§ 4.5. Appointments
(a) At the first meeting after their election and qualification, the Selectboard shall
elect a Chair, a Vice Chair, and a Clerk.
(b) The Chair shall preside at meetings of the Board, shall represent the Town government
for ceremonial purposes, but he or she shall have no administrative duties. The Vice
Chair shall act as Chair during the absence or disability of the Chair.
(c) The Selectboard shall appoint a Town Manager and may remove same for cause. The Selectboard
shall not have the power to remove the Office of Town Manager nor the power to remove
the offices that report to the Town Manager, or those offices mandated by State law
that do not contradict the content of this charter.
(d) The Selectboard shall have the power to appoint and remove a Town Attorney. A Town
Attorney (which may be a law firm) is subject to ratification by the Representative
Town Meeting. The Town Attorney shall:
(1) serve as Town Agent and shall prosecute and defend suits in which the Town is interested,
and he or she may prosecute violations of any bylaw, rule, regulation, or ordinance;
(2) prosecute crimes committed within the Town not prosecuted by the Windham County State’s
Attorney;
(3) provide legal advice to the Selectboard; Town Manager; department heads; Development
Review Board; Planning Commission; and other Town boards, commissions, and committees;
(4) perform other duties pertaining to the office as directed by the Selectboard; and
(5) have the right to appoint, subject to approval of the Selectboard, one or more assistants,
remaining responsible for their official acts and omissions, and may revoke said appointment
at any time.
(e) The Selectboard shall contract with a certified public accountant, licensed in Vermont,
to perform an annual financial audit of all Town funds as required by Vermont statutes,
including the provisions of 24 V.S.A. chapter 51.
(f) The Selectboard shall appoint the following officers of the Town and members of all
boards, commissions, and committees and shall certify such appointments to the Town
Clerk. All vacancies shall be published in a local newspaper at least ten days before
they are filled.
(1) Three fence viewers.
(2) A Poundkeeper.
(3) One or more inspectors of lumber, shingles, and wood.
(4) One or more weighers of coal.
(5) A Tree Warden.
(6) A Town Energy Coordinator.
(7) Two Windham Regional Planning & Development Commissioners.
(8) A representative to Southeastern Vermont Community Action, Inc..
(9) A Town Clerk, subject to ratification by the Representative Town Meeting.
(10) A Town Treasurer, subject to ratification by the Representative Town Meeting.
(11) [Repealed.]
(12) The required number of appointees to the Windham Solid Waste Management District.
(13) Members of the following boards, commissions, and committees as required to fill vacancies
therein. All vacancies shall be published in a local newspaper at least 10 days before
they are filled:
(A) Brattleboro Housing Authority;
(B) Bus Service Advisory Committee;
(C) Honor Roll Committee;
(D) Housing Advisory Committee;
(E) [Repealed.]
(F) Personnel Appeals Board;
(G) Planning Commission;
(H) Recreation & Parks Board;
(I) Development Review Board.
(g) The Selectboard may abolish and create new offices, committees, boards, and commissions
as changing circumstances dictate as long as such acts are not contradictory to the
Town Manager form of government central to this charter nor to those positions specifically
mandated by this charter. All vacancies in appointed offices shall be published in
a local newspaper at least ten days before they are filled.
(h) At least as often as every 15 years, the Selectboard shall appoint from among the
voters a Charter Revision Commission to review the language of the charter and the
rights, powers, duties, and responsibilities specified therein. The Commission may
propose amendments and may redraft the charter in whole or in part. Any amendments
or changes shall be voted upon in accordance with subchapter 8 of this charter or
as otherwise required by law. (Amended 2003, No. M-6, § 2; 2011, No. M-10 (Adj. Sess.), § 2, eff. April 27, 2012.)
§ 4.6. General powers, duties, and responsibilities of the Selectboard
The Selectboard shall have the general oversight of the affairs and property of the
Town not committed by law to the care of any particular officer, including the following
powers, duties, and responsibilities:
(1) To establish and maintain a police department, including quarters, vehicles, and equipment,
and to provide for the appointment of police officers.
(2) To establish and maintain a fire department, including quarters, vehicles, and equipment,
and to provide for the appointment of fire fighting officers.
