As my campaign materials indicate, I have served as Moderator of Arlington for 19 years, stepping down from that position this spring.  For those unfamiliar with that position, let me offer the following.

In towns with a Town Meeting form of government - about 300 of the 351 communitities in Massachusetts, - the Moderator is elected by the people for a term of one or three years, and presides over each session of Town Meeting.  In the case of Arlington, in a typical year there has been an annual meeting lasting for seven to ten three-hour sessions, together with one or more special meetings.  The Moderator is charged by law with keeping good order, recognizing speakers, regulating the debate, taking votes and declaring the votes. During my time in office, I never missed a meeting, and was re-elected, without opposition for five terms after my initial victory in a field of four candidates.

Prior to Town Meeting, the Moderator reviews the warrant (agenda) and helps to put it into shape.  He also advises citizens who wish to submit articles on how to do so.  During the meeting, he must review and pass upon the validity of proposed amendments, substitute motions, and the like.  After the meeting, he must review the Town Clerk’s record of the votes passed for accuracy, before they are transmitted to various departments for action, or (in the case of by-law or zoning amendments) sent to the Attorney General for approval, or (in the case of home-rule petitions) sent to the Legislature for enactment.

Another important duty of the Moderator is to make appointments to various committees, both standing committees established by law, such as the Finance Committee, and special committees established by Town Meeting to deal with various specific issues.  A particularly important appointment is that of Arlington’s member on the School Committee of the Minuteman Regional Vocational Technical School. 

An unofficial duty is helping to run the Student Town Meeting at the annual Student Town Government Day, sponsored by Arlington High School and the Elks Club.

A committee which I helped established and thereafter served on was the By-Law Recodification Study Committee.  This experience was, I think, particularly relevant to legislative work, since it consisted of taking all the by-laws which the Town had enacted over the years, and putting them into a comprehensible, organized format so that both citizens and Town officials could actually find what laws were on the books.  We took this opportunity to remove obsolete enactments and clean up a lot of confusing language.  As a lawyer, I work with the laws of Massachusetts on a regular basis, and a lot of them could use the same kind of treatment.

At the end of the last session of the Annual Town Meeting this year, an event occurred the memory of which I shall always cherish.  The chairman of the board of Selectmen presented me with a large framed parchment, signed by 100 Town officials and Town Meeting Members, which read as follows: We, the Undersigned, Do Hereby and Hereon Honor and Appreciate John L. Worden III For His Service to the Town of Arlington and Most Especially for his Nineteen Years of Meritorious Conduct Over the Exemplification of Representative Democracy as Moderator of Arlington Town Meeting.