Letter to the Editor: Weston Quorum Reform is Needed

Dear Editor:

Article I, Section 6 of the Weston Bylaws sets the quorum for Town Meetings at 40 voters and has not been changed since 1925, when the town’s population was around 2,800, or one-fourth what it is now.

While some may think a quorum sounds like a physics particle, Webster’s  Encyclopedic Unabridged Dictionary (1996) defines a quorum as “the number of members of a group or organization required to be present to transact business legally, usually a majority.” Page 20 of Robert’s Rules of Order (Tenth Edition) explains that the “requirement for a quorum is protection against totally unrepresentative action in the name of the body by an unduly small number of
persons.”

Article I, Section 5, Clause 1 of the US Constitution states “a Majority of each [chamber] shall constitute a Quorum to do Business.” Recently, the U.S. Senate under both parties has claimed to be in continuous session via “unanimous consent” even though only a handful of members were actually present to prevent presidential recess appointments, but this pretense should fool no one and makes taxpayers wonder if they are getting their money’s worth out of their elected representatives. Then again, do we really want them to keep voting for deficit spending to raise the federal debt, which is now over $15 trillion or about $50,000 per capita?

For local Open Annual Town Meetings with volunteer, unpaid citizens serving as their own lawmakers, the quorum is usually set below a majority. Of 20 “Peer” Towns with 2010 Population between 5,000 and 20,000 within 40 minutes of
Weston’s Town Hall, seven had no quorum and the other 13 ranged from five to 250 voters, averaging around 118.

Weston’s current quorum of 40 is the second lowest of the fourteen peer towns with quorums (including Weston itself) and lets 21 voters outvote 19 for a simple majority and 27 outvote 13 for a 2/3 majority to bind the entire Town.

As this standard has remained unchanged for 87 years, a revision upward is long overdue, so I have collected voter signatures to raise the quorum to 160 or about 2.1 percent of the 7,704 registered voters as of Dec. 31, 2011, per Town Clerk, Debbie Davenport, via a Bylaw amendment requiring a majority vote at our upcoming Annual Town Meeting starting on Monday, May 7. My amendment would also require that non-voter spectators be seated separately and not be allowed to participate in voice or other votes at Town Meeting, just as other local towns specify.

Opponents of quorum reform warn that this may have “unforeseen consequences” by preventing the Town from transacting urgent business and cause municipal debt defaults, starving and unpaid teachers, and potholes in our roads. The sky may also fall but I’m not holding my breath and we already have some potholes!

These alarmist objections are overstated as a review of attendance data shows that of the 49 Town Meeting daily sessions held from 1996 to 2011 (Annual and Special), on average 374 voters showed up and every opening session of
every Annual Meeting had over 160 voters present to approve Annual Budgets and other essential business. Less than one-eighth, or six out of the 49 sessions, had under 160 voters, mainly for Special Town Meetings with only a few Warrant articles that obviously were of very little general public interest. One session on Nov. 28, 2005, had only 51 voters, but this met the quorum of 40.

Please join me in voting to raise the Weston Town Meeting quorum from 40 to 160 in line with population growth, which reached 11,261 in 2010 per the U.S. Census.

William C. Crum,
Hobbs Brook Road