WORCESTER – The Worcester City Council will take up a citizen petition during its meeting on Tuesday, January 7, that it previously refused to hear in October.
The citizen petition, brought by Patricia Kirkpatrick and Claire Schaeffer-Duffy, two Worcester residents, on behalf of a multi-faith coalition, asks city councilors to approve a resolution that calls for a ceasefire and the return of hostages in the current conflict in the Gaza Strip. The organizers also gathered 1,500 signatures from Worcester residents supporting the resolution, according to the organizers.
The multi-faith coalition includes Jewish, Christian, and Muslim residents, among others.
The proposed resolution asks the city council to resolve that it calls on the U.S. federal government to facilitate and demand:
- An immediate and permanent ceasefire to end the violence
- Immediate release of hostages and detainees on all sides
- Immediate resumption of the delivery of humanitarian aid to Gaza unhindered
- Enforcement of US laws, including the Leahy Law of 1997, the Conventional Arms Transfer Policy, and the Arms Export Control Act, which would halt US weapon sales and transfers to Israel that make us accomplices to the present mass slaughter of innocents/
See the full text of the resolution.
The city council rejected hearing the petition during its meeting on October 22, despite the resolution being submitted prior to the deadline. In rejecting the citizen petition, the city council cited rule 11 as prohibiting the resolution from being heard.
Rule 11 of the rules of the Worcester City Council says:
“No petition, paper, order, communication or report of any description which deals with personalities, or with matters not within the general supervision and/or relating to city government, or does not specifically state the business to be discussed, shall be placed on any city council agenda by the city clerk. The city clerk, with the assistance of the city solicitor, shall determine when an item is not appropriate for placement on the city council agenda.”
Massachusetts General Law Chapter 30A, Section 20 (b), part of the Massachusetts Open Meeting Law, says public body must:
“Except in an emergency, in addition to any notice otherwise required by law, a public body shall post notice of every meeting at least 48 hours prior to the meeting, excluding Saturdays, Sundays and legal holidays.”
The office of the Worcester City Clerk requires all citizen petitions submitted by 4:15 PM on the same day as the law requires the city post the agenda, in this case Thursday, October 17 (in the event of a Monday holiday, the deadline becomes Wednesday at 4:15 PM).
According to the organizers of the petition, they received notice the city council rejected the petition just after the deadline elapsed on October 17.
The explanation from the city clerk’s office said that the city council instructed the clerk’s office to more aggressively enforce rule 11.
Less than 48 hours prior to the rejection of the petition, the Worcester City Council heard a citizen petition from during its meeting on October 15, which requested:
“City Council request City Manager request City Solicitor draft documentation required to amend the City Charter to require candidates beginning with the Municipal Election in 2025 to be a citizen of the United States of America to be eligible to hold elected office in the city. Further, request said amendment include language requiring any candidate not born in or within the jurisdiction of the United States, but has become a naturalized citizen by the time signature papers are due for that year’s election, submit naturalization papers or other legal documents as proof of citizenship to the City Clerk’s Office and any other necessary office or department relative thereto. Failure to submit such authenticated documents shall make the candidate ineligible for local elected office in the city.”
During that meeting, Worcester City Solicitor Michael Traynor said he did not find the resolution unconstitutional on its face. Three local attorneys that This Week in Worcester spoke to disagree, saying the resolution, if enacted, clearly violates the 14th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.
The clerk’s office notified the Gaza ceasefire resolution petitioners less than 48 hours after that meeting that the city council would not hear their petition.
On October 22, the petitioners and about 200 people supporting the petition attended the city council meeting. When a woman attempted to speak about the rejection of the petition during the period designated for public comment, Mayor Joe Petty, the chairperson of the Worcester City Council, ruled the comments out of order, as the item did not appear on the agenda.
Councilor At-Large Thu Nguyen raised a motion to suspend the council rules to allow attendees to speak about the petition. The motion failed by a 6-5 vote, with Mayor Petty, At-Large Councilors Moe Bergman, Donna Colorio, and Kate Toomey, and District 2 Councilor Candy Mero-Carlson, and District 3 Councilor George Russell voting against suspending the rules.
In response, supporters of the petition engaged in protest inside the city council chambers over the next 40 minutes through chants of “let them speak” and “shame” over the next 40 minutes, until councilors voted to adjourn the meeting.
While some described the event as a riot, there were no arrests or property damage reported. This Week in Worcester learned of one person asked to leave city hall by police. They opposed the resolution.
ACLU Says City Council Engaged in Viewpoint Discrimination
As This Week in Worcester previously reported, the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation (ACLU) of Massachusetts sent a letter to the Worcester City Council, including Mayor Joe Petty, City Clerk Nikolin Vangjeli, and City Solicitor Michael Traynor, dated Monday, December 9. The letter expresses “serious concerns” that the application of council rules to prohibit consideration of a citizen petition is unconstitutional viewpoint discrimination.
The ACLU letter cited a resolution taken up and passed by the council on October 17, 2023, which said:
The Worcester City Council took up and adopted a resolution in on October 17, 2023, that said:
“That the City Council of the City of Worcester does hereby condemn the recent barbaric and inhuman taking of hostages in Israel, including a number of American citizens, and prays for their immediate and safe release and return to their loved ones.”
ACLU of Massachusetts Legal Director Jessie Rossman and Staff Attorney Rachel Davidson signed the letter. They say that the differential application of the council rules has “give[n] one side of a debatable public question an advantage in expressing its views to the people,” citing the 1978 U.S. Supreme Court case First National Bank of Boston v. Bellotti.
Rossman and Davidson also cite a 2018 legal opinion by then-City Solicitor David Moore. Moore wrote that “under the fundamental principle that the governed have a right to petition their government for a redress of their grievances, we have exercised a bias in favor of including petitions that exhibit only the smallest possible connection with the city council.”
Moore also wrote:
“Another factor in determining whether a proposed agenda item should be rejected under Rule 11 is the nature of the item itself. There is a difference between a proposed resolution, where the council expresses its collective opinion on a subject, and a petition asking the city council to exercise its authority as the legislative body of the city. It is one thing to request adoption of a resolution urging the removal of U.S. armed forces from a particular foreign land; while it is quite another for a petition to seek adoption of an ordinance prohibiting federal law-enforcement authorities from arresting people within the boundaries of the city.”
The letter calls upon the city “to restore the resolution to the Council’s agenda for consideration at the December 17 Council meeting, or at the least, no later than the first Council meeting in January 2025.”
The Worcester City Council meeting on January 7 is the first of 2025.
The full letter from the ACLU of Massachusetts can be viewed here.
