Petition to remove Silber, Sylvia sent to state reps

LACONIA — The Belknap County Commissioners did not make a firm decision regarding a recent petition to remove Reps. Michael Sylvia and Norm Silber from the county delegation. The petition was sent last week to the county commissioners, who added it to Tuesday's agenda.

“I consider this to be a serious declaration of dissatisfaction on the part of voters of Belknap County,” said Commission Chair Peter Spanos.

The petition calls for the removal of Sylvia and Silber for spending more than twice the delegation's approved budget on litigation regarding the Gunstock Area Commission.

Vice Chair Glenn Waring agreed that the public was “speaking loud and clear” and acknowledged he had read the petition.

“I haven't had a chance to read the corresponding RSAs,” Waring said. “It's certainly not clear to me that we as the county commissioners would have jurisdiction to act on this petition so I would certainly need a few things, one more time to read through the RSAs as well as probably if the commission was in agreement, would need legal advice or opinion as to the correct course of action and jurisdiction for this.”

The petition cites RSA 24:15, which states that no "elected or appointed county officer, shall pay, or agree to pay, or incur any liability for the payment of, any sum of money for which the county convention has made no appropriation.”

“We do know that the county convention approved a maximum of $20,000 and made it very clear that at the time of approval that the money was to be spent to defend the injunctive action brought by the Gunstock Commissioners,” said County Commissioner Hunter Taylor. “That happened Nov. 16. We do know that Nov. 15, there was $1,500 worth of billing already done, we do know that Silber was in contact with the firm, and part of the research done on the 15th was involving removing the Gunstock Commissioners, who was the proper plaintiff in an action to remove a Gunstock Commissioner. During the course of this relationship, a total of a little over $41,000 has been billed, over double the maximum of what the delegation approved.”

Cleveland, Waters, and Bass, P.A., the law firm engaged by Silber and Sylvia on behalf of the delegation, on March 31, sent an invoice for $40,827.50.

Taylor also stated that there are approximately 80 emails sent between the law firm, Sylvia and Silber, and that the contents of those emails should be known before making any decision to remove the representatives from the delegation. However, those emails have yet to be released. Meredith resident and now House of Representatives candidate Matt Coker filed a 91-A Right to Know Request in order to view the emails, but Silber denied the request, citing attorney-client privilege.

“Frankly whoever makes any kind of recommendation needs to see those emails,” Taylor asserted. “In my mind, what we should do at this point based on what we got, is simply forward this petition to the county convention. It does reflect I think very serious citizen concern for the way this thing has been handled. The delegation is a client, the delegation would be entitled to look at the emails.”

Taylor also stated that the delegation was “in a a better position” to investigate the matter and come to an appropriate response.

Spanos expressed his concerns regarding Silber and Sylvia's assertion that they were the “control group” for the delegation, meaning they have no obligation to share their correspondence with the rest of the delegation.

“To me the Belknap County convention is an 18-member control group, they all have a voice and all have a vote, so why control of that body would be distilled down to a so-called control group of two, is something I don't really understand,” Spanos said. “I would also say that if any or all of this board of commissioners were ever petitioned by dissatisfied voters in this way, I would seriously have to consider myself and fellow commissioners as being unfit for the office. That's how seriously I take this petition and what it really implies.”

Spanos made a motion to forward the petition to each delegation member so they could discuss it amongst themselves at the delegation meeting. The commissioners agreed and moved on to public comment regarding the matter.

“Most of the dialogue that we've heard on this subject from Mr. Silber and Mr. Sylvia has not been about the factual allegations but the technicalities about whether the law applies,” said Al Posnack, who addressed the county commissioners as a member of the public. “I think the reason is because the facts are clear. The spending limit was $20,000, they spent $40,000. They signed a retainer with a law firm with no evidence they had a dialogue about a spending cap.”