Forum time overlap to split voters

SAUGUS – Residents will have to decide who they most need to hear on Tuesday, when candidates for school committee and selectmen go head to head in two different election forums in two different locations at the same time.”It’s a shame, actually,” said Town Moderator Robert Long. “I would hope cable would at least make an attempt to film both so they can be shown between now and November.”The Town Republican Committee will sponsor a candidates night for school committee candidates on Tuesday at 7 p.m. at Giggles Comedy Club on Route 1 south at Prince Pizzeria. The Chamber of Commerce will hold a forum for selectmen candidates the same night at 6 p.m. in Town Hall.Chamber Director Denise Seldon said she learned only after her group booked the Town Hall that they were on the same night but there isn’t much she can do about it now.”We booked ours first,” she said. “We planned it, we had already secured Town Hall so we move forward.”Chamber Vice President John Smolinsky said there is the chance it will divide the town in terms of attendance but he doesn’t think it will be significant.”I think parents with young children, the school committee will appeal to them,” he said. “With the (selectmen), political participants are more of a senior crowd. They’re not really coming with children.”Seldon said she is confident the business community will want to hear the questions they’ve put forth.James Harrington of the Republican Town Committee said he wasn’t aware the Chamber had booked its event when he planned his.”Obviously people can’t be in two places at once,” he said. “But two years ago no one did anything so we thought we’d do a selectmen and a school committee night.”Harrington said when they learned the Chamber was holding a selectmen forum they decided to only do school committee.”Cable television is coming, and will record it and put it on the air several times,” he said. “Our kickoff will be 7 p.m., and there will be pizza and soda, and Giggles has a public address system so you’ll be able to hear everything.”Long joked that the selectmen should be the ones meeting at Giggles.”How appropriate could it be?” he asked.Locations aside he said he would have liked to see an event with much higher visibility regarding the board because there seems to be a high level of interest in the election’s outcome.”I think the residents would welcome that,” he said. “I’m not sure the visibility will be there now with the split location.”He is also disappointed with the format.According to Peter Rossetti, the candidates will make an opening statement and each asked the same three questions. They will then be asked two random questions each and allowed to make a closing statement.Smolinsky said five of the nine candidates have responded and he hopes to hear from the rest. The candidates have received a copy of the questions so they will have time to prepare, which Long also said is a shame. He said the process should be run a bit like citizen’s forum, “you never know what you’re going to get there.” It’s important for a candidate to be able to think off the top of his or her head, he added.”If you know the questions and can’t come up with a great, crowd-pleasing response you probably shouldn’t be sitting in the seat,” he said. “But at least someone took the effort to put something on ? and I think that’s a good point.Smolinsky said they’ve tried to find the middle road with questions and will be asking planned questions pertaining to the running of the community.”So there will be no challenging, no name calling, and it will be as peaceful and as civil as can make it,” he said.Wendy Reed, who holds a stake in both boards as School Committee Chairman and clerk for Board of Selectmen, will be at Giggles vying for re-election. “It’s not like I have to be at the selectmen night, but I would have liked to see it,” she said.Reed, who’s been serving in Saugus since the late ’90s, said it’s unusual to have both groups debate on one night, but since they ar