Charlotte chooses to keep voice voting
More than 300 people showed up for Charlotte’s first in-person town meeting since COVID. Extra chairs had to be brought in. The meeting started 30 minutes late, delayed by the need to get so many people confirmed as registered town voters.
Charlotte residents rejected two proposals to switch from in-person voting to a secret ballot at its annual town meeting Saturday.
Residents voted 151 to 101 against Article 7, which would have required the town budget be approved by the so-called Australian ballot.
By a voice vote, they also rejected Article 8, which would have allowed residents to vote on all public questions by Australian ballot.
“The wisdom of democracy is not in the ballot,” said Charlotte resident Amos Baehr. “The wisdom of democracy is in the deliberation.”
The vote contradicts a trend away from traditional Town Meeting Day voting and toward secret ballots, especially in larger towns and cities in Vermont.
A recent analysis by the University of Vermont’s Center for Community News, which runs Community News Service, shows fewer towns are voting in person on their budgets, from 72 percent of towns before the pandemic to 63 percent this year.
Instead, Charlotte residents chose to keep their 236-year-old Town Meeting Day tradition at a town meeting that had more than 300 attendees, a bigger crowd than usual in recent years.
Father-daughter residents Dan and Emily Raabe illustrate both sides of the debate.
Dan Raabe was in favor of the Australian ballot because he said it would allow broader participation.
Father-daughter duo Emily and Dan Raabe found themselves on opposite sides of Saturday’s debate.
“It excludes 80 percent, 85 percent of the people in town from making these decisions,” he said of the traditional meeting style.
Emily Raabe, on the other hand, voted against the Australian ballot and for keeping the Town Meeting Day tradition of voice voting. To give residents more opportunities to participate, she said she’d prefer a hybrid model, rather than scrapping the tradition entirely.
“The only disappointment I have is that right now, it is black and white, either Australian ballot or town meeting,” she said.
These articles were put into motion with the goal to include more residents in the voting process. Many Charlotters have trouble setting aside a day for the lengthy traditional meeting or can’t even get to the meeting at all.
Cecily Wallman-Stokes, a Charlotte resident and mother of two, spoke on behalf of her husband, who had to leave early to watch their children.
“As my husband was leaving, he said ‘Please speak up for this,’ so I’m doing it,” Wallman-Stokes said.
Brandon Tieso, 27, was a strong advocate for keeping the town meeting and rejecting the Australian ballot.
“This is a great reflection of our town. It’s a great cross-section of our town. And I trust the people who showed up today,” Tieso said.
Charlotte briefly did vote on town issues via Australian ballot, during the pandemic. Saturday’s meeting marked the return of in-person voting, the first time since COVID shut down large gatherings.
Articles 7 and 8 would have returned things to that pandemic way of business. By law, the people at the town meeting are the only ones who can vote to change to an Australian ballot.
When it came time to decide on Article 7, the voice vote was declared inconclusive. Then, a standing vote appeared to show the defeat of Article 7, but residents called for a paper ballot to make sure.
The proposal to switch to ballot voting on the budget failed, 151 to 101.
Seeing the way the wind was blowing, several residents got up and left. A diminished crowd skipped the debate on Article 8 and rejected it by a voice vote.
Emily Raabe said the experience of civil debate she and her father experienced shows the continued value of the Town Meeting Day tradition.
“I said to my dad, the fact that we both got up, spoke our minds and sat back down is, unfortunately for him, a perfect argument for Town Meeting Day,” she said.
(Via Community News Service, a University of Vermont journalism internship, on assignment for the Charlotte News.)