'Cynical ploy' or fair play: Petition to change Co-op School Board elections rejected

EXETER — A citizens' petition to change how Exeter Regional Cooperative School District members are elected is no longer going before voters at the March 12 election.

The petition, submitted by former Co-op School Board member Melissa Litchfield, called for each town to elect its own board member instead of having all six towns in the cooperative vote for every board member. The article, however, was amended at the school district’s deliberative session Thursday, Feb. 8, to ask voters if they favor keeping the status quo with all board members being voted at-large.

Litchfield said she was “disappointed” her petition was altered, and the motion came from an Exeter resident, Paul Royal.

“Once again, Exeter is taking away the voice of the smaller towns, and that’s not okay,” she said.

Litchfield said she proposed the article to make it fairer and more equitable for the smaller towns in the cooperative consisting of Exeter, Stratham, Newfields, East Kingston, Kensington and Brentwood. While Exeter has three board members and Stratham has two, the remaining four towns only have one member each due to population.

Since Exeter has the largest population, she said they are “essentially voting in all of the members.”

“Exeter essentially has nine seats at this point in time,” she said. “…I have examples from prior elections that show that the individual towns have voted for members, they have won in those towns, yet again Exeter came in, and the vote completely changed everything, and those smaller towns do not have their desired representatives.”

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Residents clash over petition to alter Co-op elections

Several residents spoke in support and against the petition before it was amended.

Eric Kane of Exeter called Litchfield’s petition a “cynical ploy that’s topped with a heaping of sour grapes.”

He was referring to Litchfield losing her seat on the Cooperative School Board in 2022. While she won her hometown vote handily, the two-term incumbent lost her seat when votes in the other five communities were tallied.

“The driving force behind this article seems to be a former board member who was elected twice under the supposedly unfair rules – no claim of unfairness was ever made after those elections,” he said.

Kane said the school district was formed in 1996 and has played a role in his children’s success. He said no one has claimed the system to be unfair in the past, whether they won or lost.

“The only thing that changed was that somebody lost, and now they’re trying to change the rules,” he said.

Laura Chamberlain of Stratham said Litchfield’s petition was not part of a "political agenda." She said individual towns should have people who know their town, and its constituents, representing them on the board.

“We’re all different,” said Chamberlain. “Exeter knows what Exeter’s needs are, Stratham knows what Stratham's needs are, it’s simple as that…”

Elizabeth Faria of Brentwood agreed. She said Exeter has an “overwhelmingly” large population compared to the other five towns, with over 12,000 registered voters, as opposed to Brentwood, with less than 4,000 voters.

“I also was defeated by Exeter when I ran for the Co-op,” said Faria. “I won in Brentwood, I won in Stratham, and one or two in the smaller towns. But the numbers are so overwhelming (in Exeter) that we don’t have a chance… We are going to fight the taxation without representation.”

Helen Joyce of Exeter, who was also the former chair of the Co-op School Board, said she supported keeping the election of members the way it is.

She said the idea behind a cooperative “is what it is, which is to represent all six towns.”

“As a 12-year member of the Co-op board, I represented Stratham,” Joyce said. “Every vote I took, whether it be on the budget, whether it be on the policy, I did not think about how this is going to affect Stratham students, I asked how it this going to affect the students in all six towns because those are the people who voted me into office.”

Joyce also brought up the legal ramifications if Litchfield’s petition were to pass.

According to school attorney Gordon Graham, the proposed change would not pass "constitutional muster” of proportional representation as required by state law. If the change was approved, due to their low populations, Newfields, East Kingston and Kensington would be overrepresented on the board and Exeter would be underrepresented.

“If somebody were to challenge it, we would be dealing with litigation, cost of litigation,” added Joyce.

Royal said he put forth the amendment after hearing from the attorney and attending the public hearing.

"Fear not, those who have run from other towns,” Royal said. “I knew who you were, and I voted for and against you, and I enjoyed exercising that right… On the face of this, this amendment looks pretty good and pretty fair. But once you start scratching the surface a little bit more, not even as deep as the attorney did, it's unfair.”

Royal said the current system is fair.

“If you want to try to improve what you believe is unfair representation, there may be a way to do it,” said Royal. “But this was not the way.”

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Litchfield vows to continue pushing for change

Litchfield said she plans to continue fighting to change how members are elected on the Cooperative School Board.

While both her children are in private education, Litchfield said she's “passionate” about the public school system. She said it would be her “preference” to have them both in the SAU 16 system.

“My husband and I are here to fight for what’s right,” said Litchfield. “To me, it’s simple – why can’t people in the smaller towns have a say, it’s not right. It’s becoming very partisan, and it shouldn’t. It should just be about the kids.”

This wasn’t Litchfield’s first attempt at trying to change the cooperative voting system. Two years ago, in her former position as a state representative, Litchfield put forward House Bill 1646, which aimed at similar changes but failed to move forward.

An attempt to revive the bill and attach its language to Senate Bill 353 (related to the Education Professional Standards Board) was also unsuccessful.

This article originally appeared on Portsmouth Herald: Exeter resident thwarts petition to change Co-op school board elections