CHAP. 71

newspapers before first election.

-revision of ward boundaries.

transcript from the town records upon the city records by the city clerk when qualified; and such division shall fix the boundaries of said wards until the same shall be duly changed as provided in this act. Such division shall be published once in some newspaper published in said town, if any, such publication to be at least one week before the first ward meetings held under this act. At any revision of the ward boundaries made as provided in this act, it shall be lawful for the city council to divide said city into not less than five nor more than seven wards; but such division shall not become effectual unless approved by a majority of the legal voters casting votes for mayor at the annual election held next after such division is made by the city council. If such change in the number of wards is thus approved at said annual election, the action of the city council in making such change and fixing the boundaries of the wards shall take effect twelve days before the annual election of mayor in the following year ; and at the same time the terms of office of the several wardens and ward clerks shall expire, anything in this act to the contrary notwithstanding; and in the warrants for notifying the ward meetings called for the first annual election of mayor and other officers under such altered number of wards, the board of aldermen shall designate the person to preside at said respective ward meetings, such designation to include so far as practicable the persons whose terms of office as wardens expired as aforesaid, and the persons so designated shall, after being duly sworn, preside as wardens at said meetings, and shall have all the powers of wardens so far as relates to said meetings; each of such persons to be a qualified voter of the city and a resident in the ward in which he is to preside; and in case such person is absent from such ward meeting, the voters may elect a warden, pro tempore. At such meetings a clerk, pro tempore, shall be chosen by said voters and sworn, who shall perform all the duties of ward clerk of his ward relating to such election, including his own election and the administration of the oath of office to him, and including also the making and delivering of the certificates of election of officers. No change in the number of wards in said city shall be valid, unless the vote of the city council whereby such change is decreed shall also contain a definite description of the boundaries of the proposed new wards, nor unless such vote is passed at least thirty days before the day of the annual

election at which said change is to be voted upon by the CHAP. 71 voters of said city.

organization of

government.

SECT. 40. For the purpose of organizing the system of Proceedings, for government hereby established, and of putting the same in city operation, the selectmen of said town for the time being shall, after this act takes effect and at least seven days before the Monday next preceding the last Monday in March, issue their warrant for calling and notifying meetings of the legal voters of the several wards, to be held at ten o'clock in the forenoon on the Monday next preceding the last Monday in March, at such place in each ward as the said selectmen may determine, for the purpose of giving in their votes for a mayor, and of choosing for each ward a warden, a clerk, one alderman, and three councilmen. Said ward meetings shall be notified by posting an attested copy of said warrant in a public and conspicuous place in the respective wards. At any such meeting, any member of said board of selectmen may preside; and if no member of said board is present, or if such member being present declines or fails to preside, any legal voter of such ward designated for that purpose by said board of selectmen in the warrant for such meeting, or appointed in writing by said board, shall preside; and a clerk, pro tempore, shall first be chosen for such meeting and be sworn by a justice of the peace or by the person presiding at such meeting, who is hereby authorized to administer the requisite oath, and said clerk shall record the warrant under which such meeting has been convened, the aforesaid written appointment of presiding officer if any, and the votes and doings of such meeting, including his own election and qualification, and shall perform the duties of ward clerk so far as relates to said meeting or any adjourned session thereof. At said first meeting of each ward, a list of the qualified voters thereof, prepared and corrected by the selectmen of the town for the time being, shall be delivered to the presiding officer and by him delivered to the ward clerk when qualified; and such list shall be used at said meeting in the manner provided by law in the case of town meetings, and no name shall be added thereto on the day of election. The polls at such election shall be open until four o'clock in the afternoon and then closed. A transcript of the records of each ward, specifying the votes given for

CHAP. 71

-first city council, how organized.

-town officers,

mayor, alderman, councilmen, warden and clerk, certified by the clerk, pro tempore, of such ward, shall on the Tuesday next following the Monday appointed for such meetings be returned to the selectmen of said town, who shall compare the same, and cause the person whom they shall determine therefrom to have been elected mayor by a plurality of votes at such election to be notified in writing of his election, and cause all other persons by them determined to have been elected to be in like manner notified. In case of a failure to elect a mayor at said first meetings, said selectmen shall at once issue their warrant for ward meetings for a new balloting for mayor, giving seven days' notice thereof, at which meetings the wardens of the respective wards shall preside; and. all proceedings in relation to such second meetings and to the determination of the result of said second balloting shall be the same as above provided in the case of the first meetings; and if there is a failure to elect at such second balloting for mayor, the aldermen elect and councilmen elect shall, after having taken the oath of office and duly organized their respective boards, elect a mayor in the manner provided in section thirty-four of this act. If at said first ward meetings there shall be a failure to elect any alderman, councilman, warden or clerk, the meeting shall be adjourned from day to day until such election is effected, the clerk, pro tempore, delivering the certified copy of the records of each adjourned meeting at which a choice of any officer is effected to the selectmen as herein provided. If any such first meeting adjourns without day before effecting such choice, the said selectmen, or the board of aldermen if duly organized, may issue a warrant for a new meeting, giving not less than two nor more than four days' notice therefor. The city council whose members are chosen at first ward meetings shall be organized as provided in section thirty-five of this act on the last Monday in March, and allthe officers of said town of Old Town for the time being whose terms of office would expire with the municipal year

