HAMPDEN, Maine — Among the charter amendments that voters in Hampden will consider in November is whether the number of town councilors needed to constitute a quorum should be reduced from five to four.
In recent months, two council meetings have been scrapped for lack of a quorum, which in Hampden requires the attendance of five members.
A council meeting scheduled for June 2 was canceled after three of Hampden’s seven town councilors boycotted it, leaving the rest of the councilors without the necessary quorum for conducting business and forcing the meeting’s cancellation.
The cancellation of the June meeting came at a critical time. The agenda included the introduction of the proposed 2014-15 budget for a public hearing on June 16 — the council’s deadline for doing so if it was to comply with a town charter provision requiring that the budget hearing take place no later than the third Monday in June.
To that end, a special meeting was held two days later, and all seven councilors attended.
The council’s July 7 meeting was canceled when the council found itself one member short of a quorum. Two members had notified Town Manager Susan Lessard the previous week that they would be on vacation and would not be on hand for the meeting. A third member was expected to attend but attempts to reach him before canceling the meeting were unsuccessful.
About 10 members of the public had turned up for the meeting, during which zoning amendments, contract awards and other local matters were going to be addressed. A special meeting was set for the following week, and a quorum was achieved.
The proposal to lower the quorum requirement from five to four members arose during the recent review of the town charter by the council’s Finance and Administration Committee, where it generated some debate.
Councilors William Shakespeare and Thomas Brann opposed the change.
“Unfortunately, I think the reason for all this is because a couple of Town Council meetings were canceled because there was not a quorum, not because of any decision making,” Shakespeare said. “I believe by passing this you’re going to be setting future councils up for failure. For instance, if you only have four councilors at a meeting, which would be a quorum, you could have three at-large councilors and one district councilor. Those three at-large councilors could make a decision which would affect all the districts so that there would not be one district affirmation on anything discussed.”
Brann agreed, adding that the council already has means for dealing with meeting absences.
Changing the quorum threshold “creates too many opportunities for actions to be taken on behalf of the citizens of the town of Hampden without proper representation, and to me, that is wrong. The three members who may not be attending the meeting have no recourse to reconsider a motion that’s been taken by the smaller body size. They can’t ask for reconsideration because they weren’t in attendance, and I don’t think that’s appropriate.”
Councilor Greg Sirois, however, offered the following:
“I’d just like to say that probably a greater sin than misrepresentation is no representation whatsoever,” he said. “We had no representation, not because of excused absences but because somebody didn’t like a decision.
“Holding the town hostage, the town’s business hostage and the residents of this town hostage because you disagree or don’t agree with a decision made as a form of protest? That’s your right to protest, but it should not affect how we do our town’s business, so for that reason I support this,” he said.
In the end, the council voted 4-3 to put the quorum issue before residents, who will decide in a referendum vote on Nov. 4. Voting in favor were Mayor Carol Duprey and councilors Ivan McPike, David Ryder and Sirois. Brann, Shakespeare and Councilor Jean Lawlis were opposed.