Board of Finance Appointment Controversy Moves to Court
- Philip Thibodeau
- 1 day ago
- 6 min read
After the passing of Board of Finance member Edward Pocock, Jr., the process of appointing his replacement appeared to be going smoothly. Planning and Zoning Member Robert Britton agreed to take over for his Republican colleague. The Town Council voted unanimously for his appointment, and on July 13, he was sworn in as a new member.
Yet now that appointment is being challenged. Two members of the Democratic Town Committee, Dawn Anastasio, who currently sits on the Board of Education, and former Town Council member Anthony D’Angelo, have filed a complaint in State Superior Court against Britton, who is named as the respondent.
The Complaint
The complaint claims that the Town Council had no authority to vote on the Board of Finance replacement and asks that Britton be ousted from his position. Its argument, which is brief, first quotes Section 208 of the Town Charter, with six words emphasized in boldface:
“Vacancies in elective offices, except in the Board of Education, the Planning and Zoning Commission and the Board of Finance, from whatever cause arising, shall be filled by the Council for a period until the next town election. Vacancies in the Planning and Zoning Commission shall be filled by the Planning and Zoning Commission for the period until the next town election. In filling any vacancy, the Council, Board of Education or the Planning and Zoning Commission shall select a person of the same political party as that of the former incumbent, unless said incumbent was not an enrolled member of a political party, in which case his successor shall not be an enrolled member of a political party. A member elected at a town election to fill a vacancy shall serve for the remaining unexpired
portion of the term of the former incumbent.”
It then quotes the State of Connecticut General Statue Section 7-343, which says:
“In case of a vacancy in the membership of the board of finance, unless otherwise provided by charter or special act, the remaining members of the board shall, at a special meeting called by the chairman for that purpose, by a majority vote, appoint a successor, who shall serve until the next town election and until his successor is elected and has qualified. At the next town election following the occurrence of such vacancy, the electors shall elect a successor to fill the vacancy for the unexpired portion of the term and the office to be filled shall be designated on the official ballot by the words 'To fill vacancy for ....,' followed
by the duration of the unexpired term.”
After quoting these two passages, the complaint claims that, given their language, the Town of Southington, through actions of its Town Council, “failed to legally fill the vacancy” on the Board of Finance.
Possible Lines of Defense
How Britton addresses this contention should become more clear during his court appearance on September 8. One would expect the response to mirror claims made by Town Attorney Lou Martocchio and Town Clerk Kathy Larkin at the August 10 meeting of Town Council, and by Town Council Chair Paul Chaplinsky in various venues. This defense has three lines of argument – one involving precedent, one appealing to the popular will, and one focusing on the charter’s text.
The argument from precedent notes that the Town Council filled vacancies on the Board of Finance in 2009 and 2010 without any controversy. In addition, the Council’s vote in July to appoint Britton had the support of all three Democrats. The implication is that the Democrats have, by their votes, previously consented to the principle that the Town Council elects Board of Finance replacements.
The ‘popular will’ argument rests on the observation that in 2010, Southington voters were presented with the following referendum question: “Shall Section 208 of the Southington Town Charter be amended to allow vacancies in elective offices to be filled by the board or commission with such vacancy?” The proposal went down in defeat, with 5,897 voting for it and 8,906 voting against. Martocchio and Chaplinsky have pointed to this vote as an indication that it was the will of the people not to allow boards to choose replacements for their members.
The third argument, about the text of the charter, has two parts.
First, the argument goes, a sentence is missing from the text of Section 208 quoted by the Democratic complainants. The sentence went missing sometime between 2016 and 2018 after then-Town Manager Mark Sciotta and the Town Clerk’s office attempted to update the language of the section. At the time, its third sentence read, “Vacancies in the Library Board and the Board of Finance shall be filled by the Council for the unexpired portion of the term.” Some years earlier, in 2000, voters had approved a referendum measure that changed the Library Board from one with elected members to one with appointed members. To bring the language of the charter up to date, the Town Manager asked, in effect, that the words “the Library Board and” be removed:
However, in the relevant document from 2016, the whole sentence was underlined (see image above). Apparently, when the proposed change was implemented, this resulted in the whole sentence being accidentally removed. Had the edits been entered correctly, the sentence would presumably have read, “Vacancies in the Board of Finance shall be filled by the Council for the unexpired portion of the term,” or words to that effect, without a reference to the Library Board.
In fact, since the Outsider first reported on this story, the online text of the Town Charter has been changed to include this missing sentence. On July 21, the text on ecode360.com was the same as that quoted by the Democratic complainants; for an earlier article by the Outsider on the controversy, that text was copied in full. On or before August 22, however, when this story was filed, the original sentence – complete with the obsolete reference to the Library Board – has been restored.
Competing Interpretations
To summarize, then, the Democratic argument hinges on the first sentence in Section 208,
“Vacancies in elective offices, except in the Board of Education, the Planning and Zoning Commission and the Board of Finance, from whatever cause arising, shall be filled by the Council for a period until the next town election,”
while the Republican counter gives more weight to the restored third sentence,
“Vacancies in the Library Board and the Board of Finance shall be filled by the Council for the unexpired portion of the term.”
The Democratic complaint does not address the language of the restored sentence, nor did Martocchio or Larkin address the language of the first sentence at the Council meeting.
However, Chaplinsky, citing Council minutes from 1994, has argued on the Facebook group Southington Talks that the first sentence needs to be understood in the context of the full paragraph. The sentence, he claims, does not just specify who has the authority to fill vacancies, but clarifies for how long the vacancy appointments shall last. On his reading, the paragraph indicates that Board of Education and Planning and Zoning elect their own replacements, who then serve until the next town election, while the Board of Finance's replacements, which are chosen by Town Council, serve for the remainder of the term.
In 1994, voters approved at referendum an updated version of Section 208 that read, with additions that are underlined:
“Vacancies in elective offices, except in the Board of Education, the Planning and Zoning Commission, the Board of Finance and the Library Board, from whatever cause arising, shall be filled by the Council for a period until the next town election. Vacancies in the Board of Education shall be filled by the Board of Education for a period until the next town election. Vacancies in the Planning and Zoning Commission shall be filled by the Planning and Zoning Commission for the period until the next town election. Vacancies in the Library Board and the Board of Finance shall be filled by the Council for the unexpired portion of the term. In filling any vacancy, the Council, Board of Education or the Planning and Zoning Commission shall select a person of the same political party as that of the former incumbent, unless said incumbent was not an enrolled member of a political party, in which case his successor shall not be an enrolled member of a political party. A member elected at a town election to fill a vacancy shall serve for the remaining unexpired portion of the term of the former incumbent.”
Sentences two through six of this paragraph form a logically consistent unit that fits Chaplinsky’s interpretation. They specify that the Board of Education and the Planning and Zoning Commission both fill their own vacancies, for a period until the next election. They also say that the Council shall fill vacancies on the Board of Finance and the Library Board, for the unexpired portion of the term.
What remains less than clear is what the first sentence means and how it can be harmonized with the others.
In the end, it will be up to the court to decide how to move forward. If the complaint succeeds and Britton is forced to step aside, a Republican would have to take his place on the Board of Finance. However, the Board would at that point have a 3-2 Democratic majority, which would give the Democratic caucus the ability to choose which Republican would replace Pocock.