shall continue in then ending shall continue in office until such organization.

office until such organization.

and no longer, except as hereinafter provided; and the existence of said town as a city shall not begin until the day of the first organization of the city council. The clerk, treasurer, collector of taxes, overseers of the poor, and constables of said town in office at the time of the acceptance of this act shall continue to be officers of said city in their said

capacities respectively, from the time said council is organized CHAP. 71 until it elects their respective successors, which it shall do one week after its organization aforesaid, and until said successors are duly qualified. If this act shall not be accepted at such date as will enable the first ward meetings to be held as provided in this section on the Monday next preceding the last Monday in March of the year in which such acceptance is had, said meetings shall be held within a reasonable time after such acceptance, in which case the city council shall be organized and the mayor be sworn on the tenth day after the day of said ward meetings, and the date of all other proceedings mentioned in this section. and depending on the date of such meetings or of said organization of the city council shall be correspondingly changed.

Assessors, election and

SECT. 41. At the first election of subordinate city officers by the city council, three persons shall be elected assessors, tenure of. one of whom shall be elected for one year, one for two years, and one for three years; and in like manner three persons shall be elected overseers of the poor, for one, two, and three years respectively; and all subsequent elections of an assessor or overseer of the poor shall be for three years, unless such election is for the purpose of filling a vacancy for the unexpired portion of a term.

Members of number of, may be changed by city council.

school board,

SECT. 42. The city council may at any time by ordinance change the number of members of the school board in its discretion to a number not less than three no more than nine, and provide for the election of as many of such members each year as it may deem expedient, and fix the term of office thereof; but no such change shall be made in such manner as to shorten the term of office of any member of said board in office for the time being. The ordinance establishing such change shall be summitted to the legal voters of said city assembled in ward meetings on the day of annual city election, and shall not be valid unless approved by a majority of said voters voting thereon. Nothing herein contained, how-election of ever, shall prevent the city council from electing at any annual election of subordinate city officers but at no other time, a supervisor of schools in the place of said school board; in which case the term of office of all members of said school board and of any officer appointed or elected by said board shall end, and such supervisor shall perform the

supervisor.

CHAP. 71 duties required of said school board and of the superintending school committee of towns under the general laws of this state.

Act shall be in force, when accepted by inhabitants.

upon question of acceptance.

SECT. 43. This act shall take effect and be in force when the inhabitants of said town of Old Town qualified to vote in town affairs shall, at a legal meeting and under a proper article in the warrant calling such meeting, accept said act by a majority of all the votes given on the question of such -proceedings, acceptance; provided, it shall be so accepted before the thirty-first day of March in the year of our Lord eighteen hundred and ninety-three; but the question of its acceptance shall not be voted upon more than once within any one period of six months. The vote upon such acceptance shall be by written ballot; the voters in favor of acceptance shall cast a ballot having on it the word "yes," and the voters opposed to acceptance shall cast a ballot having on it the word "no." If said act shall be thus accepted, the clerk of said city when elected and qualified shall, from the records which said body corporate has caused to be kept as a town, transcribe and attest upon the records which said body corporate shall cause to be kept as a city, so much of the record of the warrant calling such meeting, of the return of service thereon, and of the action taken at said meeting upon said question of acceptance, as shall be sufficient for a full understanding of the action. taken thereon as aforesaid; and said city record shall be conclusive evidence of the matters and facts thus transcribed to the same extent as the original record thereof would be. For the purpose of calling and conducting a meeting of the inhabitants of said town to vote upon the question of the acceptance of this act, this act shall take effect when approved.

Inconsistent

SECT. 44. All acts and parts of acts inconsistent with the acts, repealed. provisions of this act or with amendments hereof, shall be considered as repealed so far as this act or amendments thereof are concerned and so far as relates to said city, and they shall not prevent the provisions of this act and its amendments from having full force and effect according to its terms and intentions.

Approved February 17, 1891.