Damn the citizens, full speed ahead

The mayor and members of the Howell Township Council spent the early part of this week jumping through hoops and trying to make last-minute decisions for one simple reason: they were deathly afraid that a citizens group would get a do-or-die change of government question on the ballot in Novem-ber.

Howell’s elected officials are doing exactly what officials in Jackson did two years ago when, faced with the same type of a citizens group that was working hard and playing by the rules to place a change of government question before the voters, they ran an end around in an attempt to short circuit the process.

The Jackson Township Com-mittee’s attempt to blow the citizens group out of the water failed, and the change of government question put forth by a group called VOTE went before the voters, who rejected the proposal in November 2003.

Over the past few weeks in Howell a citizens group called Real Accountability for Taxpay-ers (RAFT) has proposed a new form of government for Howell – a ward system to elect council representatives, a directly elected mayor and nonpartisan elections in May.

If RAFT succeeds in placing its question on the ballot in November, residents will vote yes or no on that specific form of government. A simple majority would carry the question, and Howell’s form of government would be changed.

The prospect of that happening obviously scares Howell’s mayor and council members to death.

They are in the seats of power right now. They and their political backers control the lucrative appointments of professionals such as attorneys, engineers and planners.

They interact with developers who want to do business in town. They have power and they are facing the prospect of ordinary citizens taking it away from them.

With that in mind, the council has made several attempts over the past two weeks to adopt an ordinance that would place a different question on the November ballot. The council’s question would ask voters if they want a charter study commission to study all forms of government available to Howell.

But in order to adopt the charter study commission ordinance, the council stretched its credibility to the breaking point with the number of special meetings it called in order to ram this ordinance through and short-circuit RAFT.

Special meetings should be called to deal with real municipal emergencies, not for the introduction and adoption of an ordinance that could have been done at any time between January and August.

Much the same as it was in Jackson two years ago, the Howell officials’ position is that residents will not be well enough informed by Election Day to make a yes or no choice on the form of government RAFT is proposing. The officials say a charter study commission should conduct a full investigation of all options available to Howell.

It’s an offensive attempt to silence the voice of residents.

Howell Councilwoman Cynthia Schomaker suggested several years ago that a different form of government might better serve Howell officials and residents. Her fellow council members made no move to call for the formation of a charter study commission at that time or at any time up until two weeks ago.

Now, and only now, as a citizens group forges ahead with a change of government question, the Howell council gets religion. But the only religion in this story is the praying Howell officials are doing this week that they can somehow thwart RAFT.