Twisp Town Council discussed the mayor’s draft proclamation to replace the controversial Resolution #25-745, which the council approved by a vote of 3-0-2 on May 13. The town’s lawyer and county sheriff subsequently said Resolution #25-745 creates liability by putting the onus on interpreting the Constitution on town employees.
In her remarks, the resolution’s public proponent, Kathleen Manseau, again insisted that Resolution #25-745 was not controversial and described the discussion that followed “off the rails.” While commending the participation of people who opposed the resolution, she disagreed that it was divisive or promoted a political agenda.
“The resolution was written, actually, in an attempt to find common ground,” she told the council. “We thought that the Bill of Rights in the Constitution was relatively common ground. I’ve discovered in the past few months that nowadays, it is not.”
“It’s not a partisan issue, so it has really bothered me that the critiques that have come out constantly state that- that it was politically motivated when in fact, what we were attempting to find was common ground.”
Manseau said the resolution would have been written regardless of the party in power if the same violations were occurring, and therefore the resolution is nonpartisan. She rejected the idea that the town council should not be involved in national issues.
“We want to keep people safe, and one of the primary aspects of public safety is our bodily safety, the safety to not be, for example, pulled out of a car because someone knocked the window open with an ax.”
“You cannot separate the Town of Twisp from the nation that we live within, and our local government is our first level of protection of our public safety,” asserted Manseau.
“We’re trying to be proactive. We don’t want to have to react after the fact to a violent abduction.”
Manseau also dismissed that Resolution #25-745 was solely about immigration, insisting that it was about protecting the Bill of Rights for everyone. She also said the residence of people who signed the resolution isn’t relevent.
“I think it’s kind of ridiculous to maintain that signatures only from within the town of Twisp should count,” said Manseau. “We want to have our constitutional rights protected wherever we go in the valley.”
Councilmember Katrina Auburn questioned the need for a proclamation given that councilmembers already take an oath to uphold the U.S. and Washington State Constitutions and the laws of Twisp. Mayor Hans Smith said there wasn’t enough support from councilmembers at the last meeting to rescind the resolution, but a compromise could be reached by replacing it with a proclamation, which carries less legal weight, and by changing the language to something more palatable.
Councilmember Tim Matsui said he wanted stronger language in the proclamation about what the town would condone by their police department, while acknowledging they are powerless to stop the federal government from implementing their own policies.
Matsui, who has Japanese heritage, again said his family was put in “concentration camps” during World War II and spoke in opposition to current immigration policy.
Councilmember Wyatt Lundquist, who listened to the discussion for almost an hour before speaking, said it is not the U.S. Constitution that is being debated, but its interpretation. As an example, he shared that he was fired from his previous job for not taking the COVID vaccine. He said he felt his constitutional rights were violated, but the majority in state government did not share this interpretation.
“We can talk about this a lot and we can debate these things, but it’s really kind of inappropriate when it becomes not just about the Constitution, but rather our interpretation of what the Constitution says, and our community disagrees on that,” said Lundquist.
The mayor said he will seek input from the public once the final draft is presented at the next council meeting. The public is also invited to submit their comments by email to the councilmembers- https://townoftwisp.com/government/town_council/index.php
The full text of the mayor’s draft proclamation is below.
