Council delays vote on charter changes after debate over eliminating municipal primary and meeting time shift

The Laconia City Council on July 14 tabled a proposed package of charter amendments after several councilors said the measures should be considered separately and that one proposal — removing the city municipal primary — raised particular concerns.

The resolution, numbered 2025‑25, contains four proposed changes: modify the supervisor of checklist meeting requirement to conform to state law; remove a redundant afternoon‑meeting requirement for the supervisor of checklist; eliminate the requirement to hold a municipal primary; and change the candidate filing period and the council meeting start time (proposed to move meetings from 7:00 p.m. to 6:00 p.m.). The clerk explained those changes and said the city has already sent the proposed language to the Department of Revenue, Attorney General’s Office and Secretary of State for review; staff said comments would return within about 45 days.

Councilors debated the package as a single motion and several members said the provisions are not identical in consequence and should be split for separate votes. Councilor Feltz said she supported the two procedural changes but opposed eliminating the municipal primary: “If you have three candidates and two are similar and one is different, the two similar are going to split the votes,” Feltz said during discussion, arguing that a primary can prevent vote‑splitting in multi‑candidate races. Other councilors echoed the view that removing the primary could unintentionally affect outcomes and favored separating the items.

Councilor Hoffman and others supported splitting or tabling the package; a motion to table was moved and seconded and the council voted to table Resolution 2025‑25 for further consideration.

What the council decided: • Table Resolution 2025‑25 to allow individual provisions to be considered separately or to allow further review (motion to table adopted by council vote).

Next steps: The council will return to these charter amendments in a future meeting; if staff receive substantive comments from the state offices, the council will hold another public hearing to review required changes before placing any amendment on the ballot. Staff had noted that if the state offices do not object, the city could move to place the questions on the November municipal ballot.

Details and context: Staff said the filing‑period change was requested so the clerk’s office would have more time to prepare if a primary remained in place. The supervisor of checklist meeting time change would align local charter language with a lower state minimum period for the session; staff said that avoids needing a future charter change if state law is amended.

Speakers and public testimony during this agenda item are recorded in the meeting transcript; the charter hearing opened under agenda item 13h and the item was revisited under unfinished business as agenda item 22h.