Meredith SB-2 petition
 

Both the Meredith Center Store and George's Dinner have the SB-2 petition for any Meredith resident if you care to sign it. It was easy, took about one minute, and the nice lady behind the counter even lent me a pen to use.

There are actually two petitions, one for Meredith school business, and one for Meredith town business, and the two petitions need your signature and address.

What is SB-2, which stands for Senate Bill 2? It would change the method for voting from the existing town meeting style to a ballot style similar to how we vote for candidates.

Typically, the town meeting style is done at the end of the town meeting held on the 2nd tuesday night in March. It can easily be 10pm before a vote is taken, and then it's done by a show of hands in the open town meeting.

Typically, the SB-2 ballot style would also be done on the second Tuesday of March in the Community Center but from between 7am-7pm, with a private booth, paper ballot.

With SB-2, absentee voting is possible so that people in the military, or people in Florida for the winter for example, could vote.

Alton, Gilford and other towns have chosen the SB-2 system.

How do I know about this? First off, I personally have absolutely nothing to do with creating the petition. I am just a forum blabbermouth who likes to read the Laconia Daily Sun. After reading a letter to the editor in today's LaDaSun, I stopped at George's Dinner, and sure enough, the very nice lady behind the counter handed me the two petitions to read and sign. Did not cost me even a dime!

Here's a quote I found in www.democracyfornewhampshire.com, written by paul 01/17/2007
......................................

I agree with Cosy - SB 2 is an improvement. For 20 years starting in 1973 I lived mostly in Amherst and Milford and recall the Town Meeting approach as quaint and in its' way charming...but dominated by the few, and subject to intimidation and manipulaton. And decisions were made by an appallingly small percentage of town residents.

The notion that traditional Town Meeting participants are better informed, and thus better able to reach the right decision may sometimes be true. But this is still the rule of minority. And often the winning decision isn't necessarily that of the "informed": winners are often "townies" or residents who have been in town the longest, or those who have a strong attachment to a position or benefit from it, or those who can pack the hall with supporters. I recall a case where nursing homes were emptied and seniors bused in, by a well organized effort over a school issue, that blocked many citizens from access to the hall.

The fundamenal principle of our Democracy is that each American has the right to cast a vote. The constitution does not say "an informed vote" and often we pay the price for a poorly informed, misled, or apathetic electorate. The proper way to address this is to engage the electorate, not to hope that they don't turn out - or worse, erect barriers.

We should always support methods of Democratic decision making that permit and encourage the most citizens to participate. Traditional Town Meeting has many barriers to participation that SB 2 tears down. The requirement that one be present at a particular date and time to vote; that one must endure long and uncomfortable meetings; that one must stay to the end lest something happen after most people have left, subverting the will of the majority; that one's opinions and votes are not necessarily confidential; that one can be subject to harrassment and intimidation and that due to constrained facilities and fire codes, only a small portion of the electorate can physically participate.

The voting machine issue is a seperate topic. I am deeply concerned about them as anyone. But the first principle is to let people vote. How we count the votes is a vitally important detail, but it cannot subvert the principle.

We can find appropriate ways to count under SB 2. That issue should not be a barrier to the benefits of SB 2 for more communities.
..............................

Is Meredith in a SAU situation with other towns?

Just wondering, because Alton is in a JMA (joint maintenance agreement) with Barnstead for the high school and it's sorta a pain with getting warrant articles to the public hearings, etc. on time where Alton is SB-2 and Barnstead is not. (I'm not saying one is better than the other - just that there's some scheduling differences that can create opportunities/problems.)

Yes, my very limited local school knowledge says that Interlakes High School located in Meredith, grades 9-12, is a school administration unit for Sandwich, Center Harbor and Meredith students.

...going nowhere fast!
 

I stopped into George's Diner late today to see what progress the petition was making, and since my signing it last Monday, a total of just one individual has added their name. That's terrible progress, and it is doomed to fail at this rate.

Meredith has something like 5500 residents. Both Alton and Gilford have switched over to SB-2, so it is probably doable in Meredith, too.

Maybe trying a different marketing approach is worth a try? How about having some friendly, out-going, energetic person like myself, stand out in front of the Rite Aid with a clip board and a copy of the petition for residents to sign?

Going directly to the residents has got to be more effective than trying to get them to go to the Meredith Center Store or George's Diner. 8 1/2 x 11" hand-out SB-2 info sheets for people who are on-the-fence could be helpfull.