(3) To establish and maintain a rescue service, including quarters, vehicles, and equipment,
and to provide for an ambulance service and the appointed emergency medical technicians.
(4) To establish health services as provided in 24 V.S.A. chapter 69.
(5) To provide for the construction and maintenance of roads, sidewalks, and bridges under
Town control, and to lay out, construct, erect, maintain, and repair additional roads,
sidewalks, and bridges for the safety and convenience of the people as deemed appropriate.
(6) To provide for the maintenance and repair of water, sewer, and storm water drainage
systems, including a system for the supply of water to the people by wells, reservoirs,
pipelines, and otherwise, and to provide for treatment of water, sewage, and storm
drainage for the health, safety, and welfare of the people as deemed appropriate (as
provided in 1943 Acts and Resolves No. 180, as amended by 1975 Acts and Resolves No.
123).
(7) To provide for the lighting of roads, sidewalks, bridges, parks, parking lots, and
other public places for the safety and convenience of the people as deemed appropriate.
(8) To purchase and distribute electricity or gas or to acquire, establish, and maintain
an electric light and power system and a gas system or other energy system for the
welfare and convenience of the people and for use by the Town as circumstances may
require.
(9) To establish other departments of government for the orderly and convenient administration
of Town affairs.
(10) To lease and maintain real and personal property owned by the Town.
(11) To provide for the collection, storage, and disposal of garbage and other refuse,
including building demolition materials, toxic or chemical wastes, and other commercial
or industrial waste materials as consistent with 10 V.S.A. § 6607a.
(12) To provide and operate facilities for public recreation, including land, buildings,
vehicles, and equipment.
(13) To accept or reject on behalf of the Town, grants or donations of property, both real
and personal, from the federal government, or any agency or political subdivision
thereof; from any state, or any agency or political subdivision thereof; from corporations,
both public and private; and from individuals or partnerships, including payments
in kind or in services, and to pay all necessary expenses in the acquisition thereof,
including the making of loan guarantees or relocation payments and assistance. (Ref.
subchapter 7, sections 7.1 and 7.2)
(14) To condemn lands or buildings to which public ownership is deemed necessary for the
exercise of any of the powers of the Town or Selectboard, and to hold public hearings
thereon for just compensation to be paid to the owners of any right or interest therein.
(15) To conduct such inquiries and investigations as may be deemed necessary to promote
the health, safety, and welfare of the people.
(16) To act as a quasijudicial body in all appropriate cases and to provide for the orderly
conduct of all public meetings or hearings.
(17) To provide for arbitration of disputes and for the conduct of legal affairs of the
Town.
(18) To establish appropriate procedures for all purchases and sales, for the award of
contracts, and for the borrowing of money when authorized by the legal voters or by
law.
(19) To adopt personnel rules for Town employees in accordance with 24 V.S.A. § 1121.
(20) To provide for all other services that would otherwise be performed by an elected
auditor, including the production of the annual Town Report.
(21) To provide for the regulation and licensing of such activities as it deems necessary
to secure the general welfare, including theaters, restaurants and public places where
food is sold, pool halls, bowling alleys and places for the operation of video games
and other coin operated machines, laundries, dry cleaning establishments, arcades,
clubs or other privately owned places where food or liquor is offered for sale, itinerant
vendors, peddlers, transient merchants, pawn shops, bicycles, taxicabs, and taxidrivers.
(22) To establish traffic regulations governing the operation of motor vehicles, coasting
with sleds or otherwise, bicycling, skateboarding, roller skating, or other uses of
the public roads, parking lots, bridges, or sidewalks by pedestrians or otherwise.
(23) To regulate, restrain, or control the running at large of dogs and other domestic
animals. In addition to the tax imposed by the laws of Vermont upon the owner or keeper
of dogs, to impose and collect charges for the keeping, impoundment, or examination
thereof, and to prescribe such penalties in default thereof as may be deemed necessary.
All monies received hereunder shall be paid into the Town’s treasury and belong to
said Town.
(24) To provide for the licensing and regulation of community antenna television systems
and community cable television systems, including the right to lease and operate such
systems, and to acquire, establish, and maintain such systems, for furnishing community
antenna and cable television services for the welfare and convenience of the people
and for use by the Town. The power and responsibility granted herein does not include
the power to determine, proscribe, or censor program material distributed over such
systems, whether publicly or privately owned. Any such system publicly owned or leased
shall be operated under the supervision of an independent board of directors.
