On a sticky summer afternoon, Easthampton is quiet, the traffic fluid, and the trees heavy with lush green foliage. Two years earlier the town looked notably different. In the spring and summer of 1996, yard signs of every color sprouted on the well-kept lawns in this blue-collar and bedroom community. A billboard reading “Easthampton Needs A Mayor” appeared on the side of the road leading up Mount Tom, the rocky cliffside at the east side of town.
That summer, Easthampton was in the throes of sweeping political change. A few months earlier, in April, by a margin of 235 votes out of 3,051 cast, the town had approved a new charter, beginning the process of restructuring its local government. The charter called for replacing the board of selectmen with a town council and a mayor, as well as eliminating the elected town meeting. In July, the new mayor, Michael Tautznik, was elected from a field of seven candidates, which included four of the town’s five selectmen. At the same time, a nine-member town council was chosen. The officials took office that fall.
When Easthampton adopted its new form of government, the town, with 15,800 residents living in 13.6 square miles, technically became a city. But Easthampton has never wanted to be a city and charter authors specified the name was to remain “Town of Easthampton,” a clear reflection of the desire for change without loss of identity. Massachusetts hasn’t seen a town incorporate as a full-fledged city since Gardner made the change in 1921. But since the state’s 1966 Home Rule law gave towns the right to revise their own charters without approval by the Legislature, nine communities have chosen to become a “city known as a town.” (Agawam, Methuen, Southbridge, Franklin, Watertown, Greenfield, Barnstable, and Amesbury are the others.) It’s a halfway approach that allows towns to be run by either a mayor or a town manager, in tandem with a town council.
The burst of political energy that propelled a mayor into Easthampton’s town hall had several antecedents. In 1994, a handful of residents, including the owners of a local funeral home who are active in town affairs, set the change in motion, petitioning to elect a charter commission. The petitioners were motivated by a number of issues, particularly frustration with the increasingly heated battle between the board of selectmen and a private association over control of the town’s public library. Others in town were unhappy about poor relations between the board of selectmen and the three successive town administrators who served between 1987 and 1996. As well, the town had its share of economic frustrations over the closure of industrial mills and lack of development downtown, particularly when compared to the rejuvenation of neighboring Northampton.
Although dissatisfaction with the town meeting was not the prime impetus for the charter change, there were some who argued that the town meeting was dominated by special interests and members who “voted by the seat of their pants.” Age-old questions about the need for efficiency in government versus the value of citizen participation were hashed out as voters considered ending the town meeting tradition, which dates back to Easthampton’s incorporation in 1785. In the end, the town meeting was a casualty of the desire for a “strong” mayor who could be held accountable for decisions and who could serve as a point man in the town’s economic development.
Now, residents say, the town has gotten just that in Mr. Tautznik, a lifelong resident, a former selectman, and a conservationist. In particular, the state may be taking more notice. Town Planner Stuart Beckley notes that in the last year about $2 million in state and federal grants have rolled in the door for economic development, housing, and the purchase of an old post office for renovation into a senior center. Mr. Beckley, who served two stints as acting town administrator, also said the budgeting process is much smoother.
Mayor Tautznik said the new charter, while it has some flaws, has solved some problems in town government. It used to be that if you didn’t like the town administrator’s decision, you could turn to the selectmen or the finance committee or ultimately to town meeting, he said. “In this government there is no way around the mayor’s office. I think that’s what the people were looking for; not only someone who can be seen as a figurehead, but someone who is the key decision maker… Whether the decisions are right or wrong, they like the idea that decisions are being made,” said Mr. Tautznik.
Despite the activity of the new leaders, local affairs in Easthampton are said to be pretty quiet these days. The end of town meeting released 126 people from civic obligation, but this summer there were 22 of the approximately 130 positions on volunteer boards and committees that were not filled. Mr. Tautznik says Easthampton is experiencing a “lack of civic involvement.” The calm leads some to conclude the mayor and town council are working smoothly and efficiently. Others wonder if public discourse and involvement have gone the way of town meeting.
“The government is probably more efficient, but less visible. It’s a trade-off,” said Michael Engel, a school committee member and a political science professor at Westfield State College who used to be a selectman and town meeting member.
The “less visible” factor has some worried. As the town meeting and the selectmen’s meetings were, the town council’s weekly meetings are shown live on the local cable-access channel. But the town council does most of its work in subcommittee meetings that are not televised. Mary Brewer, a charter commission member who opposed the mayoral form of government, said she once stayed informed by watching the board of selectmen on cable access, but has found little debate in town council meetings. She detects a lack of chatter about public affairs and wonders how that is affecting the town. “Any issue of any meat is referred to a subcommittee,” said Ms. Brewer. “There is nothing that has taken the place of what the town meeting and the finance committee did in the way of informing the citizenry of where their tax money is going.”
On the other hand, Town Council President Merritt Loomis, also a charter author, counters that subcommittees research matters thoroughly and the council is well informed and swift when it comes time to vote. Mr. Loomis said that under town meeting, the best orator tended to win votes, regardless of the information provided on an issue, but that is no longer the case.
Alan Shaler, who moderated town meeting for about 10 years and is now a council member, said town meetings were “colorful and interesting affairs,” but he believes people are generally happy with the new system because it operates with greater speed. “I think we have more chance to move forward with dispatch and I think we’re also in a better position to deal with the state with grants and so forth,” said Mr. Shaler.
Michael O’Brien, a Hampshire County commissioner, said some residents who used town meeting to pursue their goals may not realize that on the legislative side the action now happens at the council’s subcommittee meetings. Mr. O’Brien added that despite the mayor and the town council flexing political muscle and testing the boundaries of the new charter over contentious issues such as political appointments, funding of a public safety complex, and conservation regulations, the new government has encountered relatively few problems and the public jury evaluating its success is likely still out.
Easthampton may be quiet now, but a sure measure of the new government’s popularity will come at the next municipal election in November 1999.
Laura Longsworth is a graduate student in broadcast journalism at Boston University. She wrote about Easthampton government as a reporter for the Daily Hampshire Gazette from 1994 to 1997.