Category Archives: Citizens Speak Out

Councils behaving badly; good employment prospects for dictators, riot gear manufacturers

Posted on January 2, 2012 by | 31 Comments

Happy 2012, everyone!  I know there are a lot of people reading this who have a whole lot of legitimate complaints about the state of our local government, but I’m here to tell you It Could Be Worse.

You could be in Pensacola, Florida, where the Council Chair ordered police to remove a priest from a city council meeting for criticizing the council president’s use of procedural rules to limit unflattering public comment at recent council meetings:

Oh wait, I forgot, that sort of shenanigans totally happened to us this year.

Moving on, you could be in Quartzsite, Arizona, where they share Team Clark/Nikolla/Clemence’s view that only certain legally registered voters of a municipality should be allowed to run for local office, which unfortunately led to some questionable disqualifications of otherwise eligible candidates in a recent recall election.   They also arrested two citizen speakers at their Town Council meetings this summer.   After the arrest video went viral, the council fired the Mayor (what on Earth is their Charter like?!)  put the police chief in charge of everything (can a municipality even declare Martial Law?!) and decreed that open meeting laws were suspended.   Wow.  Clearly this is a municipality we need to emulate by way of Special Legislation.

Of course, you could be living in one of the handful of deeply unfortunate cities in Michigan whose local government was taken away entirely and is now run by a state-appointed “emergency manager” that effectively functions as a municipal dictator.  From what I’ve read, it makes gentrification a breeze!   Apparently, some cities are just too poor for the privilege of a democratic process.  Certainly of interest to some well-paid local professionals: it looks like the State of Michigan has several potential employment opportunities for Municipal Dictators.  (Detroit’s days are numbered, you know.)

In other news, thousands of people with political opinions were knocked around, pepper sprayed, and/or shot with tear gas and rubber bullets this year for being a public nuisance in cities across America.

Welcome to 2012.  My word, these sure are interesting times.

→ 31 Comments

Posted in Beyond Southbridge, Citizens Speak Out, Scandal!, Utter Shamelessness

Town Council Rule #8: A Victory for Citizen Participation?

Posted on September 23, 2011 by | 16 Comments

After spending nearly two hours on one agenda item, it looks like we’ve finally got something that works for all most involved parties.  (Editor’s Note: See Marketti’s comment below.) I’m having some video editing problems tonight, but the meantime here’s the new, much more specific language for Town Council Rule #8 the General Government Subcommittee has unanimously agreed to send up to the full Council:

As provided in Chapter 2, Section 5 of the Southbridge Home Rule Charter, all inhabitants and employees of the Town shall have a reasonable opportunity to be heard at any such meeting in regard to any matter considered thereat.  For regular agenda items, each speaker shall have three minutes to speak to the agenda item at the time the agenda item is being considered. The time limit may only be extended by a majority vote of the councilors present for an additional two minutes. Each speaker will have one opportunity to speak per agenda item.  Additionally, there shall be a Citizens’ Forum which will allow citizens the opportunity to present information or address issues to the Town Council that are not regular agenda items of the meeting.  Each speaker shall have five (5) minutes to present the subject of his or her concern.  The time limit may only be extended by a majority vote of the Councilors present for an additional five minutes.  Each speaker will have one opportunity to speak at Citizens’ Forum.    

UPDATED 9/25:  I’m still working out my own video-related kinks, but in the meantime, Mr. James Sottile has graciously provided his own video work so that people can see the meeting:

Thanks again, Mr. Sottile!

This updated language for Town Council Rule #8 will be voted on at agenda item #16 at the Town Council meeting on September 26.  The agenda for Monday’s Town Council meeting is available right here.

→ 16 Comments

Posted in Citizens Speak Out, General Government Subcommittee, Meeting Agendas

Tagged

Meeting of the Whole: Maybe General Gov’t subcommittee isn’t such a bad idea after all?

