New Canaan town clerk receives signatures to prompt referendum
Nearly 700 more signatures needed
NEW CANAAN — Town Clerk Claudia Weber said she received 102 signatures on April 13, more than twice the number of signatures needed to register the intent to referendum.
This is the first step to prompt a referendum, in keeping with Town Charter Section C4-16, that would overturn a vote taken by Town Council to stop the changes to school start times.
Later in the day, Weber said she had checked the signatures to make sure 50 signers are registered to vote in New Canaan and stopped once she had enough.
These signatures, by law, will not count toward the nearly 700 needed to force a referendum, she told parent Jennifer Dalipi, who gave her one of three signed petitions.
Those signatures will be due by May 7, according to Weber.
Dalipi said many signers of the petition have volunteered to gather signatures for the effort.
The request for signatures reads: “Shall the action of the Town Council, at its March 31, 2021 meeting, which did not reduce the Board of Education budget by $463,337 be overruled and returned to the Board of Finance for reconsideration?”
Proponents of the referendum say they do not begrudge the spending of money for the school start times change. In fact, they may support spending more money for what they view as a better answer and hope the actual referendum includes language to make that clear.
Grade school parent James Yao wishes the referendum would reflect the original motion that was brought up for vote by Mike Mauro of Town Council, so there would be less confusion.
At the Town Council meeting, Mauro made a motion, seconded by Maria Naughton, to reduce the Board of Education operating and health insurance budget of $92.3 million by $463,337, the amount projected for a change in start times 202122 midyear.
Yao, like other proponents of the referendum, believes the new start time for the three grades schools of 7:45 a.m. would be too early for elementary students.
The vote, which would be overturned, was one in a series that was taken to approve the $154.5 million town operating budget for 2021-22.
The motion failed with a vote 2-10, with Mauro and Naughton the only two voting in favor.
The Town Charter requires five percent of the electorate, or 681 votes to force a referendum, since there are 13,621 registered voters in New Canaan as of April 1 of this year, according to registrar John Amarilios.
Once a referendum takes place, at least 15 percent of electors, or 2,043 votes are needed to repeal or overrule the vote, assuming it is majority of votes.
That petition must be filed in the town clerk’s office no later than 30 days after the publication which is May 7, according to Weber.
The first tier would mean East School, South School and West School, would start at 7:45 a.m. and let out at 2:15 p.m. The second tier, New Canaan High School, would ring the first bell at 8:30 a.m. and discharge students at 3 p.m. Also, as part of tier two, Saxe Middle School upper grades, seventh and eighth, would get going at 8:35 a.m. and be released at 3:05 p.m. For tier three, Saxe Middle School’s fifth and sixth grades would start at 9:15 a.m. and get out at 3:45 p.m.we are looking to do.”