Cambridge City Manager: Update, March 4, 2015

Dear Friends of Cambridge,

 

The city manager issue is back on the docket for the city council meeting this coming Monday. I do not know all of what will be discussed but have some information that you need to know.

 

Within the past few days the mayor and others met with the Dorchester Election Board, their staff, and their attorney. The purpose of the meeting included the city's request that the election board verify or certify the signatures on the petition that was presented to city council on January 26th. This request had been previously made and rejected and, apparently, was rejected again.

 

That moves the matter back to the city for it to make a decision on how to proceed to certify or verify the signatures on the petition. I have made a written request to review the petitions and possibly copy some or all of them but have not yet received a response to that request.

 

It is unclear what, if any, rules or guidance exist regarding how the signatures or the petition will be verified or certified so we will have to wait to see what the city council tells us on that issue.

 

If it turns out that the petition is certified or verified (the count may be done between now and the Monday city council meeting), there are at least two things that need to be decided  by the city council. The first is what the referendum question will be for the voters to vote on, and the second is when that vote will take place.

 

With regard to when a vote would take place, there are two options. One is to have the vote within 40-60 days of the verification/certification of the petition and the other would be to have the vote in May-June of 2016 at the time of the general election for the mayor and commissioners.

 

With regard to what the referendum question will be, it appears that that decision lies with the city council to draft the question based on how the issue is raised in the petition.

 

I plan to attend the meeting on Monday and would certainly encourage you to attend as well to be able to hear first hand what the current situation is and what next steps may need to be taken.

 

It is our position on when the vote should take place (if the petition is verified/certified)  that it take place within the 40-60 day period from the date of certification rather than waiting until more than a year from now. This is an issue that has now been discussed for over 2 years and needs to be decided sooner rather than later.

 

Steve Rideout