Posted on September 21, 2011 by | 10 Comments

This meeting was one of those surprise 48-hour town-hall-only postings that never made it to the website, and as such, it very sparsely attended by the general public. The folks you saw up at Citizen’s Forum made up the entire audience, I believe, other than myself and the newspaper guys.

Southbridge Town Council, Meeting of the Whole, September 19, 2011

I think the best part of the entire meeting is the part where Councilor Spinelli seems to find his conscience, right there on live television. I am so proud of him for suggesting that this Rule #8 question go back to Subcommittee, which is where it was supposed to go in the first place.  (Honestly, I still have no idea what we were all doing there on Monday night.)

Brian Lee from the T&G was at the meeting, but for some reason the only thing he ended up writing about was the OML violation complaint response, which in my honest opinion, was a small and not nearly as interesting fraction of the meeting compared to everything that surrounded it, which was pretty much entirely on the topic of citizen participation at local meetings.

The General Government Subcommittee will be meeting to discuss Town Council Rule #8 and whether to limit citizen participation at meetings on Thursday, September 22 and 7pm in the Rice Conference Room at Town Hall.

In other news, I caught the the end of the EHS Subcommittee meeting tonight, and it turned out that they did not end up changing the Trash bylaw in preparation for the Trash Cop.  I really have no opinion on this particular issue, other than to say what I’ve already told everyone in town: on July 25th, when I advocated for enforcement of our trash regulations, as opposed to borrowing $240k to buy a Smart Cart for everyone in town and limiting free trash pickup to 40 gallons per week, I was NOT advocating for a Trash Cop.

I should have been more specific: I wanted (and I still want) the Health Department staff to do their jobs, and write out 21-D violations when there’s a problem that people are complaining about. We as a town are already paying for Health Department staff who are responsible for this task.  We don’t need to have a police officer in charge of this job, and we certainly don’t need to  use the old RecycleBank funds to hire new Town personnel (i.e. the Trash Cop) to write tickets. I am both embarrassed and appalled that this is going forth in an economic climate where the School Department lost their resource officer this year because of fiscal constraints. The schools are left high and dry, and meanwhile we’re raiding the RecycleBank account to hire a cop to inspect our garbage? It’s utterly disgusting, and I’m not talking about the content of the trash cans.   (Perhaps I’m biased; I really miss the RecycleBank program.)

One more thing: I’ve also got a copy of the DPW Subcommittee Meeting Agenda for Wednesday’s meeting.  (I won’t be coming, but I figured I’d throw it out there in case anyone might be interested.)

→ 10 Comments

Posted in Citizens Speak Out, EHS Subcommittee, Meeting Agendas

RIP Southbridge Town Council Rule #8?

Posted on September 17, 2011 by | Leave a comment

What’s the point of even having subcommittees these days?  First we decided to hire a Trash Cop without going through the PPP subcomittee, and now we’re going to change Rule #8 without going through General Government?  FANTASTIC.

As some of you may have already heard, we’ve got one of those previously-unannounced Council of the Whole meetings again this coming Monday.  Item #5 on the Agenda:  Discuss and vote to amend Town Council Rules and Regulations #8.   

Rule #8 is the rule concerning public input at Town Council meetings:

“As provided in Chapter 2, Section 5 of the Southbridge Home Rule Charter, all inhabitants and employees of the Town shall have a reasonable opportunity to be heard at any such meeting in regard to any matter considered thereat. Each speaker shall have five (5) minutes to present the subject of his or her concern. The time limit may only be extended by a majority vote of the Councilors present. There shall be a Citizens’ Forum which will allow citizens the opportunity to present information or address issues to the Town Council that are not regular agenda items of the meeting.”

