Town Meeting Voting History - Fall 2019
As promised, the record of my votes from Fall Town Meeting activities. I’ll continue to improve the formatting and search capabilities on these voting records over time, but for now I’ve posted them here in this format just to have them available for constituents. This includes votes on the primary motions, as well as votes on procedural activities (such as whether to limit debate by moving a given question or whether to approve various amendments and floor amendments/motions). Also note that these votes are self-reported, though you may cross reference against the Moderator’s notes if applicable, or against video livestreams of the session that may capture various votes of mine if/when I appear on camera. I may at times include commentary about my thought process on why I voted as I did for a particular motion if I feel it wasn’t self explanatory. Also note that this is only a running list of how I voted, not whether a given article, motion, amendment, or proposal passed or failed.
Town Meeting Voting History
Special Town Meeting
Fall 2019
Night 1
Motion for Michael Riley to act as temporary Moderator while Moderator Hern recuses himself
Main Motion - Yes
Article 1
Motion to Move Question - Yes
Main Motion - Yes
Article 2
Main Motion - Yes
Article 3
Motion to Move Question - Present
Main Motion - Yes
Article 4
Motion to Move Question - Present
Main Motion - Yes
Article 5
Motion to Move Question - Yes
Main Motion - Yes
Motion To Adjourn to 8:20pm
Main Motion - Yes
Motion to Adjourn to next week
Main Motion - Yes
Night 2
Motion To Move Article 10 Forward in the Agenda
Main Motion - Yes
Article 10
Move Question - Present
Main Motion - Yes
Article 6
Main Motion - Yes
Article 7
Move Question - Present
Main Motion - Yes
Article 8
Move Question - Present
Main Motion - Yes
Article 9
Main Motion - Yes
(Article 10 taken out of order to earlier position in the Agenda)
Article 11
Main Motion - Yes
Article 12
Main Motion - Yes
Article 13
Main Motion - Yes
Article 14
Motion to Accept the Report of the Rules Committee
Main Motion - Yes
Article 14 Motion A
Move Question - Present
Main Motion - Present (Selectman Plasko raised some very good procedural points, but so did Moderator Hern. As well as the concerns raised by other Members, and their ideas for ways to mitigate possible problems. I think either implementation - registered speakers or calling on the group - can result in forms of the minority opinion getting silenced inadvertently. Allowing registered speakers can result in no back and forth if everyone speakers their opinions but can’t respond to each other’s opinions because once they’re done everyone’s “tired of hearing about it” and the first motion is to move the question. Opinions without rebuttals is not a “discussion”. Conversely however, if a Town Meeting session is running multiple nights with many articles, and you have no Registered speaker procedure, those later articles may get no debate if the Moderator calls on the first or 2nd person and they move the question and the Body goes along with it not because they’re tired of that topic, but tired of being in session at Town Meeting in general. I’d love to say that everyone stays rock solid in attention span for every single night … I mean personally I find Town Meeting sessions infinitely fascinating and assume my constituents are counting on me to be alert and attentive. But I’ve also seen the Body fail to reach quorum for a football game too. Ultimately I could not decide which situation was worse, having or not having registered speakers. In the absence of prior Constituent feedback, I voted Present to defer the results to the Body of the assembled Town Meeting this night. I would have however liked that motion suggested by Moderator Hern to amend the language for “not withstanding” to avoid contradictions in legal language, but ironically the Question had already been moved and we had to vote heh.)
Article 14 Motion B
On Amendment to Motion B, to strike 5 to 3 on Holds
Move Question - Present
Amendment Motion - Present (This might seem like an odd choice of vote from me, right? After all, I was in favor of a lower number, and debated adamantly in favor of lower numbers during Committee meetings … particularly after learning that the process of forming the Consent Agenda results in the ability to slip Conflicts of Interest through undeclared. But ultimately I am still strongly in favor of 1 person holds to support the authority of Town Meeting Members to legislate and support the Commonwealth’s Constitutional Right of Free Petition. One person is not “one person”, they are the representative of thousands of constituents in their District. And even if they were one person, that is their Constitutional Right of petition. If an individual wants to see something discussed, it is their right to their 5 minutes of tyranny before someone moves the question on them - and a person who abuses this for sabotage purposes rather than genuine discussion will make fast enemies within the Body for subsequent Town Meeting activities. Seeing satisfactory support in the Chamber for a lower number, I did not see the need to vote yes to a Motion of 3 and give the false impression that I favor anything above 1. Nor did I want to vote against it and imply that I wanted 5. I also wanted it to be clear that the motion to lower the number came not from me, but from the Body on its own. So with those things in mind, I voted Present.)
Move Question - Yes
Main Motion - Yes
Article 14 Motion C
Move Question - Yes
Main Motion - Yes
Article 15
Main Motion - Yes
Motion to Dissolve Fall Special Town Meeting
(Shout out of gratitude to fellow District 7 Member Connolly for his 18 years of civic service in Town Meeting <3 )
Main Motion - Yes