Selectmen Affirm Civil Discourse Policy for Board and Committee Meetings

By Jeffrey Epstein

In a time when hot-button issues are turning meetings across the nation into rude shouting matches, the Selectmen quietly edited and codified a longstanding local policy on appropriate meeting conduct Monday. Nothing new, pointed out Chair Margot Fleischman, but good to have as policy nonetheless. “It’s probably the right thing to do,” she said.

Final language has not yet been printed, but the rules would seem to be commonsense; among them: Allow each speaker to finish their thought before responding, and be respectful and willing to listen to differing points of view.

In controversial public hearings, “sometimes the decorum…starts to break down,” Fleischman commented, and the guidelines can be helpful. For board and committee members, though, such guidance is a part of the job, and a subset of larger rules that committee members must follow as part of their public responsibilities.

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In Other Business

Earlier in the evening, the Selectmen interviewed Mark Bailey and unanimously appointed him to the Bicycle Advisory Committee. Toward the end of the session, Fleischman took the time to carefully walk the new member through the ethics procedures that attach to such an appointment, such as making sure any committee discussions are held in public, as opposed to email.

When the Selectmen discussed their wish that the Finance Committee would allow their meetings to be recorded and broadcast by Bedford TV, the Selectmen made it clear that the opinion was advisory only; the Selectmen should not try to dictate or mandate action to the Finance Committee, they said.

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