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(JANUARY 2002) I
have reached ‘zero tolerance’ for the game-playing, one up-manship,
and inefficiency that results from having quorum requirements at our
Town Meetings.
Anyone who has sat
through three or four town meeting sessions knows exactly what I
mean. Picture this. It’s a Monday evening, the second session of
an Annual Town Meeting, somewhere around 8:45 p.m., and a
controversial article comes before voters. There are 115 people in
attendance (a minimum of 100 voters needs to be present to have the
article considered), with 25 or 30 mobilized opponents of the
measure. The opponents aren’t sure they have the votes to defeat
the article, so 20 of them get up and walk out. Someone who stays
behind asks for a "house count." The tellers determine
that there are only 95 voters present in the hall, so the article
can’t be voted on. The article is dead on arrival. Once the
meeting has moved on to consider the next item of business, the 20
stray voters return (or they head off for a victory celebration
somewhere).
The opponents have
won a victory without a vote ever having been taken. And the people
who attended the town meeting, in good faith, have been denied their
chance to vote. While using ‘parliamentary procedure’ to one’s
advantage is no crime, there is something very wrong with a system
that allows this to happen.
Presently, some
town meeting articles require quorums (a minimum of 100 or 150
people for action to be taken). Typically, these involve borrowing
money or rezoning land. Some articles, though, require no quorum. In
my view, all articles belong in the ‘no quorum’ category.
Woody Allen once
said, "90% of life is showing up." That’s how it should
be for town meetings. If you show up, you get to vote. It shouldn’t
matter whether the audience consists of 1, 10 or 1000 voters.
How many hours (and
taxpayer dollars) are wasted because articles get sidelined due to a
lack of a quorum? How many times, and how many sessions, does it
take to get an article its chance to be discussed and heard? Whether
the lack of a quorum is a deliberate, politically motivated action,
such as the example I outlined earlier, or just that not enough
voters showed up, the result is still the same.
Let’s get rid of
this outdated notion that we need quorums to conduct business.
Eliminating the
quorum will offer several immediate benefits.
1.
It will virtually eliminate manipulation of the system,
where people walk out of meetings to endanger the quorum and thwart
a vote. Someone who walks out during a zero quorum vote simply
forfeits the right to vote. The rest of the audience doesn’t lose
its chance to hear the merits of the article and vote.
2.
Next, this should save taxpayer dollars. Because our town
meeting system will be more efficient, with no delays on article
consideration, town meetings will require fewer sessions and result
in lower operating costs.
3.
A zero quorum may just encourage more people to attend
town meeting. Suppose there is an article at a future town meeting
calling for the expenditure of $1,000,000 to build a new recreation
hall for our recently-approved ballfield project (Heaven help us
all!). Imagine further that, in the absence of a quorum, as few as a
half dozen people could literally decide the fate of this article. I’d
consider that strong motivation to attend town meeting and do my
part to keep my taxes (and blood pressure) from rising further. The
existence of a quorum can sometimes lull voters into a false sense
of security that one additional vote won’t make a difference.
Eliminate it and you establish an atmosphere where every vote
counts.
Opponents of the
no-quorum system might say that we can’t let matters of great
importance be decided by a handful of people— that we need the
safeguard of a minimum number to be representative of the will of
the voters.
That’s nonsense.
How representative is our current system now? Consider that,
theoretically, 51 voters can decide money issues under our present
quorum requirements (that would represent a group of 100 people in
attendance, the minimum number required). How much more
representative is 51 than 34, or 29, or whatever number shows up?
Consider this, too.
Only three votes are currently required (a majority of our Board of
Selectmen) to appoint a Fire Chief, a Police Chief, our Town
Administrator, issue a liquor license and decide which legal firm
will represent us as town counsel. A single vote can place an
individual on the Finance Committee (our Town Moderator’s
appointment). A mere five write-in votes in a Kingston election in
the 1980s seated an individual on a town board that he hadn’t even
campaigned for. It doesn’t take a lot of votes to get things done.
It just takes a climate where votes can be counted.
It’s difficult
enough to get people to participate in town meeting. Let’s not
make it more of an exercise in frustration by clinging to a quorum
requirement. Few things are more irritating to a voter (this voter,
at least!) than showing up to participate and having article after
article sidelined because not enough people are present.
My reasoning is
that, if I’ve made it to town meeting, I’ve done my part. It’s
not my responsibility to drag every living Kingstonian I know to the
elementary school to meet some arbitrary minimum voting number. The
town should recognize its obligation to embrace a system that allows
votes to be taken without delay. Zero quorum will accomplish that.
Scrapping the
quorum isn’t a total solution to fine-tuning the town meeting
process, or solving attendance problems. Eventually, Kingston may
consider options such as a Representative Town Meeting form of
government (I hope not), changing the date and time of Town Meeting,
or using a lottery system to determine the order of articles to
avoid ‘packing’ the hall by special interest groups. Who knows;
maybe one day we’ll offer prizes to stimulate attendance. I’m
kidding about that last one (although I’ve heard stranger
suggestions).
Let’s improve the
efficiency of our Town Meeting by saying good-bye to a major
impediment to progress — the outdated, unneeded quorum.
I’ll vote for that
(and, in a no-quorum forum, I might just win!)
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