Pretend Democracy on the Cheap

 

Last night about 50 members of the Hampton Democrats Club, sometimes ironically referred to as the "Young Democrats Club" (median age 72) held its monthly meeting.

This was something different: it was not devoted to the usual business about picnics, fund raising and complaints about Donald Trump,  but to a panel discussion.

On the panel was a member of the Planning Board, the chairwoman of the Budget Committee, the chairwoman of the Zoning Board and a member of the Board of Selectman. The only Board not represented was the School Board.

These constitute the town government as most citizens of Hampton understand town government. 

There is also a town manager, who most people in the room (and in the town at large) could not only not name, but could not pick out of a line up. What his role is is anyone's guess. There is also a town moderator of elections and a town moderator for the Deliberative Session on schools.

Although the majority of those present last night had lived in the town for over 40 years, many having grown up here and graduated from Winnacunnet High School, few could have actually described how the town government works. More Young Democrats could tell you what the three branches of the federal government do--or used to do before Trump--than  could describe the functions and jurisdictions of these town organs.

The Zoning Board chairwoman enlightened us by saying that the Zoning Board does not set up zoning rules--that's done by the Selectmen. All the Zoning Board does is hear appeals from citizens who find they cannot possibly comply with a zoning ordinance for their given property: as in the case of a person who owns a property which extends only  30 feet back from the road but who is required to establish a 40 foot set back. If the Board finds the code cannot be reasonably applied, the Board grants an exemption. 

The Budget Committee chair told us that committee simply executes the will of the voters, who vote on the warrant articles every March. If the voters vote down money for a new garbage truck, the Budget Committee does not spend money on a new truck, but scrounges around for money to buy parts for the old trucks. If the town voters vote down money to put a new roof on the high school, then the high school does not get a new roof.

The Planning Commission comes up with recommendations for what ought to happen for the town longterm: Should overhead power lines be buried? Should a study of what to do as rising tides and sea levels overflow the seawall and flood the main road along the coast, and flood the homes and businesses? They send these recommendations to the Select Board who may or may not put them on the warrant articles for the March vote.

What was clear was that  these committees do not talk to one another much.

And something else was clear:

The town has roughly 20,000 year round residents. In the summer it has 150,000 residents, for whom garbage collection, water, electricity, sewage treatment, police, fire and emergency services have to be provided. 

The town's budget is difficult to nail down: Not counting the school budgets for the four town schools, the town budget is around $45 to 50 million. There's another $40 million in trust funds of obscure origin which may or may not be at the disposal of the town and its schools. The school budgets, perhaps as many as three different school budgets, run around $25 million each--which would be $75 million total. 

So, overall, you're looking at a town of 20,000 which has a government controlling somewhere in the neighborhood of $150,000,000.

As someone observed, if Hampton were a college or a business, the ladies on these boards, but especially the chairwoman of the Board of Selectman would be making $2 million a year for that job. 

She gets $3,000 and the other chairman get zero.

In fact, the representatives to the Concord House of Representatives and to the state senate get $100 a year.

Decisions about how to spend  these millions are often left up to the annual March "warrant article" votes, which draw on a big year, 2,000 to 3,000 voters. Then, if the new roof for the school is voted down, well, it is said, the citizens of the town have spoken.

This was the inevitable refrain when the slush fund for the Catholic school in town was voted through every year: The voters have spoken. But the fact is, the voters had no idea what that warrant article meant--they simply read "Recommended by the Budget Committee" and moved on to the next twenty pages of warrant articles, about which they knew next to nothing.

This is why democracies, in their purest form, cannot function for a group of people exceeding a hundred souls. There is just too much minutiae to wade through. You need a civil service for that. 

So, we go through an annual charade called "Deliberative Sessions" where townsfolk get up and speak on issues important to them, but only a hundred citizens attend these. To be a really good, informed citizen would be a second job. And after the deliberative sessions, warrant articles are printed up and about a third to half the eligible voters in town vote on the two articles they actually know something about and then just rubber stamp the others.

For most people in town, they want to get home at night after work and just be able to flush their toilets, put out their trash and not find the Atlantic Ocean in their living rooms. 

The fact is, our local government was constructed when the town was a dinghy, but now it's a battleship. 

We've got a command structure built for a dinghy.