Chapter and verse, no rhyme or reason

Well, I caught most of the selectmen's meeting last night.  Most surprising moment of the evening, the way the meeting room emptied out after the re-organization of the board.  Well let me fine tune that, and say the number of people that cl;eared out of the room.

Biggest winner of the day.  Selectman Murphy. 

Truth be told, and it doesn't need to be but will be, the ball had been dumped squarely in the outgoing chairman's court for nominating his successor. The ball handling on this one was pretty good. Why?  Well here is the long winded version.

Protocol in this town for decades has been to rotate the chair each year handing it to the selectman next up for election.

We can argue about this, whether it is the right thing to do, whether it serves the best interest of the town, whether we get the best chair available.  We can debate it over and over again. The simple fact of the matter is this has been a protocol that has worked for the most part and that has as many pluses as minuses if one cares to weigh in rationally and dispassionately.

Point blank, we do not have a government set up where there is a "first" selectman.  Where there have been attempts to turn the chair into such a position, it has been through the acquiescence of one other then sitting selectman or design between two of three sitting selectmen.

The chair under our structure is a titular head.  Yes under the new open meeting laws, and absent a board policy to the contrary, the chair sets the meeting agenda and runs the meetings.  Sure the law in certain instances requires a signature from the chair, and in actual declared and fairly delineated emergencies grants power to the chair. That believe it or not, pretty much sums up the extra "real" authority.  

Any other authority excised in the name of the "chair" essentially is by actual delegation from the board or acquiescence. In fact, the vast majority of an individual act by any member of the board, and there are plenty of those, derives its authority from delegation and acquiescence.

So why is Selectman Murphy the winner.  First, he doesn't have to sit in the chair.  Those who covet the chair really never grasp the true responsibility or the actual limitations.  I will leave  it at that.

Secondly, in my opinion he did the right thing.  Not agreeing with the politics, goals or agendas (and they all have them) of a fellow selectman is not a reason to chuck the protocol.  Indeed, if the standard is the lofty best interest of the town, that would have been best met by Selectman Murphy by nominating himself again for chair.

In any event, he didn't.  He nominated Selectmen Espindola, who was placed in the always uncomfortable position of seconding the nomination for himself.  It was a 2 to 1 vote appointment Selectman Espindola chair.  Why the dissent? Never stated.  What other option?  Never presented. 

For a town so wrapped up in its history, it seems the lessons of history are seldom every learned, at least political history.

Moving on ...

The call officially went out for those interested in filling the unexpired term for School Committee member David Gonsalves.  Mr. Gonsalves passed away recently.

It seems that two people have all ready thrown their hats into the ring for the appointment. Whether there will be more remains to be seen.  I am/was a bit confused about the how and deadline. Contact the selectmen's office as it seems be following a different procedure than I was aware of.

I always thought it was Section 11 of chapter 41 of the General Laws that applied. See what happens when you assume; and, that the 30 day thingy was only applicable to the special act for the BPW.

Anyway, out of time.

Be safe.