I’m going to do what they’ve asked us to do at the last couple of meetings, and call my councilors to express my concern about this issue.   If you’re a concerned Southbridge resident and you’d like to call your councilors too, here’s a list of their phone numbers:

Denise Clemence 508-764-7642
David A. Livengood 508-765-0481
Lawrence N. Spinelli * 508-764-6294
Pamela A. Regis 508-728-4413
Conrad L. Vandal 508-764-4831
Laurent R. McDonald 508-765-1670
Darlene M. Marcucci 508-764-4126
David S. Langevin 508-764-4298
Catherine E. Nikolla 508-764-2642

Anyhow, here’s the agenda for Monday’s Council meeting:

TOWN OF SOUTHBRIDGE
SOUTHBRIDGE, MASSACHUSETTS 01550-2638

COUNCIL OF THE WHOLE
MacKINNON COUNCIL CHAMBERS
MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 19, 2011 – 7:00 PM

AGENDA

1. Call Meeting to Order
2. Roll Call
3. Citizens Forum
4. Discuss Open Meeting Law violation submitted by John Pulawski
5. Discuss and vote to amend Town Council Rules and Regulations #8.
6. Adjournment
ymt
 

Here’s a PDF if you’d like to download a copy for printing:
SEPT 19 Agenda – Council of the Whole

→ Leave a comment

Posted in Citizens Speak Out, Southbridge Town Council, Utter Shamelessness

Southbridge Citizens Speak Out!

Posted on September 13, 2011 by | 9 Comments

A group of concerned Southbridge citizens gathered on the steps of the Town Hall before the September 12 Town Council meeting to speak out in protest of the Council’s initiative to limit citizen input at Council meetings to Citizen’s Forum.

I was so pleased and surprised to see the fantastic turnout we had for the press event before the Southbridge Town Council meeting tonight.  I had expected about 20 people but I’m told that at our peak we numbered around 40.

Here’s the video:

I’ll have video of the Town Council Meeting posted sometime Tuesday night. The Town Council Meeting is posted on the Public Meeting Videos page.  In the meantime, here’s that link again to the PDF of the statement in support of our full rights to citizen participation in our government.   I’d like to collect all of these and get them assembled before the General Government Subcommittee meeting on the 20th; if you don’t know me in person, I’ve got my mailing address listed in the post below this one.

→ 9 Comments

Posted in Citizens Speak Out, Southbridge Town Council, Town Hall

Sign the statement: Let the People Speak!

Posted on September 10, 2011 by | Leave a comment

I’ve been getting a lot of phone calls since the Telegram article came out this morning, and there’s no way on God’s green Earth I am going to be able to visit everyone who wants to sign the letter to the Council before the meeting on Monday night.

That being said, I want everybody who wants to sign to have the opportunity to do so.

So, if you’re a Southbridge resident and you have a printer at home, feel free to download the letter as a PDF and sign it, along with up to 9 of your good-looking, civic-minded Southbridge friends.

If you’re planning on coming on down to Town Hall to support our full right to speak at meetings on Monday at 6pm, just bring it along with you and give it to me then.

If you can’t meet up with me in person, feel free to send your letter to my mailbox and I’ll include it with the other ones for delivery to the council sometime in the next week:

Amelia Peloquin
P.O. Box 110
100 Central Street, Suite 4
Southbridge, MA  01550

In the meantime, have a great weekend, everyone!  :)

→ Leave a comment

Posted in Citizens Speak Out, Town Hall

Tagged

Democracy and Local Government: Fearing the People’s Voice

Posted on September 10, 2011 by | 1 Comment

SOUTHBRIDGE, MASSACHUSETTS, USA, September 9th, 2011 - A coalition of concerned citizens from the Town of Southbridge, Massachusetts are calling a press conference to voice their opposition to what they feel is an egregious violation of their right to free speech and their rights to participatory government under the Southbridge Home Rule Charter. Recent pronouncements by Town Council Chair Catherine Nikolla suggest a dramatic change in the way Town Council meetings will be conducted: citizens are no longer to be allowed to speak on agenda items and/or other issues as they are presented. Chairwoman Nikolla has announced that it is her intent to have citizens address the council in a single section of the meeting, referred to as Citizens’ Forum.

Continue reading →

→ 1 Comment

Posted in Citizens Speak Out, Town Hall