Give me a private message or email, and I'll volunteer a 12 hour shift on Monday, Dec 24, which is probably a busy day at the Rite Aid.

In Gilford, the police department recently voted to join the International Brotherhood of Teamsters for union representation in their job bargaining with the town. An argument can be made that no one knows the local town management better than the police dept, and with the school dep a close second.

Without the much higher voter turn-out which SB-2 creates, it is just too easy for a small number of committed residents to attend the town meeting and sway the vote.

In the past few years, important items such as a new Meredith police station, new community center, and new million dollar football field w/ no bleacher seats were all passed at the annual town meeting.

So, it would appear that all the police, teachers, and municiple employees are all better organized than the resident population, the peoples who pay the tax bill.

As it is now without SB-2, if you want your vote to count on non-candidate issues, then you need to show up to the 2nd Tuesday in March, town meeting, and vote.

And, a Merry Christmas to everybody!

I agree with you FLL. You get a lot more people voting and not just the special interests in a SB2 town than just town meeting. Some of the police, fire, teachers, etc. don't like it because they cannot sway the vote quiet as easily by packing the meetings. Hopefully the public will make a point to be more informed so they will know what they are voting for. Good luck, I hope you get it.
Someone brought to my attention a listing of the top schools and I was surprised that Gilford didn't rate that well. I thought Gilford spent a lot of money on their schools. Carpenter in Wolfeboro was number 8 I think and Tuftonboro was just a couple behind. I shouldn't quote numbers because I am not sure, but they were right up there.

SB2 is a good thing. I've heard that Gilford schools have been slipping recently, but I don't know how true that really is.

SB 2 and Gilford
 

I am a long time Gilfrod resident >25 years, and support the SB2 method of managing spending by plebisite. Before SB 2, the town meetings were dominated by special interest groups (supporters of some particular spending item) who dominated the meeting and intimidated by rudeness anyone who was not seen as supporting of their interests (personal or family salaries as town employees,facilities,other projects). I do not know how other towns meetings are run, but having sat thru several at Gilford, I would be surprised if they are much different.

Gilford schools, stand as proof that you can't buy good education. Gilford is one of the top 10% of the districts in spending per pupil, and yet the preformance (standard tests) indicates mediocure results. Our school administration and leadership would be sacked in a commercial world, where failure to perform and wasting money is not acceptable. Unless Gilford gets new leadership, we will continue to spend and waste more on compensation thus continuing to reward poor performance.

Education presents a :) one time opportunity, you can't do it over, so you must do it well the first and only time.

Wish we'd had SB2 in Meredith before we built the police station and community center......each of them would serve cities 10 times the size of Meredith.

Next on the list is Moultonboro, they already have their gigantic new town hall, new library and new police fire station, now they are pushing hard for a community center.

Wonder if Moultonboro would consider renting from Meredith?

Dreamer, me....

Your choices in Meredith under SB2 for something like a new police station will be whether the chief's door has right hand hinges or left hand hinges.

Town meeting is one of the purest forms of democracy in this country. There is nothing so sweet as an article appropriating $10,000 being amended to $7000 by the citizens on the floor of a town meeting. With schemes like SB2, you lose this ability, subjugating your rights to a few elected people, who will absolutely be influenced by special interests and their interpretation of the "greater good".

Schemes like SB2 are dreamed up by Massachusetts transplants who were driven out of their home state because it has gotten so expensive, yet are only comfortable with a bunch of criminal legislators spending their money. They are too lazy to get involved themselves, and get upset when they see their neighbors doing it at town meeting.

Happy New Year

Yuh...right,ITD.......you mean there is nothing like 20 voters (all with something to gain) approving a 3 million dollar project at 11;00 pm,when most working folks have gone to bed.
GET OUT THERE FLL.....we need ya' buddy

Could not have said it any better.

