Supreme Court finds for Purcell

By Cynthia Drummond for BRVCA
July 18th 2023

PROVIDENCE – In an opinion released Tuesday morning, the Rhode Island Supreme Court granted a petition by Jessica Purcell challenging the Richmond Town Council, Clay Johnson and the Chariho School Committee over the council’s appointment of Johnson to fill a vacancy on the school committee.

Purcell, a Democrat, came third in the Nov. 8, 2022 election, losing lost her bid for a School Committee seat by just 27 votes.  When Richmond committee member Gary Liguori announced in January that he was moving out of Rhode Island and vacating his seat, it was believed that under the provisions of the town’s Home Rule charter, Purcell, with the next-highest number of votes, would be named to fill the seat.

But on Jan. 19, three of the five members of the Richmond Town Council, council President Mark Trimmer and members Michael Colasante and Helen Sheehan, appointed fellow Republican, Clay Johnson, to the vacant seat.

Purcell, represented by attorney Jeffrey Levy, took her case to the Supreme Court.

Named as defendants and represented by attorney Joseph Larisa were Johnson, the Richmond Town Council and the Chariho School Committee.

Oral arguments were presented before the Supreme Court on April 13.

The long-awaited opinion

In their opinion, released Tuesday, Chief Justice Paul Suttell and Justices William Robinson III, Melissa Long and Erin Lynch Prata, the author of the opinion, granted Purcell’s petition with Justice Maureen McKenna Goldberg the lone dissenter.

Purcell said Levy had notified her Tuesday morning of the court decision.

“My heart stated beating fast. I was sweating,” she said. “Relief was the biggest part. We went from winter to spring to summer.”

Levy, who had come under intense questioning by Goldberg during his oral argument, said he had been uneasy about whether the justices would find in favor of his client.

“I was a little bit concerned after the oral argument,” he said. “The oral argument consisted of Justice Goldberg yelling at me.”

The arguments

Levy’s argument was based on the compatibility of the Chariho Act and the town charter, because the act requires the Town Council to fill a vacant School Committee seat and the charter states that the person the council chooses should be the next-highest vote-getter.

Larisa countered that the Chariho Act and the town charter cannot, as Levy had argued, be harmonized because they are fundamentally incompatible.

In their opinion, the four justices concluded that the charter superseded the Chariho Act.

“The Charter is specific in its outline of a substantive procedure to fill the vacancy and precise in who the appointee will be,” the opinion states. “The Charter is clearly more specific. For these reasons, the Charter controls.”

The opinion continues:

“Our ultimate goal is to give effect to the purpose of the statutes as intended by the General Assembly, and we presume that the Legislature knew that the Chariho Act included a general vacancy provision for the School Committee when it approved the Charter that included a more specific vacancy-filling provision for the School Committee …. It is clear that it was the will of the voters in the Town to have procedures in place to fill a vacancy on the School Committee with an individual who had shown some effort and desire to be on the School Committee by running for the seat.”

Goldberg dissents

In a 38-page dissenting opinion, Justice Goldberg wrote,

“After carefully examining the relevant statutory provisions upon which petitioner Purcell relies, including the various iterations of the Chariho Act that span sixty-five years and this Court’s numerous and clear pronouncements when

confronted with a provision in a home rule charter that concerns the constitutional authority over education and elections reserved to the General Assembly, I am of the opinion that Article 2, § 5(B) of the Richmond Town Charter does not supersede the Chariho Act under article 13 of the Rhode Island Constitution. … Because Article 2, § 5(b) of the Richmond Town Charter directly, and irreconcilably conflicts with a special act of the General Assembly concerning the election of school committee members, our jurisprudence has been clear and unequivocal: The charter provision must be explicitly validated by the General Assembly to be operative. 

What happens now?

Purcell’s appointment to the School Committee

The Chariho School Committee is awaiting the court’s written “judgment of ouster,” which will remove Johnson from the committee seat. The Town Council will then swear in Purcell, who is expected to be installed in time for the School Committee meeting on Aug. 8.

Chariho School Committee Chair Catherine Giusti said she was relieved that the matter of who should fill the seat had been resolved.

“I am happy that there has been a resolution to the matter of who should be appointed to the School Committee should there be a vacancy,” she said. “Jessica has proven, both by initially running for a seat and staying involved with Chariho, that she is willing to work hard for the people of Richmond.”

Johnson did not respond to a request for comment.

Legal fees

The town is paying Larissa’s $21,792 bill for legal services, and Levy said he intended to ask the court to order the town to pay his bill as well. (That amount is not known.)

“I intend to ask the court to require the town to pay my attorney’s fees,” he said. “It’s not fair the other side gets their fees paid but Jessica is on her own.”

Mending fences

Trimmer, who voted to install Johnson on the committee, now says he regrets his decision.

“I plan to apologize to Jess,” he said Tuesday. “I didn’t do it maliciously. I felt I was following the law and the laws do not harmonize.”

Trimmer said he wanted to swear in Purcell at the earliest opportunity.

“My goal is to do this as soon as possible, and right a wrong that was made and move forward,” he said.

Purcell said that waiting six months for a decision had been difficult, but she added that she had not allowed it to consume her.

“I did get on with my life,” she said. “I never lost my priorities – my family, my work and my home.”

In a written statement emailed later, Purcell added,

“All Richmond residents have been truly served by this decision as it upholds the power of our votes and voices in how we deserve to be represented by elected officials. 

This ruling affirms what we've known all along, Richmond deserves representatives not rulers. The Town Council should have followed the procedure in the Town Charter and appointed the next highest-vote getter from the last election. Three members chose to follow political motivations instead of local obligations and they have been thoroughly rebuked by a majority of the RI Supreme Court, and many fellow residents.”