Harwich Charter Commission Backs Supermajority Threshold for Removing Town Administrator

HARWICH -- May 28, 2026, Harwich Charter Commission reaches consensus on capital plan language and sets June 18 listening session. At its 46th meeting on May 28, the commission heard from former Town Administrator Jim Merriam, who spent 23 years in Walpole and served Harwich from 2006 to 2013, and who urged the commission to raise the Select Board vote needed to remove the town administrator from three votes to four, matching the existing four-vote hiring threshold, as a check on factional removal. The commission indicated general agreement and said it would incorporate the change. On capital planning, members reached consensus that any project jumping into year one of the five-year capital plan without prior inclusion would require a two-thirds town meeting vote, and that failure of that vote would render any associated funding article null and void. Merriam also weighed in on the commission's proposed compliance body, describing a personal incident in which he refused a selectman's improper directive and took the professional fall while the selectman faced no consequence, calling it "the perfect example for a compliance" mechanism. The public listening session is set for June 18, 2026, at 6:30 p.m., with a clean red line draft of the proposed charter to be posted online by June 11.