Staples High School Class of 1976 alum Jan Carpenter is a retired financial executive. She graduated from Boston College, and spent her career working in the consulting and advertising business in New York and San Francisco.
She has been an active civic volunteer, and recently became involved in political efforts to improve how we govern ourselves and improve our democracy. Jan writes:
Feeling stressed from the toxic political news of the day? Here is a bit of stress reduction.
I am a co-state leads for America’s new Forward Party. We don’t take a position on traditional party platforms like gun control, etc.). Rather, we believe that our political system is broken and we need to fix it.
We will not run a candidate for president in 2024. Instead, we are trying to get regular folks elected at local and state levels who want to work together with grace and tolerance, advocate for compromise and civility, and want democracy reform.
That reform takes many forms, including voter reform (ranked choice voting, for example), open primaries, and independent redistricting.
As part of this work, I am lucky to have been exposed to many grassroots organizations fighting for these sorts of reforms that few have ever heard about.
I want to share with Westport 3 of them that I found especially interesting and promising, in the fight for reform and a better future.
Citizen Assemblies. The concept involves taking a thorny community issue and, in an effort to move in a positive direction, bringing together everyday citizens by lottery to work together over a period of time to come up with a recommendation.
Participants attend a set number of days/meetings (and typically get paid for doing so), get to know each other, hear from experts on both sides of an issue (also typically paid), then vote on a decision, which must be a supermajority (2/3) vote.
Their decision (in writing) goes back to the legislative body that needs to vote on the topic. That body could vote against the recommendation of the CA, but would need concrete reasoning. (Click here to learn more.)
Citizen Assemblies:
- Get citizens involved in helping make decisions for the community
- Help provide information for elected officials to assist in decision-making
- Offer information to defend decisions; takes “political maneuvering” and (in many cases) vitriol out of politics.
Citizen Assemblies have been used in a variety of places, including:
- Ireland to decide same-sex marriage
- Petaluma, California during debate on the use of park/farm land
- Michigan to review the response to COVID.
Westport might be a great maverick/leader, by using CAs to address difficult problems (there is no shortage of them these days).
It’s probably too late for Long Lots (though if thought about earlier, might have worked beautifully), but maybe not too late for discussions surrounding downtown.
Open Primaries. Connecticut’s closed primaries means that only Democrats get to vote in Democratic primaries, and Republicans in theirs.
Yet these are not “clubs” that we think of when we think of closed memberships. These are public primaries, which we all pay for.
Most Connecticut voters identify as independent — yet most voters here do not get to participate in primaries. Some say this results in more extreme candidates, less competition, and less incentive to appeal to a broader part of the electorate.
A group is trying to fix that. Click here for details; view the video below:
The Good Party. It’s incredibly difficult to run and get elected as an independent candidate today. This is particularly frustrating since (as noted above), most of us are independent.
This group is trying to fix that. The Good Party is not actually a party at all; rather, it’s a group that has come together to help people at local levels to run as independents.
They are building a movement (and offering free technical support) to end America’s 2-party political dysfunction. Click here and also here for details.
I hope “06880” readers find this interesting and encouraging. To learn more about the Forward Party, click here.
Readers: Would the Forward Party work in Westport? Click “Comments” to discuss. As always, please use your full, real name. And be civil!
(“06880” is your source for all local politics: Democratic, Republican, independent and Forward Party. Please click here to support our work. Thank you!)
The concept of Citizen Assemblies is a welcome idea, and it is NOT too late for 13 Hyde Lane (aka Long Lots). The project has just entered its most critical phase where adjacent land use will be decided, and the costs will be determined.
The adjacent land use is the main point of heated contention in the community, followed closely by the suggested price tag of $100 million, the lack of transparency, and possible government malfeasance in bringing the project forward.
A mechanism for bottom-up voices to be heard, to counter the autocratic dictates of a few elected officials in power, would go a long way toward restoring trust in our fractured town government and community.
