With an election over, most people accept the results and look to moving their town forward. Unfortunately, some who have no positive agenda cling to the same tactics and misinformation rejected by voters.
Justin Katz, leader of the political group Clean Up Tiverton Cavalry, has written letters claiming that the Town Council is bound by past precedent to appoint the next-highest-votegetter to an open Budget Committee seat. His group failed in the election, with just four of its ten candidates elected (while fourteen of sixteen Tiverton 1st-supported candidates won, and the two unsuccessful T1 candidates were within 31 votes of election), so now he offers twisted logic and inaccurate "facts" to claim entitlement to this seat.
Tiverton voters changed the Charter to give the Town Council authority to fill a vacant seat and not have the next-highest-votegetter automatically appointed. Yet Katz falsely claims appointing this next-highest-vote-getter remains the precedent. Why? Because that unsuccessful candidate is part of his group. In fact, the Council led by TCC, Katz's previous group, several times declined to appoint the next-highest-votegetter.
Katz claims automatically giving a seat to an unsuccessful candidate is the will of voters, despite voters having made the Charter change and having not elected that candidate. This isn’t Miss America, where voters choose a first-runner-up. The Council respects voters by carefully considering who will best serve the town. And remember that not only did voters choose Tiverton 1st-backed candidates for the majority of seats, but the seat being filled is that of a successful Tiverton 1st candidate.
Katz states the Council must appoint a CUT candidate to show "unity". By this theory, the Council majority elected by voters to lead the town should ignore voters and Charter alike to appoint a person voters didn't elect who wants to take the town in a direction it chose not to go. If Katz and friends truly want to bring the town together, they'll accept the decisions of voters instead of suing the town (over $25,000 in taxpayer money wasted on their nuisance lawsuit that seeks to overturn voters’ decisions), filing frivolous Charter complaints, and concocting schemes such as this. Apparently Katz and his allies continue to suffer from SLS (Sore Loser Syndrome).
It's time to move past self-serving political agendas and work for the good of our community. That's what the voters chose, it's what Tiverton needs to move forward, and it's what Tiverton 1st stands for. For more information, visit Tiverton 1st on Facebook or at www.tiverton1st.blogspot.com.
Brian Medeiros
Co-Coordinator
Tiverton 1st
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