Martha Coakley Gives Oral Hex

Ken O’Brien

According to the official website of the Office of The Massachusetts Attorney General, “Attorney General Martha Coakley is the chief lawyer and law enforcement officer of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.”

In that regard, Ms. Coakley is responsible for the actions of her numerous functionaries, especially when it comes to their actions in that official capacity as the chief law enforcement officer of the Commonwealth.

This fact has become especially relevant in regard to the amendments to the Home Rule Charter of the town of Southbridge that are now pending before the Joint Committee on Municipalities and Regional Government.

When the Southbridge Town Council submitted these amendments to the legislature, the members of the Charter Review Committee submitted their objections to them to our local legislative delegation.

Among the comments made in that letter was the following:

“The most egregious of these violations [in the charter amendments proposed by the town council] are:

1) The proposed amendment to change the following section of the Town Charter

’-6-1:Final removal of the manager shall be effected by a majority vote of the entire council (i.e., a minimum of 5 votes) at an open council meeting.’

           

           The Council proposes that the vote required to remove the Town Manager be increased from 5 to 6. However, Chapter 43 B of Mass. General laws states in Section 10:

            ‘ ...only a charter commission elected under this chapter may propose any change in a charter relating in any way to the composition, mode of election or appointment, or terms of office of the legislative body, the mayor or city manager, or the board of selectmen or town manager.’"

                                                                    

As the Southbridge Evening News reported on January 30, 2012 in an article titled “Charter changes filed in Legislature”

“The town is seeking such changes under Article 89 of the state constitution, which requires the Council to approve them by a two-thirds majority before sending them to the Legislature. The article, however, sets a specific restriction: ‘any change in a charter relating in any way to the composition, mode of election or appointment, or terms of office of the legislative body, the mayor or city manager or the board of selectmen or town manager shall be made’ only by an elected Charter Commission. Southbridge’s most recent charter review body was appointed, and this particular proposal didn’t even come from them — it came from the council itself.

Durant said that issue was the one sticking point, since the changes include upping the vote required to fire the Town Manager from five councilors to six. The Attorney General approved it on the grounds that ‘these are all going to the voters anyway,’ he said. “

Ever since that comment appeared in the local press, I and others have attempted to get a copy of that opinion.

To date, according to everything we have been able to ascertain, the opinion was merely verbal. The Attorney General’s Office has not committed it to writing.

It should be clear why. The law is unambiguous. It says, “…only a charter commission elected under this chapter may propose any [such] change”. [Emphasis added]

Yesterday Amelia Peloquin posted the following on my Facebook page. “FYI, I was informed by the committee's counsel this morning that the chairs would be moving this forward in executive session later today, because it had been decided that procedurally there was nothing wrong with it.”

As much as I may hope that Elizabeth Warren replaces Scott Brown as U. S. Senator, I have to conclude that he is preferable in that role to his former opponent who exhibits such an arbitrary and casual attitude to her responsibility as the chief law enforcement officer of the Commonwealth.