At a Town Council meeting on April 19, commissioners approved the recommended changes from the Charter Revision Commission (CRC). The public will get to approve or reject the proposals at the municipal elections in November.

In the summer of 2022, the Town Council appointed a new five-person CRC to review the Town Charter, a document that outlines the roles and bylaws for the different boards, commissions, and town departments in Clinton.

The council asked the CRC to consider recommended changes such as the ability to hire a town manager for a term of longer than three years, increasing the amount of money the Town can appropriate without a referendum, and the cancellation of the required annual town meeting. The CRC was also able to consider other proposed changes members deemed appropriate.

Over the course of the fall and winter, three different public hearings were held for the citizens to weigh in on the proposed changes and add suggestions they had.

The final proposed charter was filed with the Town Clerk in March, which left it up to the council to either approve or reject the entire proposed document. All council members voted to approve the proposed changes except for Carrie Allen. Allen said she was “very opposed” to the amount of money the Town would be able to appropriate without going to a referendum under the proposed charter.

With the proposed changes now approved by the council, the Town has 15 months to get the public to weigh in on the changes. However, it is most likely the proposed charter changes will be on the ballot as part of the 2023 municipal elections held in November.

Assuming the target date is the November election, the council will approve the wording of the ballot questions in August.

The Proposed changes

The most significant change proposed by the CRC is the ability to hire a Town Manager for a term not to exceed five years instead of the current three-year maximum.

A second substantial change would increase the amount of money the Town can appropriate without a referendum to $700,000 from the current $300,000.

Other proposed changes would allow the town manager to hire, dismiss, and advertise for town employees without the approval of the Town Council first.

Further proposed changes to the charter would remove the requirement for the town council to appoint a search committee to fill the vacancies in town departments. The town manager would then be able to appoint or hire people for the roles. The changes would also cancel the annual town meeting held each January, where boards and commissions give updates on the previous year’s actions.

The last time the Town appointed a CRC was in 2018, when a major charter revision was proposed that changed the form of government from the board of selectman model to the current town manager-town council model. Citizens approved the proposed change in November 2018, and the new government went into effect in November 2019.

The current charter requires the Town to appoint a CRC to review the document no less than every five years, but given the large change in government structure that the Town underwent in 2019, it was suggested by other towns’ town managers that Clinton appoint a new CRC sooner than that to work out any issues that council members may have noticed.