Is town government working? How might it work better?
To review, rethink and revise the town’s basic rules and operating structure, a Charter Revision Commission has been created by the Board of Selectmen and peopled with seven volunteers of varied backgrounds.
The commission will have until August 2014 to study the charter, listen to the concerns of townspeople and town officials at public hearings, and design proposed changes to the charter that could improve the working of town government.
The commission’s proposed charter changes will have to pass muster with the Board of Selectmen, and would then be put before voters as ballot questions in the November 2014 election.
The seven people chosen for the board, from among 12 who interviewed, were:
- Daniel K. O’Brien, a principal in the private equity firm J. H. Whitney and Co., who as volunteer chairman of the town’s Historic District Commission has substantially revised its rules of procedure. He has served on the boards of the Community Center, the Ridgefield Symphony Orchestra, and the Ridgefield Visiting Nurse Association.
- Ethel Geisinger, a fund-raiser and lobbyist whose experience ranges from her current position as director of development with the French-American School of New York to lobbying in Washington for a variety of banks, to serving as director of legislative affairs for the federal Securities and Exchange Commission during the Reagan administration.
- Ed Tyrrell, chairman of the town Golf Committee and a former Board of Ethics member who moderates many town meetings. He served on the 2005 Charter Revision Commission, and then helped the 2009 commission get launched at the start of its revision efforts, to ensure continuity.
- J. Gregory LoBasso, a banker who oversaw audits throughout the Northeast for JPMorgan Chase.
- Paul Jasinski, a corporate lawyer for numerous airlines who spent 19 years as British Airways general counsel, responsible for the company’s legal affairs throughout the United States, Canada and Latin America.
- Richard Vazzana, a retired IBM executive and private management consultant who has served as volunteer chairman of events and projects for the Chamber of Commerce, the Community Center and the Keeler Tavern.
- Jonathan D. Seem, a strategic revenue executive with experience in consulting and banking, both in this country and overseas. As a volunteer he has served on the board of directors of the American School of Madrid in Spain.
Since late summer, as the selectmen met and interviewed candidates for various boards and commissions and committees, they’d taken to asking if people might also be interested in serving on the Charter Revision Commission that was to be appointed soon.
They eventually came up with a slate of 12 candidates, interviewed them over a few meetings in the last month or two, and appointed seven at their Nov. 20 meeting, with Town Attorney David Grogins, who happened to be at the meeting, tallying the paper-ballot votes.
First Selectman Rudy Marconi thanked all the volunteers after the appointments were announced.
“We really appreciate everyone who came forward,” he said, “regardless of whether you got five votes or no votes.”