayor and town council. My feeling was at the time that I thought a Representative Town Meeting might solve some of the issues we had. I really haven't changed my mind as far as that goes. I like Town Meeting, I understand how it works. It's very daunting for a lot of people because it gets a little aggressive. It's almost like an arena, but it's actually quite enjoyable as long as the discussion is on target. The advantages of having a Representative Town Meeting is you have usually around 250 people who are elected in the area, which represent other people ... and therefore the Representative Town Meeting might eliminate problems where you don't have a quorum, and this is the reason why I still think that's a possibility. It's a reasonable change. Town Meeting as it runs right now is fine as long as you understand how it works." - Alan Slavin

What is your plan to clean up Wareham and Onset? Can the owners of the many abandoned, dangerous, and unsightly buildings be made to fix them or tear them down?

"I would say that under our current bylaws, I don't know that there is all that much we can do. If [the sender] would like to see us advance some bylaws that do require a certain level of care to be taken with a property, a way for us to go after dilapidated properties, and to deal with them, then I would 100% support such an effort, but it's very difficult in a town to figure out what to do with these properties. Many of them have been abandoned for years and don't really have much to do with the current economic downturn that we've been in for the last few years. They're simply properties that nobody wants. They're a mess, they're fire hazards. I think that possibly we could get into condemning the properties and doing something, but we really need to look at setting forth a regulatory framework for dealing with dilapidated properties." - Peter Teitelbaum

"The issue is very difficult because there are so many legal questions when you go to do this. You just can't go in and take a piece of property and remove it, rebuild it, whatever. We all know if you go down Sandwich Road where the particular house burned down next to a really nice house, the clean-up there has been going on for a year plus. The Board of Health has regulations that actually deals with all this, but even the Board of Health, with their legal powers, ... it is not something you can just put through there. It costs the town money. The town would have to put some appropriation together to help out. I believe someone was talking about an article at some time, looking to put funds aside for this, but again you just can't go in. If someone is the legal owner of that property, even if it's dilapidated, the Board of Health has to go through a process before you can do anything. The town really needs to go look at it and if the town ... wants to do something, you're probably going to have to do what you call zoning bylaw changes." - Alan Slavin

"If our current bylaws are not addressing some of these properties, we need to do a better job, as we are leaders in this community. ... Certainly we need to do a better job of establishing that framework so that you don't have slumlords just leaving properties behind. ... If it's a matter of just framework, I think we should certainly establish that. Let's face it, Onset is a beautiful place and it's a tourist attraction, and the fact that there's abandoned properties, I can't imagine the negative impact it's having on the rest of the properties that are there. So I think certainly the regulatory framework, but at the same time the owners need to take a little more responsibility of their own actions with their investments. I think it's a two-fold approach and it's going to have to be a partnership between ownership, owners, as well as the local town authorities." - Amit Johar

Candidates got the opportunity to ask each other questions. Alan Slavin chose not to ask a question, as he is not running against the two other candidates who attended the debate.

Amit Johar to Peter Teitelbaum: A month back, nobody knew me. Nobody knew where I lived, and all of a sudden I popped up on the radar and ... I guess a lot of enemies have been born. I'm hearing some really vicious attacks in terms of racial slurs that are coming towards me, and yet I'm not seeing anybody stepping up as far as the candidates are concerned, stepping up and condemning this. What kind of role model or what kind of leadership are we really demonstrating to the youth or to the community at this point?

Peter Teitelbaum: "I would refer you to then to my website, teitelbaum-selectman.com. I actually put a statement on there saying that I do welcome every race, every creed, every person. So, I think I've addressed your concern about whether I'm leading on that issue."

Moderator Jay Heard gave Alan Slavin an opportunity to weigh in.

Alan Slavin: "The problem we have is, is if you sit there and respond or not, most of this stuff is coming through the blogs, and as everybody knows, I don't participate. Never have, never will. To participate in the blogs, whatever you say is more fodder and it just keeps going. ... I've made the comment many times, I don't care what [color your skin is], all I care is if you cut that skin, it's red, we're all the same."

Peter Teitelbaum to Amit Johar: We all got to do our WCTV candidate blurbs and I noticed during your portion you discussed what I think you described [as] "mountains of regulations" in Wareham that frustrate people who try to get things done in town -- business owners, people who try to go before boards. Could you identify some specific regulations that the town imposes that you would like to get rid of and also by what process you would get rid of them?

Amit Johar: "Being a small business owner, I understand this pain centrally. If you take just a walk through some of either Onset [and] talk to some of these businesses [or] go down to Cranberry Highway and speak to them. There is a major gap with [the] understanding that's out there right now that we are business friendly. There is [a] major gap between what we're advocating as to what's happening in the community. And it's pretty evident when 25 businesses open right across the street without us even being considered. So, as far as the process is concerned, ... there are things in place for example ... New York has something really good ... they have an economic development director who ... if a business wants to open up, they will walk them through the licensing process, and I think that friendly process will not only expedite, but it will get the desperately-needed revenue in this town."