In Plymouth, there are 18 precincts and nine Town Meeting representatives elected per precinct. In each precinct the members vote on a chairman. Those chairmen constitute the Committee of Precinct Chairs or COPC.
And at the COPC meeting on the 19th, the group heard from Charter Commission Chairman, Bill Abbott and League of Women Voters Observer Corp Chair, Martha Vautrain.
A key topic of discussion concerned the expanded responsibilities of the COPC that the proposed new charter assigns to the group. Not everyone was happy about those added responsibilities.
Bobbi Clark has more…
Wrestling Brewster Chairs Precinct 15 and was an elected member of the Charter Commission. He says that under the new charter, instead of the Moderator appointing the nine members of the Advisory and Finance Committee…
“…the Committee of Precinct Chairs in conjunction with the Moderator—I believe it’s five and four—that the Committee of Precinct Chairs nominates five and the Moderator does four.”
And also, according to the new charter:
“Town Meeting nominates and elects the Moderator at the fall
Town Meeting—and for a period of three years.”
Brewster notes that although one of the members, Christine Pratt, a former Chair of the COPC, spoke in favor of the expanded role of the COPC, because it could promote more respect for the group, there were others who objected:
“The main objection and push-back is, it’s going to take more
time and more commitment—and it was a time commitment—and they are volunteers, unpaid.”
And possible consequence of that is…
“…because of this added time and added commitment, that less
people would run for Town Meeting and less people would run for Chair.”
Of the work of the League of Women Voters, presented at the meeting, Brewster says:
“They created a document that’s really awesome because what it does is: it has what the Charter was, and the changes that are proposed and why.”
Full Disclosure: Bobbi Clark is a member of the League of Women Voters.