Perhaps it will be made up of neighbors! People who actually have houses that look into Long Lots, are in walking distance to Long Lots, hear the children outside laughing and playing, and have kids who play on ball fields, could be an important voice in this group! Sounds like a great idea! I will help spread the word. I agree 13 Hyde is at a critical juncture if anyone is proposing a three story building. Time to get involved parents!
My short answer is yes. It reminds me of the traditional “town meeting” concept that once governed Westport. The introduction of “Representative Town Meeting” (a supposed enhancement) is where things started to slide. Not immediately but I’ve noticed over time that the RTM has evolved from a “get it done” body of public servants to a launching pad for ambitious people looking to accumulate “PTP” (power through parasitism). I’d encourage all Westporters to take this concept seriously. It could be the dawn of a “new Progressivism” and who better to lead the world into the future than Westporters United for the common good as they have been since 1835.
Let me clear, I don’t like closed primaries that disenfranchise independent (moderate) voters. But open primaries invite abuse with crossover voting designed to damage candidates.
The primary reform that makes a positive impact is Open All-In (aka “Louisiana-style”) primaries, when all candidates from all parties are on the primary ballot. The top-two move on to the general election, regardless of party affiliation. (These have also been adopted in some Western states.)
This results in general election candidates who are way more reflective of their collective communities than we currently have. This is the case in either “liberal” or “conservative” populations.
Jan,
Thank you so much for such an articulate message.
Can not agree more that our two party system is so broken, and we all need to get involved right now , and work on making things better. We are on such a bad path.
Shared this with my friends at the Boston Globe , and Greg Reibman President of the Charles River Regional Chamber to help spread the word.
We can never stop trying!!!
Seana, you and Pegeen ROCK!!!!
1. So how does the Citizen Assembly come to be? Does it require State sanction or not since it is merely an “advisory committee” of sorts?
2. Can Westport decide to create these without a Charter modification for the same reason?
3. Who funds this?
4. How are the applicable issues determined and the lottery system engaged to acquire the CA participants?
5. Most importantly, since there is zero incentive for Town leadership to accede even a modicum of power, how do these CAs get off the ground when applicable issues arise?
If these answers are readily solved
I don’t have definitive answers to these, but if the Town of Westport was interested, I would help them coordinate with others who have used them (there are non profit groups that help coordinate them – as you can see from the video). Here is what I think are the answers: 1. and 2. No law changes/charter revisions required exactly as you thought – because it’s only advisory; 3. the Town funds it. Communities have found the cost well worth it – to come to a “community developed” solution, which they may not have been able to achieve otherwise. In addition, you want to weigh the cost against that which you might have spent otherwise – educating the community and arguing amongst opposing factions. 4. The issues are defined by the town with the help of related governing bodies. 5. If your question is “why would our elected officials do it”? – good question. A politician driven by power with little appetite for community involvement might hate the idea (that community probably has bigger issues). Reasons that it does take off: (a) they are true believers in community action; (b) they see how politicians are blamed for unilateral decisions and they want to improve the way government works and their image; (c) their community demands it. Hope that helps!
The RTM system we have now doesn’t work. Six of 9 districts were noncompetitive in the last election, which means the town gets a mixture of intelligent, hardworking representatives (if it’s lucky) along with self-interested blowhards who brag openly about ignoring their constituents’ views in favor of their own parochial concerns. Two of my four RTM reps fall into the latter category. I’m tired of the bullshit. Westport creaks along when it could make easy strides.
I hear you on that. The RTM doesn’t work well in other towns as well. Unfortunately, that change would require a charter revision to fix. Each town is supposed to review their charter every 10 years and I don’t know when Westport last did that. The next time would be the time to raise that change with the Charter Revision Commission (the First Selectwoman’s Office will know when and if that is planned).
It doesn’t make it work any better when the Moderator ignores citizen petitions to RTM, in violation of the Town Charter.