SB-2 Petition
 

I live in Wolfeboro, and Wolfeboro is an SB-2 town. I lived elswhere for 25plus years in a town meeting vote town, and I lived in Wolfeboro when it was a town meeting vote town, and there are pluses and minuses to the SB-2 form of voting. The opportunity for more people to vote, the day time voting, the absentee voting - all of these are pluses, but the biggest minus is the loss of discussion about an article, and the ability to do someting based on that discussion. I know, I know, there is a deliberative session several days before the vote, and each article can be discussed then, and some changes can be made, but nothing beats a well-moderated discussion right at the time of the vote. You know, in politics it isn't always what is WRITTEN in the Article, sometimes it is WHO is behind the Article. In the town I lived in away from Wolfeboro, the town meeting moderator would require a sponsor of any article to speak to the point of that article as the first speaker, then others could discuss it back and forth. If a sponsor didn't speak, the moderator would rule the article out of order and go on to the next article. At the deliberative sessions there is usually some explanation, but not the good old discussion you need to really find out the WHO behind an article.

So, if you are activly trying to go SB-2, be prepared to give up some of the privileges of discussion you have now.

As far as I can tell,

(1) 25 signatures & addresses of residents,

(2) and to be handed in to selectmen 5 weeks before town meeting,


is what it takes to get an SB2 petiton item on the ballot.

With a Meredith population at about 6000 people, getting 25 voters to walk into either the Meredith Center Store or George's Diner and ask to sign the two petitions should not be too difficult to do. It's not hard to find people who are unhappy with their property taxes, and want to do something about it.

What I do not know is how the ballot is handled. Is a vote held in the town meeting by a show of hands, or on a paper ballot as a seperate petition article where the voters go to the Community Center on the 2nd Tuesday in March, March 11, from 7am-7pm, or what?

What am I missing here? What else is there to know or do?
..............................

SB2 and Town Meeting

www.nhpr.org, March 1 2007, NHPR radio interview by Laura Knoy

"The traditional town meeting may slowly be on its' way out as more and more towns adopt SB2, a form of local government that has been around since 1996 and allows residents to vote on town and shool district warrants at the polls instead of in town and school district meetings. Sixty of New Hampshire's 221 towns have adopted SB2 and only a handfull (three) have reverted back. We'll look at town meeting, its place in New England and what the future may hold as it competes with the new guy in town - Senate Bill 2."

(The rest and large part of this radio interview can be read at www.nhpr.org)

.................................

An opinion reply to the above NHPR article.

"Since my property taxes have skyrocketed this year I've become a more involved citizen. I've been attending selectman meetings and budget committee meetings, and Hopkinton-Contoocook Taxpayer Assn meetings. I see SB2 as a win-win situation for all the taxpayers. Town meetings and the School meeting can run on for hours and by the final vote, they've lost half the audience. It's not fair to the seniors, those with children, or those who just can't sit there on the bleachers hour after hour. I'd like to see the Town & School Meeting or the "Deliberative Session" as they will be called, televised and available through our cable TV. Then the vote will take place 30 days thereafter; giving all of us a sufficient amount of time to study all the articles and make good decisions in the privacy of the ballet booth. It will also give those who cannot get to the polls the ability to have an absentee ballot and vote on every issue."

Thankyou, Joan Flood

www.nhpr.org

You make a good point, but the problem is that there are aggressive factions in most of our small towns that have decided that by building mega-buildings (police stations, fire stations, community centers, elderly-centers, schools, libraries) they can increase the number of personal (them) and build up a voting block that is hard to defeat. The towns are being buried under pension costs & the costs associated with running these buildings. SB-2 came about because of these issues. Anyone who remembers what happened in town-meeting in Bow several years ago understands why SB-2 is popular with the voters. And as an addendum: Almost every town that has voted in SB-2 in NH has hardly ever voted it out again. it's imperfect, I grant you that, but once put into practice, folks seem to like it.

Sorry but I don't understand your point about finding out who is behind an article...

Here's my case:
Alton is SB2 and the deliberative session consists of the town's Warrants, the school districts' Warrants (Alton has two school districts), and the petition Warrant articles. The petition Warrants are presented, usually, by the parties who are promoting it. For example, last year we had a petition Warrant article for a social worker/drug and alcohol counselor for the high school. The petition Warrant article was well presented and thoroughly discussed. I can't think of a single Warrant that we didn't have at least some idea who was behind it...

Additionally, there's room for public input at the deliberative session and discussion for each Warrant article. The town's budget committee reviews and recommends the Warrant articles, as does the town's selectmen. They present the Warrant articles to the public at the deliberative session and invite the public to ask questions or discuss the article. I've seen a vote called on a Warrant article or other budget item, for that matter, when members of the public still wanted to bump their gums about it, but mostly it's very fair and I felt that people weren't unjustly cut off.

