By Christian Gardner

It’s been 50 years since the number of representatives on the Town of Tonawanda Board changed.

The town added two seats to the board in 1956, increasing the total to seven members, including the supervisor. The addition of seats coincided with the town’s increasing population, which was approaching 100,000 residents.

When Election Day arrives this Nov. 7, Town of Tonawanda residents will vote whether to decrease the size of the board from seven back to five.

Councilman Dan Crangle said the town’s decreasing population justifies the subtraction of board responsibilities.

“The population has decreased to about 76,000 including Kenmore,” he said. “There are 932 towns in New York with five councilmen. Six towns that I am aware of have a seven-member council.”

Terms

• Common council members currently serve a four-year term.

If proposal passes

• Members will continue to serve a four-year term if the proposal passes.

• One board member and town supervisor would be elected in 2007.

• Three remaining council seats would be elected in 2009.

Town of Tonawanda Supervisor Ronald Moline said the proposal defies common sense and is a rush of judgment.

“This denies voters the opportunity to make significant change every two years in our town government,” he said. “The logic is you have two running in each election if you have four chairs. If voters are desirous of making a change in the town board next year they are going to have a handicap in that only one seat is on the ballot.”

A Citizens Commission was established in 2005 to review any initiatives involving changes in town government. In February, however, the board voted to abolish the commission.

A law to decrease the number of council members from six to four and limiting terms for elected officials were also passed, Moline said.

“As I stated in February, the proposal should have been reviewed by the commission, but the council majority abolished the commission immediately before the vote to down-size the town board. In other words, they are forcing the agenda.”

Councilman John Donnelly, who stands against reducing the board members, said the whole idea is a joke based on contradiction. The amount of money saved by eliminating two chairs is about $50,000.

“You can’t propose this for a savings then add lights to Kenney Field which is $150,000 and increases utility costs,” Donnelly said. “You can’t preserve Brighton Library, you can’t create a DMV for Erie County at the cost of taxpayers. And then you want to reduce the town council on the basis of saving $50,000?”

Donnelly said the situation needs to be investigated further before decreasing the common council.

“You can’t throw it out like an uninvestigated situation,” he said. “We need to know what the repercussions are.”

Crangle, who has analyzed the decrease with board member John Flynn for three years, said he is aware of the repercussions of decreasing the common council entail.

“The bigger workload will be to the town and the department heads because they are the people responsible for the day-to-day operations of Tonawanda, not the common council,” he said.

Crangle said board members will have to become involved in more committees as well. Since six board members currently serve on town committees, four board members would pick up the responsibilities of departed members.

“If you don’t like the increased workload, then don’t run for common council,” he said.