Laura Rom, Tiverton
In the 2017 special election for Tiverton Charter Review Commission (CRC) there were 24 candidates running for 9 available seats. 9 of those candidates were endorsed by the TTA, and subsequently, all 9 were duly elected by the voters of Tiverton. The sitting town council dismissed the 12 months of intensive work by the CRC and put their own charter changes on the ballot, denying the voters of Tiverton the opportunity to revise their own government from the work by the duly elected CRC.
In the 2018 election for town council,18 candidates ran. Seven candidates were TTA endorsed and ran a great campaign based on “shaking things up” by introducing new and fresh ideas to solve the long, on-going issues and preserve the future of Tiverton. The 7 TTA endorsed candidates promised to end the “we have always done it this way” mentality, they promised an open government with fewer “behind closed door” discussions, they promised resident access to meeting agendas, they promised long term goals, less contentious contract negotiations, they promised to either follow the existing rules or change them, and they promised to implement an employee “code of conduct” to prevent some of the past, very expensive pay-outs for town employee misconduct.
Town council candidates Katz, Coulter, Cook and Driggs (Coulter, Cook and Driggs were previously elected to the CRC) were duly elected, again, to serve the people of Tiverton. In the 10 months since they were elected, they have worked tirelessly to kept those campaign promises and will spend the remainder of their term doing the same.
Unhappy voters from the 2017 and 2018 elections want a “redo” of the 2018 election for no other reason than they did not like the outcome and are using ridiculous statements, and sometimes outright lies, to try and overturn the results. The recall has absolutely no validity and is driven by the sore losers of the past 2 elections.
Voting is a constitutional right that must be preserved. The strategy based “just don’t vote” campaign has been difficult for me to endorse, however, because I know the history of the 2017 and 2018 elections, I am convinced that the recall is a total sham that voters should ignore. Consider staying home and enjoying your day.