I guess what I'm saying here is that there's room for input - you just have be ready to play by the new rules to get your point in there at the right time...

p.s.
Please don't take it that I'm being disrespectful to you or your point of view - I'm not. It's just that I see how it works in Alton with the town and the school districts and although it's "different" I do prefer it to the town meeting format and feel that we have more to gain as being SB2 than we did by not going that route - that's all...

Meredith SB-2 Petition
 

To Argies Wife: absolutely no disrespect taken, as a metter of fact, you made a very clear and accurate explanation of the process. My only concern is that some articles are written in such a way that knowing the people (WHO) can help clarify the article. All towns have "groups" with agendas, and in all towns not everyone knows everyone, but it does help understand the intent of an article if you know the people involved.

SB2 in Gilford
 

Voter participation has increased a huge amount in Gilford since we passed SB2 two or three years ago. Sometimes as many as 2,000 votes are cast on an issue, versus a few hundred in the old town meeting format. Democracy at work! Meredith voters would be well advised to take advantage of this opportunity.

Meredith SB-2 Petition
 

A side issue to all of this, and maybe one not for this thread, is the issues faced by the non-voter eligible people who live in some of the local towns. In Wolfeboro, for instance, some serious road/utility infrastructure work had to be done on Sewall Rd (a road along the edge of Wolfeboro Bay and therefore very high property values) but many of the people who live on Sewall Road are not voter-eligible due to their resident status. Unfortunately, because many people who don't live on Sewall Rd don't really care about that road, and most of these people are voters, it was very difficult and costly to get the work done over about a three year period. This is anecdotal, but the issue is, some of the people who pay the most have no vote (say) in the use of the money they pay. Again, I know, I know, they choose to live in these spots, and they know the trade-offs, but it's too bad there isn't a way to let them participate in the town government. The irony of the whole situation, at least in Wolfeboro, is that some of these non-voters are extremely active in volunteer work within the town while they are resident. Sort of one-sided, lop-sided. This is probably the case in many of the towns bordering water bodies in New Hampshire.

And I totally agree with you on that one... but from my experience, the ambiguously worded Warrant articles are generally those that there written by high-priced lawyers with little regard for the layman. It's almost like they don't WANT you to know what it is you're voting on. However, here in Alton it seems like it's always the same ten people who are "activists" in the town - you can pretty much tell who's going to be presenting something even before they speak! :D Likewise, it's the same ten people who ask a lot of questions (God bless 'em!) and get to the root of what's really before the people to vote on.

Love my town~!

And thanks for not taking my initial post wrong - it can be a challenge to communicate in this format (non-verbal) and I didn't want to step on any toes... :)

Stopped into George's Dinner late this afternoon and unfortunately not a single name had been added in the last seven days, so this petition drive definately needs an energy boost. As I understand it. each petition needs 25 signatures & address, and then to be submitted to the town 5 weeks before the March 11 town meeting, or by February 5. As I say earlier, with 6000 Meredith population, how hard can it be to get just 25?

Anyway, I shall give it a go when the weather gets nice & warm & sunny, hopefully this weekend at the Rite Aid-Cumberland Farm-Aubuchons....looking for Meredith voters who want to sign the SB-2 petitions for town & school.

You hit the nail right on the head good job man.

PS. A lot of people don't like to admit that they are lazy thus will not like your comment.

SB-2 has its good & bad points, but it's a valid way to run town government. Where SB-2 has been instituted it has thrived. Very, very few NH towns have voted SB-2 out after adopting it. As for SB-2 being some Massachusetts-scam......show me some documentation for that ?

IMO SB-2 works best in towns with fast growing populations......in smaller towns, not so much.

Your the one who said it you back it up. I don't believe that. But this is interesting and the time frame is right. Link

Back what up ? You show me some stats that people from Massachusetts are moving to NH......no kidding. They are also moving here from NY & NJ & and the Mid Atlantic states, and just about everywhere else.....so what ? Where in your article does it show THESE people started the SB-2 movement ? A poster said people from Massachusetts have started the SB-2 movement, and I asked for some information on that, some facts.....your information about the changing demographics of NH is well known, but it contains no information about SB-2.

