Conclusion: Toward openness, accountability, and participation

By William C. Shelton

(The opinions and views expressed in the commentaries of The Somerville News belong solely to the authors of those commentaries and do not reflect the views or opinions of The Somerville News, its staff or publishers.)

Lord John Dalberg-Acton famously wrote that power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Massachusetts politics offers convincing evidence. Less than eight percent of its 351 cities and towns have a strong mayor form of government. But they historically account for all of the Commonwealth’s major municipal corruption scandals. Somerville is one of them.

When power is highly concentrated in a chief executive, the corruption need not be an illegal exchange of money for favors. Highly concentrated power in the executive branch fosters an unconscious arrogance that usurps the legal and democratic prerogatives of aldermen and voters. It leads to decisions made in the absence of public awareness or input, which when politically necessary, are justified after the fact.

Lord Acton, a devout Roman Catholic, made his observation in 1870 when Pope Pius IX announced the dogma of papal infallibility. After the Pope had carefully orchestrated “spontaneous popular demand,” for the dogma, the First Vatican Council proclaimed it. Lord Acton bitterly opposed it.

Last year, Mayor Joseph A. Curtatone announced that he would like for the elected School Committee to be replaced by one that is appointed-by him. He subsequently modified his proposal to a partially elected and partially appointed committee. He also announced that he would like to double his and the aldermen’s term of office. Both measures would require changes to the City Charter.

On April 18, the mayor announced that he would ‚Äúconvene a Charter Advisory Committee to examine the City of Somerville’s municipal charter and recommend changes.‚Äù The committee is comprised of members whom he appointed.

Since the days when the Board of Aldermen actually made policy, the world has changed profoundly, and with it, the circumstances of Somervillians’ lives. But Somerville’s favor/relationship-based political culture has outlived the social institutions and rich fabric of relationships that once gave it vitality and effectiveness.

Historically, Somerville politics were not about ideology and seldom about broad issues.  They were about whether a voter’s street was repaired or a relative got a job. Politicians maintained loyalties through dispensing favors and maintaining personal relationships.

In a culturally homogenous city where challenges faced by city government were simple and well understood, this worked fairly well. Extensive and dense family, neighborhood, union, fraternal organization, sports, friendship and church relationship networks ensured that voters personally knew candidates and held them accountable. They provided countless opportunities to informally discuss the matters of the day. But over the years, these networks have disintegrated, while the population has be ome more diverse, the challenges, more complex, and the stakes, higher.

The city’s antiquated charter and political culture now undermine city government’s effectiveness in meeting the needs of its people. Politics remains mostly about personalities and relationships, but of a different kind. Relationships between politicians and voters are often fictional, existing only in the mind of the voters.

 
The most potent relationships are based on the narrow interest of someone who wants something. They are potent because (1) spin has replaced mobilization of the bygone relationship networks as the primary electoral tactic; (2) advertising has replaced organizing and requires more money; and (3) the cost of mobilizing significant political contributions is small compared to what special interests hope to gain. This skews political calculations from “what will enable me to make a difference for most voters?” to “what will enable me to raise enough money to get elected and re-elected?”

It shifts more power to the mayor in a city with an already too-strong-mayor charter. It better positions the mayor to capture large campaign donations. In turn, aldermen are more obliged to a mayor who can either support their campaigns or punish them by withholding city services from their constituents.

Since I began this series, some readers have commended me, and some condemned me for ‚Äúgoing after the mayor.‚Äù They understandably mistake my intentions. This miss-take takes for granted that Somerville’s political culture is the natural and inevitable way of the world. We live in a city in which every public park, program, affordable housing development–anything of value to the voters–literally has the mayor’s name on it in large letters, as if it were bestowed on them by his generosity rather than created through their own taxes and hard work. From inside the assumptions of our political system and culture, any criticism of it will inevitably be seen as an attack on its supreme leader.

But stepping outside it, the opportunity to create a city government that is open, accountable, and participatory is inspiring. The most important thing that we can do to realize that opportunity is to substantially shift the balance of power to legislators and to the people who elect them. Doing so will base policy decisions more firmly on real-world evidence, make governance more participatory, produce more creative solutions to the city’s great challenges, moderate escalating campaign spending, reduce the influence of self-interested parties, make the city’s true fiscal conditions and choices more transparent, and help shift political discourse from name calling to civil interaction.

Massachusetts General Laws Chapter 43B specifies a democratic method to accomplish such a transformation. The people can elect their own Charter Commission. The commission may call any city official or expert to offer testimony or expertise.  It must seek public input and conduct public hearings. Between 10 and 18 months after its formation, the commission must put the proposed charter changes on the next municipal ballot.

Residents of more than 130 Massachusetts cities and towns have used this method to change their charters. What possible justification can there be for using a less democratic method, which is the product of the old system, to create a new system?