A handful of Seacoast towns are carrying on the tradition of annual town meetings
Words by Larry Clow, illustration by Alyssa Grenning
Ed Jansen has been a selectman in Rollinsford since 1976. He’s been through 39 town meetings while on the board, and every year, he’s happy to hear the debates and discussions that come up at each meeting.
“I believe in having everybody go and speak before we vote. As a citizen, you might influence some of your friends at the meeting,” he said. “That’s why I don’t like SB2, personally. It prohibits people getting informed by their peers before they vote.”
A lot has changed in Rollinsford, and in the Seacoast, in the last four decades, and so have town meetings. The SB2 that Jansen refers to is a state law passed in 1996, which allowed towns to switch over to a two-part town meeting format. Instead of meeting and voting in March, towns could now hold a deliberative session in late January or early February, in which residents could debate and finalize town warrant items, and then vote on the warrant and elected positions in March.
A number of area towns have made the switch to SB2, and so the traditional town meeting — held the second week in March, when residents would gather together to discuss and vote on the town’s budget, elect officials, and debate everything from buying a new fire truck to changing zoning codes — is now the exception, not the rule, in the Seacoast.
But there are still a number of towns in the region keeping the tradition alive. Rollinsford, Newington, Greenland, Madbury, and Stratham all hold traditional town meetings, with voters gathering in town halls and school gymnasiums for hours-long sessions, debating budgets and bonds and deciding who’ll next serve on the board of selectmen or town budget committee. For residents in those towns, the centuries-old town meeting format is still a robust form of democracy, worth maintaining even as the pace of modern life makes civic participation more difficult.
Old-school democracy
First off, don’t be alarmed: the old-school form of democracy that town meetings represent isn’t dying. In fact, the majority of New Hampshire towns still use the traditional town meeting format, according to Margaret Byrnes, a staff attorney with the New Hampshire Municipal Association.
As of 2013, of the state’s 234 cities and towns, only 67 towns used an SB2 system. That number includes many Seacoast towns. Some, like Hampton and Exeter, were early adopters — they made the switch in 1996, the year SB2 took effect. Others are recent converts; Lee voters switched to SB2 meetings in 2011.
“I do think towns are trying to brainstorm ways to bring out more people and (increase) participation.” — Margaret Byrnes of the N.H. Municipal Association
Apart from those 67 towns, a number of cities, and two towns that function as cities (Derry and Durham), the state is left with a lot of communities voting the old-fashioned way. Some of the trappings may have changed — using a PowerPoint presentation to go through warrant articles, for example, or having free child care on site — but the meetings themselves are largely the same as they were in decades past.
“I do think towns are trying to brainstorm ways to bring out more people and (increase) participation,” Byrnes said. Though many towns have switched to SB2, she expects the traditional meeting format to carry on for years to come. “It’s been here a long time, so I don’t see it going away any time soon,” she said.
Up for debate
Madbury selectman Jay Moriarty agrees with Jansen — the ability to spend a few hours at town meeting and hear debate about all sides of an issue is something worth preserving.
Sometimes, unexpected debates spring up. A warrant article about a proposed leash law in Madbury wound up being very contentious, Moriarty said. And though small towns have a reputation for being extremely frugal, at a previous meeting, a resident proposed amending a warrant article to add more money to the town’s fund for a new library, Moriarty said.
“Compared to most towns, we seem to have been blessed with very calm town meetings,” he said. “There have been some exceptions, but generally … they are usually pretty polite.”
Ruth Fletcher has been Newington’s moderator for about 20 years. She’s the person who runs the meeting, recognizing speakers, clarifying rules, and making sure the meeting stays on track. Fletcher runs a tight ship.
“I have my rules. One of them is to respect other people’s opinions, whether you agree with them or not,” she said.
Budget items usually stir up the most debate. Last year, Fletcher said, there was an article about buying a new ambulance. Those kinds of expenditures can get people riled up. “It’s something usually connected with the budget that somebody doesn’t agree with, and they debate and debate and debate,” she said.
“I try to be very fair and give everybody a chance to talk, but with any public meeting, you’ll have people who want to do all the talking.”
— Newington town moderator Ruth Fletcher
When that happens, a moderator like Fletcher steps in. A few years ago, she found that some individuals were monopolizing the debate — they’d make their case, sit down, and, when someone else spoke, they’d get up again to deliver a lengthy rebuttal, only to repeat the process for each new speaker. Fletcher established a rule: A person could speak only three times on any one subject, with a total time limit of five minutes for each person. She put the new rules to a vote and residents adopted them.
“I try to be very fair and give everybody a chance to talk, but with any public meeting, you’ll have people who want to do all the talking,” she said.
It also helps to have food. After Madbury’s meeting, Moriarity said, there’s a social hour, with baked goods and coffee and a chance for conversations not necessarily related to budgets. And, in Newington, volunteers provide a spread of homemade soups, hot dogs, and pastries.
Making the switch
Not all small towns can keep the tradition going. And, for some, it’s a tradition full of drawbacks.
Lee adopted SB2 town meeting proceedings in 2011. Selectman David Cedarholm was elected in 2012. Before the town switched to SB2, he said, the annual town meeting was a “difficult process.” The meeting would start on a Wednesday night and go straight through until midnight. Then, the moderator would call a recess, and the meeting would resume on Thursday night, only to wrap up at midnight again.
“At the beginning of the first night, we might have more than 100 people. By the end of the first night, we’d be lucky to have 30. On the second night, we’d be lucky if we had 30 people at the start of the meeting,” Cedarholm said.
The time commitment was difficult for residents with children, who’d need to find a babysitter for two nights, and elderly residents, and residents working nights or early in the morning, or residents in the military — basically, Cedarholm said, it was difficult for almost everyone except for maybe retirees and those with few outside commitments. That meant that only a small group of residents were there voting on all the warrant articles.
“You’d be amazed at how many people turn around to see who is going against (an) issue.”
— Lee selectman David Cedarholm
And then, according to Cedarholm, there’s the intimidation factor. Because votes at town meeting are in the open, everyone can see who votes for what. That can lead to intimidation, scorn, and dirty looks, Cedarholm said. It’s something people don’t like to talk about, but it ha