Scheme not scam, Scheme
 

Come on Irish Mist, I said scheme, not scam. I don't think SB-2 is a scam. I also said "Schemes like SB2 are dreamed up by Massachusetts transplants who were driven out of their home state because it has gotten so expensive", I stand behind that statement, although maybe I should have said "Massachusetts and other choke-hold blue state transplant". You have to admit, the political leanings of NH are changing. As to whether Massachusetts transplants or NH old timers wrote SB-2, it really doesn't matter, I certainly don't care.

What I do see, is the purest form of Democracy being phased out due to laziness and apathy. Schemes like SB2 add a layer of bureaucracy to the voting process, removing the spirited debate and change on the fly afforded by a town meeting. For the convenience of voting yes or no to one choice on election day, you give up the chance to get together with your neighbors and truly hammer out and fix or reject an article. Yes, I understand about meetings for articles and hearings. As far as SB2 being the answer to "special interests", I seriously doubt it.

There are studies that show that the majority of Massachusetts transplants are conservative, but that's up for debate. I was just concerned that you were painting everyone from away with a broad-brush. I share your concern about how NH is going blue......but I don't think SB-2 is a major problem. Folks who vote it in seem to love it. I certainly think towns with small populations don't need SB-2.

But larger, fast growing towns seem to adopt to SB-2 very well. Lol, if I had my way.....I would build a wall in Salem and stop all this growth:) but I'm afraid that's not to be. Every town has the right to vote SB-2 out......and I trust my fellow citizens to do just that if it is not serving them well.

You can't tell me that town-meeting does not have some serious flaws ? We have all heard of those late night votes.....and those"factions" that form. President Madison warned of factions, and town-meeting can really devolve into that situation from my experience. I like that folks have the option of SB-2. It's just another tool to help citizens get involved in government.

I really don't think town meeting has serious flaws. The flaw lies with the voters who don't show up and/or don't care. When 20 out of 1000 voters show up that is recipe for disaster. When 500 or even 250 out of 1000 show up, the shenanigans are quickly squashed.

If you don't care, your pocket will get picked. Come to think of it, if you care and beg for more taxes, you will be turned upside down and shaken until all the money falls out of your pockets. Once the Genie is out of the bottle, it is nearly impossible to put back in. Look at the Mass. income tax.

As far as transplants go, most of the ones I know personally are flaming liberals. I try to make it a point when they complain that they are bringing to NH exactly what they ran away from in Mass., high taxes, they never get it though.....

I can only go by what I see........NH folks seem to love SB-2. If it is such a bad system I think most towns would have voted it out. Gilford folks seem pleased with its recent arrival. As for transplants: this is JMO but most Massachusetts folks I know moved here to get away from taxes, and vote conservative. Most of the liberals seem to be coming up from NY &NJ & from other parts of the nation.

In the old days most people that moved here were from MA......now they are from everywhere, and they have no sense of the NH low tax history.

...the perfect spot!
 

:)Yesterday's primary election at the Meredith Community Center was like the perfect spot for collecting signatures for an SB2 petition, plus the weather was highly cooperative, too. I got there at about 8am, equipped with my olde rockin' chair, and rocked away for about ten hours until six o'clock, collecting a lot of signatures. Printed name, signed name, address, and date on two seperate petitions; one for town business, and one for school business. I have not yet actually counted up all the signatures yet, but there are quite a few. Later on today, I will deliver the two petitions to the Meredith Town Clerk for her inspection, scrutiny and administration. Hopefully, the petitions will pass legal scrutiny. I got my petition info from a website for NH taxpayers, and will put that website here later on.

Thanks again to all the Meredith voters who chose to sign the petitions. It was a fairly easy "sell" and that presidential primary and the warm weather were the perfect spot.
.....................

Here's the count. For the town petition, there's 15 1/2 pages w/ 13 voter's per page for about 200 Meredith voters, total. And , for the school petition, there's 15 pages w/ 13 voters per page for also about 200 Meredith voters.

If you read the rsa, it says that 25 signatures is what's needed.

As I understand it, what these petitons do is to put the two questions on a town voting ballot for a yes or no vote.
................
town petition


We, the undersigned Town of Meredith registered voters respectfully request that the Town adopt the following warrant.
Shall we adopt the provisions of RSA 40:13 (known as SB2) to allow official ballot voting on all issues before the Town of Meredith on the second Tuesday of March?
By signing this petition, you are affirming that you are a registered voter in the Town of Meredith.
.......................


