HomeMy WebLinkAbout_06182018-6332Town Government Study Committee
Minutes of the meeting of June 18, 2018. The meeting took place in the Public Safety Facility Training
Room, 4 Fairgrounds Road, Nantucket, MA 02554. Members of the committee present were: Rick
Atherton, John Brescher, Penny Dey, Kristie Ferrantella, Richard Ray and Tucker Holland. Linda Williams
arrived at 1:45.
Also Present: Andrew Vorce, Director of Planning
1. Chair John Brescher called the meeting to order at 1:31 with a quorum.
2.Agenda: Penny Dey moved approval of the agenda, seconded by Rick Atherton. All voted in
favor.
3.Minutes: Rick A made a motion to approve the minutes from the May 21st meeting. Seconded
by Kristie. All voted in favor.
4.Public Comment: None.
5.Discussion with Andrew Vorce about the Town charter and any issues that he might wish us to
address. Andrew has been here in planning for 25 years, gave us some of his background. He
would hope that we are able to work on the bigger picture items that affect the Town. It is a
disservice not to have our minutes posted for the entire year with which we agreed (whose job
is it to make sure these are posted as they are supposed to be?). The charter should be focusing
on the structure and organization of government. He does not believe that our charge is to be
focusing on smaller departmental or management issues. Andrew raised the issue of “code
enforcement” and asked if it is more of an administrative issue? Rick gave some examples of
concerns about code enforcement which may have given rise to the issue. Andrew pointed out
the relevance between the level of staffing and funding and budgeting. Andrew suggests that
we be wary of putting administrative procedures into a charter.
Richard suggests that the charter should reflect that PLUS encompasses the Building
Department, HDC and Zoning. Andrew did not agree with this. He brought up other examples
with other departments where a similar situation would apply as well. When the PLUS
agreement was developed it was fully vetted with Town Counsel. There was some discussion
about making sure that the Town Manager has the flexibility to organize departments in the
most effective way without requiring a change to the charter. Tucker suggested that having
documents, such as an organizational chart, outside of the charter would certainly be helpful to
many people to understand how the process works.
Andrew brought up the issue of license applications and asked why this could not be delegated?
The TGSC agreed that there are other ways to configure the licensing issue. Some discussion
followed about the Planning Board alternate position(s) of which there are three. Andrew
reminded us that this was established by a special act of the state legislature. Having 3 positions
also reduced the likelihood of inherent conflicts on particular applications.
Andrew opened it for questions. Rick asked whether Andrew had any particular feeling about
going to a different form of government. Andrew supports strengthening the professionalism
and capabilities of the Town Manager. He did say that he feels that the Select Board needs to
focus less on smaller matters and more on their larger role of policy setting. The more the
charter can separate these issues, the better. Andrew pointed out that the current boards are
very open to joint meetings (NP&EDC, Planning and the Select Board) which is a positive thing.
Perhaps there should be some specific criteria about when we hold the town meetings (annual
and special). Penny commented that she did part of the review of the Dedham charter and they
have very specific guidelines about their two scheduled town meetings each year. Richard
brought up the issue of having a separate town meeting for zoning articles. Andrew says he is
not in favor of this as zoning is part of the overall business of the Town. There is a danger of
more special interest attendance should we separate zoning out from the regular town meeting.
Some discussion followed about the 2/3 standard for zoning articles and most people agreed
that this makes sense. Andrew was asked how he felt about a representative form of town
meeting. He is not a supporter for various reasons: including getting the precincts right, would
people fall through the cracks, would it take even longer to get anything done? There was some
discussion from Tucker about “Australian ballots” as a method for people to vote privately on
articles/issues. Some of us would “miss the drama” of our town meeting system. Richard
pointed out that people “cherish their vote”.
Rick raised the issue of changing the composition of the Audit Committee to include 3 citizens.
We also discussed including a non-voter taxpayer seat on the Audit Committee. Andrew
commented that the charter vests a lot of authority with the Select Board. He pointed out that
there are some positive things about having a shared appointing authority (for instance the
Select Board and the Finance Committee). Andrew brought up the issue of amendments to the
charter (6.5b) – sends on to the state – maybe this could be clearer or more focused. Andrew
agreed that he would take a look at the charter in broader terms and get back to us with any
other suggestions. John mentioned that we are still waiting to hear back from Lauren Goldberg
with her recommendations for the charter update as well. We will specifically ask her for some
alternate recommendations on how to set up a licensing board.
6. Reviewed the list of the review topics. It was decided to wait until a future meeting to discuss
the review topics.
7.The date and time of the next meeting is: Monday, June 25th, 2018 at 1:30 PM, same location.
8.Penny mentioned that this is her final meeting and thanked her colleagues. The TGSC thanked
her for her service.
9.Penny made a motion to adjourn the meeting, seconded by Rick, all voted in favor.
The meeting was adjourned at 2:15 P.M.
Respectfully Submitted,
Penny Dey, Recording Secretary