The Charlestown Town Council Limits Public Participation

The Charlestown Town Council has quietly initiated another new policy. Now the Town Council will drastically restrict citizen participation in its meetings when business matters are being discussed.

The new policy was announced at the Town Council meeting on June 12 when those waiting to speak were told that members of the public could speak only once for 2 minutes. The Town Council president announced the new policy one day later in a meeting of the Charter Revision Advisory Committee, a committee where no public comment is allowed at all.

This is not the procedure followed by previous councils for at least a decade, nor has it been the procedure followed by the new Town Council for the past 6 months.

This new policy limiting public input is contrary to the intent of Chapter 15 of our town ordinance, entitled “Town Meetings.” Chapter 15 states, in paragraph 12, the following.

“Any person addressing the Town Council shall, while speaking, be subject to the same rules and shall be entitled to the same privileges or order as pertains to a member of the Town Council…..”

The rules and privileges for members of the public depend on those that apply to the members of the Town Council itself, as is clearly stated in paragraph 11 of Chapter 15:

“No member shall speak more than once on the same question until all members desiring to speak thereon shall have done so, and in no event shall a member speak more than twice on any question.”

Thus, severely limiting citizen input is a jaw-dropping change, especially because Councilor Stephen Stokes had written on the same day, June 12, in a Letter to the Editor of the Westerly Sun (entitled “An open, transparent process in Charlestown”) that the new Town Council participates in discussions and debates and considers facts from multiple sources.

How then will the Town Council obtain facts from multiple sources? Who are these sources, and why is the public not one of the sources? How will real discussions and debates occur when members of the public are not able to participate fully?

Allowing citizens to ask questions, provide input, and offer comments is essential to an open and transparent government. Not gathering the information available and then weighing all the evidence in order to make considered decisions is not transparent, is not in the best interests of the citizens of the town, and also makes no sense.

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Bonnie Van Slyke, the author of this post, was a member of the Charlestown Town Council from 2014 to 2022. She was the Town Council Liaison to the Planning Commission, Parks and Recreation Commission, and Senior Citizens Commission. She is a former officer and member of the Board of Directors of the Frosty Drew Observatory & Science Center, a former Chair of the Zoning Board of Appeals in Harvard, MA and a former member of the Board of Trustees of the Harvard Conservation Trust. Bonnie is a freelance copy editor, technical writer, and publications specialist. Bonnie writes occasionally about governance issues in Charlestown.