The tax freeze question — including about 50 people a speaker said were added this year — stays off the agenda until ethics opinions arrive. Camp counselors will be paid up to minimum wage, and two fire departments get new equipment.
Scituate, R.I. — The Scituate Town Council at Thursday night’s meeting declined to add a discussion of how the town’s elderly tax freeze is being administered, after a motion to put it on the agenda drew no second, according to the Scituate Town Council’s published meeting recording. The council then approved a slate of spending items by voice vote, including retroactive pay for summer camp counselors and new equipment for two fire departments.
Tax freeze stays off the agenda
Council President Charles A. Collins, Jr. opened public comment by explaining why nothing on the tax freeze was on the docket. They said they had been told by ethics officials not to seek opinions from solicitors or their own attorney, and that they had asked through the solicitor that every council member seek an opinion from the state ethics commission on whether they could vote on freeze matters. If too few members are cleared to form a quorum, they said, they would direct the Solicitor’s Office to request a “rule of necessity” so four of the seven members could vote.
A council member then moved, citing state open meetings law, to add a discussion-only item on the administration of the elderly tax freeze ordinance and the status of people on the freeze who the member said do not currently meet its requirements. The motion received no second…