(25) To promote and safeguard the public health, safety, comfort, or general welfare by
the adoption of ordinances and regulations relating to the following subjects:
(A) The design, construction, repair, alteration, removal, and demolition of buildings
and structures of all kinds.
(B) The design, installation, repair, alterations, removal, and maintenance of plumbing
systems, sanitary sewers, and drains.
(C) The installation, repair, alteration, use, and maintenance of electrical wiring, motors,
devices, equipment and appliances, and appurtenances thereof.
(D) The handling, transportation, storage, and use or sale of explosives; radioactive
materials or devices; and other hazardous chemicals, materials, substances, or devices
and the use and occupancy of buildings, structures, land, and premises for such purposes.
(E) The installation, repair, and alteration of furnaces, stoves, fireplaces, and devices
used for heating, cooking, or in any industrial process from which damage by fire
may occur.
(F) The air conditioning and ventilation of buildings and structures.
(G) The lighting of buildings and other structures and open areas.
(H) The minimum dimensions of rooms used for habitation, based on the number of occupants
thereof.
(I) The minimum requirements for sanitary facilities in buildings used for habitation
or for dispensing food or food products.
(J) The fixing and determination of fire limits within the Town based on density of buildings
and the prescription of standards for buildings and structures within each fire limit
area with reference to the type of occupancy within a building.
(K) The adoption of a building code, electric code, plumbing code, fire prevention code,
and housing code. A book, pamphlet, or other publication may be made a part of any
ordinance, bylaw, or regulation by reference therein to such publication by its title,
clearly identifying it. When a book, pamphlet, or other publication is so incorporated
by reference, it need not be published in a newspaper; but copies shall at all times
be available for public inspection in the office of the Town Clerk, who shall keep
a reasonable supply in his or her office for sale, at cost to residents of the Town.
(L) Prescribing the powers and duties of building inspectors, inspectors of electric wiring,
plumbing inspectors, fire prevention inspectors, and housing inspectors.
(M) Providing penalties for noncompliance with orders of any inspector named in subdivision
(L) of this subdivision, made by virtue of any resolution, ordinance, bylaws, or regulation
adopted by the Selectboard hereunder. However, provision shall be made to appeal such
orders and decisions in the manner specified by 24 V.S.A. chapter 83.
(N) Expanding and enlarging, consistent with this section and the charter, the requirements,
powers, duties, and other provisions of 24 V.S.A. chapter 83.
(O) Regulating and licensing electricians and electrical contractors, plumbers and plumbing
contractors; handlers of explosives; radioactive materials and devices; and other
hazardous chemicals, materials, substances, and devices and persons engaged in installing,
repairing, or servicing ventilating equipment, air conditioning equipment, heating
equipment, electrical or electronic appliances or equipment, or sanitary sewers and
drains.
(26) To provide for the preservation of the public peace and to define, prohibit, abate,
or remove nuisances.
(27) To adopt ordinances, including emergency ordinances effective for no more than 30
days, rules, regulations, plans, directives, maps, or bylaws in furtherance of the
powers of the Town, whether under the authority of this charter or of other general
or special enactments of the General Assembly. The adoption process shall follow the
applicable State law adoption procedure as applicable to the subject matter, except
that proposed ordinances or amendments thereto shall have two readings before the
Selectboard: the first reading shall be for information purposes; the second reading
shall be for a public hearing on the ordinance or amendment thereto and adoption or
nonadoption by the Selectboard. All publishing, posting, recording, and referendum
requirements shall be as set forth in the applicable statute for the adoption of an
ordinance.
(28) To provide by ordinance for the abatement of nuisances and the prosecution of violations
of the ordinances or other regulations enacted under the authority of this charter,
and to fix the penalty for such violation.
(29) To report annually in writing on the Town’s progress toward accomplishing the goals
set out in the duly adopted Town Plan. (Amended 2003, No. M-6, § 2; 2003, No. M-21 (Adj. Sess.), § 2; 2011, No. M-10 (Adj. Sess.), § 2, eff. April 27, 2012.)