Adventures in Town Government

Given my inability to attend both significant budget meetings for the Town of Tiverton, tonight, I opted to be present at the School Committee’s. For one thing, the way Tiverton’s budget process is structured, the Council’s passage of the budget is merely the first step, and not necessarily an important one. As I’ve noted, the…

Let it be noted for the public record that it is patently unfair of the Tiverton Town Council and the Tiverton School Committee to have key budget-related meetings at the same time on Tuesday evening. Should interested citizens (few as we may be) follow the doings of those most directly able to take our tax…

Some of the numbers floating about at tonight’s Tiverton Town Council meeting left me unable to suppress my guffaws. The town pays, if I heard right, $13,000 per family healthcare plan. Indeed, according to the outgoing town administrator, Glenn Steckman, the reason he included a healthcare buyback in the contract that he put forward for…

Tiverton resident Jay Lambert makes a good point in a letter in the latest edition of the Sakonnet Times: According to Mr. Medeiros, the lack of a contract with the teachers “is actually the result of the union refusing to accept the (financial) challenges we all face.” This seems to be the view of several…

An editorial in yesterday’s Newport Daily News makes an excellent point with reference to recent departures of town administrators: … the lack of information about why the (Middletown and Tiverton) administrators are departing — whether because of poor performance, personality conflicts or political pressure — is frustrating, as is the fact that neither agreement has…

My observation of Tiverton government began too recently — and I’m insufficiently inside — to really get the significance of the move, but Town Administrator Glenn Steckman offered, and the town council accepted, his resignation tonight. Apparently the “arising rift” in town government noted in recent Providence Journal coverage was more of an arisen rift.…

Thanks to Mayor Michael Napolitano (D) who has tried to summon the Ghost of Controversy Past, the front lawn in front of Cranston City Hall will not have a manger scene or any religious decorations this year. In December, 2003, then Mayor Steve Laffey (R) invited Cranston residents to place religious and seasonal decorations on…

A point of extended discussion at tonight’s Tiverton Charter Review Commission meeting was how citizens can be given some sort of budgetary power when 86% of the budget is untouchable by them because it is bound up in contracts. Looking at a flow chart of the budgetary process in Tiverton, commissioner Frank Marshall asked who…

My suggestion to have the Charter Review Commission reconsider asking the voters whether they’d like to have partisan elections was just shot down. A commission member who wasn’t here for my spiel last time, Frank “Richard” Joslin (I’m almost positive), himself a member of the town Democrat committee, spoke against me, making two points to…

Alright. I realize that a Charter Review Committee meeting is hardly likely to generate passions and intrigue, but the Tiverton town hall is mostly empty. The committee is currently discussing ways to market the meetings. The truth is that even the “big” meetings of town government types — the town council and the school committee…