HALIFAX — Select Board members unanimously approved a new conflict of interest policy, a goal of community members who raised concerns about the town’s handling of issues last year.
“This is something I thought of a lot last year,” Select Board member Cara Cheyette said at the Select Board meeting held remotely and in person Tuesday. “I am on record as having said I believe there was an ethical violation last year.”
Cheyette, an attorney, represented 41 Halifax residents in suing the town last summer over what they believed was an illegal act of allowing Brad Rafus to rejoin the Select Board after he resigned. His resignation had to do with his feeling harassed by community members over a controversial land deal in which the Rafus family was going to sell a gravel pit to the town.
Peggy Rafus described Cheyette’s proposal as a personal attack on her husband Brad Rafus, who serves on the Select Board and is the town’s road commissioner.
The lawsuit and land deal were both dropped. In an op-ed by Cheyette about the plaintiffs’ decision to no longer pursue the suit, which was published before being elected to the board, she included the adoption of an ethics ordinance under “our collective clarion call to action for Halifax voters.”
Cheyette said the new policy, which is a model offered by Vermont League of Cities and Towns, “has teeth” and more clearly states that a public officer should not participate in an action where they have a clear or perceived conflict of interest.
“I think it’s great that we have something clear,” Peggy Rafus said to Cheyette, “but I feel you are not looking at this objectively. You are looking at this personally.”
Cheyette said the updated policy includes a new provision about ex-parte communications and a post-recusal procedure.
“The most notable difference I’m seeing,” board member Tristan Roberts said while comparing the two policies, “is the post-recusal procedure.”
Board Chairman Lewis Sumner agreed.
The post-recusal procedure says “a public officer who has recused himself or herself from participating in an official act or action by a public body shall not sit with the public body, deliberate with the public body, or participate in the discussions about that official act or action in any manner in his or her capacity as a public officer, though such member may still participate as a member of the public or private party, if applicable ... [and] the public body may adjourn the proceedings to a time, date, and place certain if, after a recusal, it may not be possible to take action through the concurrence of a majority of the total membership of the public body. The public body may then resume the proceeding with sufficient members present.”
Also, the updated policy has an enforcement measure against elected and appointed officers whereas the last one did not. A person can be asked by the board to step down from a position and additionally, an appointed officer can be removed from the position.
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