.......................
school petition


We, the undersigned Town of Meredith registered voters respectfully request that the Town adopt the following warrant.
'Shall we adopt the provisions of RSA 40:13 (known as SB2) to allow official ballot voting on all issues before the Interlakes School District, in SAU #2, on the second Tuesday of March?"
By signing this petition, you are affirming that you are a registered voter in the Town of Meredith.
............

Now, today I will deliver the two petitions to the Meredith Town Clerk, for her inspection, scrutiny and administration, and wait to see what all happens next.

Thanks again to everyone who chose to sign!

...............

So yesterday on primary day, I sat outside the Community Center and collected signatures for about ten hours. What moved me the most was to see all the different people of Meredith. There was quite a number of older and injured voters who slowly walked in to vote with the assistance of their cane or walker. Moving slowly and gingerly, they all wanted to get inside to vote.

Sounds like we have a political activist amongst us, good for you Less. Now if we could only convince you it's a spending problem not a need more taxes problem............;)

I wish I knew that was you, You were very polite, and I was to, as I ignored you.....LOL

Sorry I missed meeting you FLL......I saw you but since I have already signed the petition,I didn't connect the dots.Good job.

I would have introduced myself as well. I did sign the petition, didn't realize it was you.

SB2 in The Meredith News
 

The Meredith News
Thursday, January 10, 2008
(top of front page on the right)


MEREDITH - For the first time ever, Meredith's Town Warrant this year may ask voters whether they want to adopt Senate Bill 2, with a petition in support of the bill currently circulating through town.

The petition, initiated by Meredith resident Richard Juve, currently sits behind the counter at George's Dinner and at the Meredith Center Grocery Store and Garage, and calls for a change from the more traditonal form of Town Meeting to the SB2 format. Instituted as an alternative form of Town Meeting in 1995, instead of a meeting at night, SB2 towns pass or fail articles on the warrant by secret ballots cast at a polling place all day.

Gilford adopted the SB2 form of government several years ago and Moultonboro has had petitioned warrant articles on it for several years. Deputy Town Clerk Kerri Parker confirmed that a petition for SB2 has never been on Meredith's Town Warrant.

Juve said that about 50 people so far have signed the petition and said that he hopes to get in 200 signatures before he submits it to the town clerk in a week. Both George's Diner and Meredith Center Store reported filling up their pages. Twenty-five signatures of registered Meredith voters are required for a petition to make it to the Town Warrant, submitted by Feb 5.

"It (traditional Town Meeting) is based on a time when we all got together in town and met our friends and brought food." said Juve. "Now people have to hire a babysitter for four or five hours, and they can't stay that long. What if they work a night shift? What if they're at a business meeting, or in the military and overseas?'

Dr. David Almstrom, a veterinarian doctor and another supporter of SB2 government in Meredith, agreed that the changing lifestyles of residents should warrant a change to allow more residents to take part in the process.

"For the average person, there's not enough time," said Almstrom. "I run a practice that covers emergencies, and others have kids at home. If more people participate, it brings more people in, and that's to our advantage."

Juve said that rising tax rates in an uncertain economic situation and problems that residents had in attending Town Meeting are the reasons that spurred him to pursue the SB2 petition.

Citing the roughly 240 people who attended the last Town Meeting, out of a town with a poplation of over 6000, Juve said that he thought SB2 would open up the process for greater participation.

"(In SB2), no one sees my hand go up and never speaks to me again for the rest for the year." said Juve. "The wonderfull advantage is that you have time to think about it and make your decision in the privacy of the voting booth."

In the SB2 style of Town Meeting, the school and municipal budgets are formally presented to residents, then considered and amended by the public at later deliberative sessions. Once the amendments are set and approved by the public present at the session, the polling station opens in March for residents to vote on each warrant article. Juve said that these deliberative sessions have the essence of the Town Meeting but get the ballot out sooner.

If the petition fails, Juve said that he and others will try again at the next Town Meeting and asked that anyone with questions about the petition call him at 279-5643.

The Meredith News, Thursday, January 10, 2008

.........................................

SB2 editorial-The Meredith News
 

Editorial - January 10, 2008

The Meredith News

Think long and hard on SB2

It's good to see that Meredith will be considering Senate Bill 2 this year; unlike several neighboring towns, it will be a first for Meredith voters. This does not mean, however, that the town should rush into adopting the practice, which eliminates the traditional town meeting in favor of a deliberative session followed several weeks later by Election Day. The deliberative session is as close to town meeting as SB2 gets, and though voters cannot vote on warrant articles, they can make amendments that, if passed by the majority in attendance, will ultimately be put on the ballot for Election Day.

