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Traditionally, municipal elections in Connecticut have a much lower voter turnout rate -- below 40% in both 2005 and 2007, as compared to the last presidential election, which had a turnout of 78% in the state.
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BURLINGTON — -
This town woke up after last Tuesday's election realizing that it had delivered a Republican sweep.
The GOP not only knocked off Democratic incumbent First Selectman Kathleen Zabel and replaced her with Republican Cathy Bergstrom, but 14 of 16 Republican candidates for other town boards also were the top vote-getters.
But now, after much back and forth among leaders of both parties, Town Clerk Cindy Kosher has certified only 12 of those Republicans as winners. Republicans James M. Rigdon and Rudolf Franciamore actually won more votes for the board of finance than all three Democratic candidates, but they will not be seated on the board.
How can this happen in a democracy, where the most popular vote-getter is supposed to get the seat?
The answer is that, technically speaking, municipalities such as Burlington are not pure democracies. A host of arcane election laws often intervene to prevent the winners from actually winning.
On election night, in a field of seven candidates for the board of finance, Republicans Susan Brault (with 1,351 votes), Mark DiOrio (with 1,288 votes), Rigdon (with 1,103 votes) and Franciamore (with 970 votes) were the top vote-getters.
But Section 3, paragraph 4 of the Burlington Town Charter says that, on the seven-member finance board, "The maximum number of members of the same political party shall be four."
This provision, common in town charters, is called a "minority representation rule," which prevents one party from having lopsided power on a town board.
This presented Kosher with her first problem. There already was one Republican incumbent on the board, Gerald Mullen, who was elected to his four-year term in 2007 and was not up for re-election. To meet the minority representation rule of just four Republicans, Kosher was forced to eliminate the lowest Republican vote-getter, Franciamore.
But then Kosher discovered a second problem. Another incumbent not up for re-election, Tony DiNicola, listed himself as an "unaffiliated" member of the board, but in fact had received the endorsement of the Republicans when he ran in 2007.
But this, Kosher said, violated Statute 9-167a, sub-section g, of state law, which reads: "any person whose candidacy for election to an office is solely as the candidate of a party other than the party with which he is enrolled shall be deemed to be a member of the party for which he is a candidate."
Translation: DiNicola ran as an endorsed Republican, therefore he is a Republican. So now DiNicola too counted toward the minority representation rule, and the Republicans still had more than four board of finance members.
This eliminated Rigdon, the next lowest Republican vote-getter.
Thus, Democrats Arthur W. Johanson Jr. (with 964 votes) and John Achilli (with 926 votes), who actually lost the election, won seats on the board.
Republican First Selectman-elect Bergstrom spent this week carefully reviewing Kosher's work, to verify that the right list of names was sent to the secretary of the state's office.
"We have a town charter in place, and we have state statutes in place," Bergstrom said. "And we have to abide by those rules."
And don't be upset if you have to read this article two more times to get all of this straight. Even Kosher said her head is still spinning.
"I don't even want to talk about this anymore," Kosher said. "There may be challenges to all of this."
The GOP not only knocked off Democratic incumbent First Selectman Kathleen Zabel and replaced her with Republican Cathy Bergstrom, but 14 of 16 Republican candidates for other town boards also were the top vote-getters.
But now, after much back and forth among leaders of both parties, Town Clerk Cindy Kosher has certified only 12 of those Republicans as winners. Republicans James M. Rigdon and Rudolf Franciamore actually won more votes for the board of finance than all three Democratic candidates, but they will not be seated on the board.
How can this happen in a democracy, where the most popular vote-getter is supposed to get the seat?
The answer is that, technically speaking, municipalities such as Burlington are not pure democracies. A host of arcane election laws often intervene to prevent the winners from actually winning.
On election night, in a field of seven candidates for the board of finance, Republicans Susan Brault (with 1,351 votes), Mark DiOrio (with 1,288 votes), Rigdon (with 1,103 votes) and Franciamore (with 970 votes) were the top vote-getters.
But Section 3, paragraph 4 of the Burlington Town Charter says that, on the seven-member finance board, "The maximum number of members of the same political party shall be four."
This provision, common in town charters, is called a "minority representation rule," which prevents one party from having lopsided power on a town board.
This presented Kosher with her first problem. There already was one Republican incumbent on the board, Gerald Mullen, who was elected to his four-year term in 2007 and was not up for re-election. To meet the minority representation rule of just four Republicans, Kosher was forced to eliminate the lowest Republican vote-getter, Franciamore.
But then Kosher discovered a second problem. Another incumbent not up for re-election, Tony DiNicola, listed himself as an "unaffiliated" member of the board, but in fact had received the endorsement of the Republicans when he ran in 2007.
But this, Kosher said, violated Statute 9-167a, sub-section g, of state law, which reads: "any person whose candidacy for election to an office is solely as the candidate of a party other than the party with which he is enrolled shall be deemed to be a member of the party for which he is a candidate."
Translation: DiNicola ran as an endorsed Republican, therefore he is a Republican. So now DiNicola too counted toward the minority representation rule, and the Republicans still had more than four board of finance members.
This eliminated Rigdon, the next lowest Republican vote-getter.
Thus, Democrats Arthur W. Johanson Jr. (with 964 votes) and John Achilli (with 926 votes), who actually lost the election, won seats on the board.
Republican First Selectman-elect Bergstrom spent this week carefully reviewing Kosher's work, to verify that the right list of names was sent to the secretary of the state's office.
"We have a town charter in place, and we have state statutes in place," Bergstrom said. "And we have to abide by those rules."
And don't be upset if you have to read this article two more times to get all of this straight. Even Kosher said her head is still spinning.
"I don't even want to talk about this anymore," Kosher said. "There may be challenges to all of this."
Minority representation is arcane, and unnecessary at the local level. Voters can elect anyone they want. If they don't like the results of an all-Democrat or all-Republican term of rule, they can easily vote them out the next election. There are no such rules at the state or national level, which is even more dangerous than the local level, as we are now seeing nationally.
NBConservative (11/14/2009, 9:06 AM )