Town hall meetings would work in New Brunswick
Published Tuesday March 17th, 2009
The smell of milk farms wafted through the air and a winter storm made the roads treacherous outside, but that didn't impede the exercise of intelligent democracy for 75 people in the Village of Morgan, Vermont.
The first week of March is typically when Vermonters participate in their annual town hall meetings. In fact, Town Meeting Day is a holiday for state employees and much like an employer cannot refuse a request to go out and vote, Vermont employers must allow their workers time to attend Town Hall.
I attended two meetings while in Vermont; the first for the small Village of Morgan and the second for the Town of Barton. There are some differences between what a town is in Vermont and what one is in New Brunswick. Towns in Vermont are more like parishes than actual towns; they typically include villages and the sparsely populated areas between them. Also, villages in Vermont are responsible for school boards, much like New Brunswick counties were prior to the Equal Opportunity reforms of the 1960s.
But there are some significant similarities between Vermont and New Brunswick. The populations of both are largely rural and, when compared to other states or provinces, they are small. Indeed, New Brunswick surpasses Vermont's 620,000 residents by a mere 100,000.
The major population difference lies in the cities. Vermont's capital of Montpelier contains less than 10,000 people and the state's largest city -- Burlington -- is made up of less than 40,000 people. While the Burlington town hall depends more upon ballots than other municipalities, it still holds its meeting and the tradition remains a sacred cow to virtually all Vermonters.
I attended the meetings with New Brunswick in mind. Why can't the smaller ungoverned regions of the province or our villages and towns develop a tradition of town halls?
Especially the smaller communities where many contain a shared Loyalist background and others have a similarly strong shared Acadian culture.
What I enjoyed most about the town halls and why I believe they should be adopted by municipalities in New Brunswick and throughout Canada is the sense of ownership they encourage.
Never once did I hear a Vermonter say, "The government should . . ."
The reason is that while they attended the town hall, the gathered citizens were the government. Their combined wisdom determined the direction of their community.
One example of this wisdom occurred during the Village of Morgan meeting. A citizen was unimpressed with the level of police service he received and put forward a motion to deny the increase in the policing budget. Another citizen exclaimed, "We just voted to spend $600,000 to send our kids to school. Why won't you spend $9,000 to protect them?" The matter even went to a secret ballot vote, where the majority agreed to the increase.
The Village also debated the merit of increasing a deduction in property assessment from $10,000 to the state maximum $40,000 for veterans collecting disability. The proposal was amended from the floor to approve a deduction of $20,000 instead. The citizen responsible for the amendment concluded that since the $10,000 deduction was put in place 20 years ago, property values have only doubled not quadrupled, therefore the deduction should follow the market. Her neighbours found the argument convincing enough to approve the amendment. The following day, the local newspapers reported that some other town halls had approved the $40,000 deduction.
Another example occurred in the Town of Westmore where some very vocal people were having a "problem" with nudists at a secluded cove. Most of these people were non-voting residents, meaning they likely spent their summers in Westmore but were residents of another town or state. The selectmen (councillors) let it be known that they would pass an ordinance against the nudists if the people of the town approved the money to enforce it. In these economic times, the assembled crowd voted two to one against the $25,000 required to enforce the ban. In this case, the silent majority prevailed.
In the Town of Barton, a citizen asked that the capital reserve fund be scrapped. The citizen even put forward an amendment to the budget requesting such. However, since no one could even be bothered to second her amendment, it didn't go much further than that.
While the collective wisdom is something one hopes to see at these meetings, my guide informed me that capital reserve funds can sometimes be seen as "slush-funds" and residents have voted to have them reduced or removed, from school board budgets especially. The results are never positive.
While the examples above deal primarily with budgets, Town Meeting is also used to elect selectmen as well as important administrative positions such as auditor, tax collector, animal control officer, constable, clerk, and the Town Hall moderator, to name a few.
It also provides a venue for state representatives to update their constituents. The updates revolved around deficit control, health care spending, and the stimulus package. The news was not promising and the speeches were somber.
Most importantly though, Town Hall is a place for Vermonters to mingle with their fellow citizens and discuss issues of importance to them, their neighbours, and their community as well as their shared path, no matter how treacherous the roads are.
n David Gingras is a Metro Moncton resident and is currently working towards a National Advanced Certificate in Local Authority Administration (NACLAA).
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