01:00 AM EDT on Tuesday, April 10, 2007

By Maria Armental

Journal Staff Writer

CHARLESTOWN — The Town Council last night voted 3-2 to not advertise for an assistant solicitor for the planning and zoning boards.

Council President Katharine H. Waterman and Harriet A. Allen requested that the position be filled through competitive bidding.

The issue arose several weeks ago after Town Solicitor Robert E. Craven, who was on vacation, sent a member of his law firm to a Planning Commission in his stead.

Waterman and Allen also said that two lawyers, not affiliated with each other, are necessary in the event that decisions by either the Planning Commission or the Zoning Board of Review are appealed.

Councilman James M. Mageau favored allowing Craven to name an associate to replace him in those instances in which he is not able to attend, saying that’s the way the contract stands.

Craven’s contract, however, is silent on who is to replace him when he is absent or how his replacement is to be chosen.

The Town Charter requires the position to be open to competitive bidding, Waterman said.

Waterman and Allen also challenged the validity of Craven’s contract, negotiated and voted upon behind closed doors and signed by Town Administrator Edward M. Barrett without direct authorization from the council.

The council is to schedule a workshop to discuss Craven’s contract.

Craven told the council he expects to submit to the council by then the name of a lawyer who practices in North Kingstown, and whom he described as “one of the deans of the business,” to serve as his assistant solicitor.

Craven said he and the lawyer, whom he did not name, are not in business together but plan to share office space.

Earlier in the meeting, and after heated discussion, the council voted unanimously to remove from the agenda three items asking for the resignation of Barrett, Craven, Waterman and Allen and the removal of Mud Cove Committee Chairwoman Faith LaBossiere. All were accused of violating the Town Charter.

“Let’s get to work. Let’s start to do what needs to be done,” Councilman John O. Craig Jr. said, invoking the words of former council president Deborah Carney, who earlier in the meeting asked the council to “put aside the petty bickering.”

“This sort of childish nonsense does not help in conducting town’s business,” Carney told the council as she referred to a flier that had accused her of violating the Town Charter during her tenure as council president.

Mageau opposed removing the request for Waterman and Allen to resign for their involvement in the police station project.

That charge, Mageau said in responding to a residents’ request the demands be put to rest until an investigation were conducted, “has been well investigated by the state’s auditor general.”

The report, released last month, concluded that the town violated the charter by spending $606,898 more than the $3.3 million approved by voters. Of that increase, $257,330 was funded by taxpayers and an additional $349,568 came from federal grants.

The council never voted on the resident’s request to set up a committee to investigate the charges that the five had violated the Town Charter.

In other business,, the council appointed seven residents — from a pool of some 20 candidates — to serve on the Charter Revision Advisory Committee. The committee will hold its first meeting on May 1; it will submit recommendations to the council by May 1, 2008.

marmenta@projo.com