Both Moultonboro and Sanborton have been debating the merits and downfalls of SB2 for years, and neither town has seen it to pass - yet. Undoubtedly it will continue to be a topic of conversation for many years to come. Gilford, on the other hand, has been an SB2 town since it was adopted in 2004, and at this point it seems to be working out just fine, with no serious attempts to change back to a town meeting format.

What this appears to mean is that some towns are ready for the change and some are not. It's not necessarily an inevitable change, either, despite the fact that as of 2006, 57 towns in the state (roughly 32 percent) had adopted SB2. Sixty towns in total have adopted the bill at some point, but three have rescinded it.

So what does this newfound interest in SB2 mean for Meredith? What it should mean is a good opportunity for discussion. Passing the bill the first year it is introduced is probably not the best idea, as it seems to take a while for people to truly research and understand the bill's effects. It is fairly complicated, and even a lengthy discussion or debate at town meeting won't be enough to truly inform voters. This year's vote should be the first step in a process that involves educating the public of both the positives and negatives of SB2 so that voters will be able to make an informed decision.

With only two months to go before the 2008 Town Meeting, it just doesn't make sense that enough people would be comfortable with SB2 to vote it in, and that's a good thing. There's a reason it's been a hot-button issue in other towns, and Meredith, which is a traditional New Hampshire town in so many ways seems an unlikely candidate to abandon town meeting as soon as 2009. Still, as we said, it is definately worth the discussion and getting a petitioned article on the warrant is the best way to get that conversation
going.

The Meredith News, January 10, 2008




............

Meredith will vote on SB2 for town, school
 

The Citizen of Laconia
by Erin Plummer
January 23, 2008

Meredith will vote on SB2 for town, school
..........

A petitioned article calling for the implementation of Senate Bill 2 will be on the warrants of the town and the Inter-Lakes School District.

The petition, generated by resident Richard Juve, would change the town's form of government to the Official Ballot Act, commonly known as SB2, which would eliminate the traditional town meeting process and replace it with a deliberative session to amend articles, while voting would take place by secret ballot.

Petitions with 174 signatures were submitted to the town and school district calling for SB2 after they were circulated around town and were available to voters during the primary on Jan. 8.

Town Manager Carol Granfield told the selectmen during Monday's budget workshop that she had spoken with Inter-Lakes Superintendent Phil McCormack about the possibility of having a joint public hearing between Meredith and Inter-Lakes. Granfield said a joint hearing would be best to differentiate between the effects it would have on the two different groups.

Other board members said the joint meeting might not be the best idea, as Inter-Lakes also includes Center Harbor and Sandwich, which are not facing SB2 petitions, and that further discussion should be held with McCormack to determine the process.

Granfield said the passage of SB2 in Meredith would be unique for the town as it would be one of the few with SB2 that does not have a union. SB2 requires communities to fulfill all contracts and without a union "if you're not obligated to something, some people might want to be obligated."

An SB2 article cannot indicate whether the boards approve or disapprove of it.

"I don't think we should promote it or hide from it," said Board Chair Frank Michel.

Selectman Collette Worsman said the petition for SB2 was a sign voters are fed up with town spending. Worsman advocated methods of cutting around $500,000 from this year's budget by trimming some department line items.

"The community has had enough of tax increases," Worsman said. "I truly believe there are a lot more out there who are tired of seeing the increases (and the taxation on money) they have worked so hard to get."

"I do hear the consensus of the community that we need to conserve the money that we spend. It should be on necessities, not luxuries."
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by Erin Plummer
Wednesday, January 23, 2008
The Citizen of Laconia
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The two SB2 ballot questions for town & school will take place on Wednesday, March 12, and be a paper ballot, private vote held in the Community Center from 7am - 7pm.

I believe there's another ballot question as well that has to do with a zoning issue.

The annual town meeting is scheduled for Tuesday, March 11 in the evening, as usual.



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Ok Less, here's your chance, I suggest you call Selectman Collette Worsman and tell her that you fully support her effort to cut $500,000 in spending AS LONG AS she makes sure it goes toward REDUCING THE TAX RATE. I can almost guarantee they have some other area where they want to put that money and it's not back in your wallet. Go Less, Go....:banana: