The provisions of the Constitution and General Laws of the State, now or hereafter in effect, pertaining to elections, special, general and primary, and also any special acts pertaining to elections in the Town of West Greenwich, now or hereafter in effect, shall govern all Town elections, special, general and primary, excepting those provisions which are inconsistent with the provisions of this Charter.
[Amended 11-2-2010]
An elected official, having been in office for at least six months, may be removed from office by a recall petition prepared and approved by the electors of the Town in the manner hereinafter provided for recall procedure:
A. 
Upon application by an elector of the Town, the Town Clerk shall issue the recall petition with signature blanks. The petition issued by the Clerk shall be dated, demand the removal of the designated elected official, and state the cause upon which the removal is sought.
B. 
The petitioner may duplicate the petition form as needed to record the required number of signatures. Each petition signer shall add his or her signature, as it appears on the Board of Canvassers' records, and provide place of residence giving the street and number or other sufficient designation if there be no street and number. One of the signers or the petition circulator shall take an oath before an officer competent to administer oaths that the statement therein made is true, as he or she believes, and that each signature to the paper appended is the genuine signature of the person whose name it purports to be.
C. 
The recall petition shall be signed by at least 30% of the electors registered to vote on the date that the Town Clerk issued the petition blanks. The petitioners shall have 30 days from the date of issue to collect the required signatures and file the completed petition with the Town Clerk.
D. 
The petition shall be submitted immediately by the Town Clerk to the Board of Canvassers for certification forthwith. If the petition shall be found to be sufficient, the Board shall submit the same with its certificate to the Town Council without delay. The Town Council shall order an election to be held on a Tuesday fixed by them not more than 75 days after the date of the Board of Canvassers' certificate that a sufficient petition is filed; provided, however, that if any other Town election is to occur within 120 days after the date of the certificate, the Town Council shall postpone the holding of the recall election to the date of such other election.
The Town Council shall appoint three electors to the Board of Canvassers. Political party representation on the Board shall be qualified in accordance with Section 17-8-1 of Rhode Island General Laws.
A. 
The terms of the Board members shall be six years with the terms so arranged that the term of no more than one member shall expire and no more than one appointment be made in any year.
B. 
All qualified electors of the Town, regardless of their political affiliation or the lack thereof, are eligible to serve. The Town Council, in making the appointments, shall strive to select a board whose membership shall be representative of all citizens of the Town and of their diverse points of view. The Board of Canvassers shall be vested with all the powers and duties now or hereafter vested by law in the Board of Canvassers of the Town. All members of said board now in office shall continue in said position as members thereof until the expiration of the terms for which they were chosen.
A. 
The electors of the Town shall have the right to participate directly in the making of policy decisions by petition and direct vote, in the following ways:
(1) 
Initiative. The electors of the Town may propose ordinances to the Council and, if the Council fails to adopt an ordinance so proposed, to have the authority to adopt said ordinance at a special or general election; provided, however, that such power shall not extend to the capital program, budget, Comprehensive Plan or zoning;
(2) 
Referendum. The electors of the Town shall have power to request reconsideration by the Council of any adopted ordinance and, if the Council fails to repeal the ordinance upon such request, to repeal it at a special or general election; provided, however, that such power shall not extend to the capital program, budget, Comprehensive Plan or zoning.
B. 
Any five electors of the Town may commence action pursuant to one of the procedures outlined in Subsection A above by filing with the Town Clerk an affidavit stating that they will constitute the petitioners' committee and be responsible for circulating the petition and filing it in proper form. The affidavit shall state the name and the addresses of said electors, specify the address to which all notices to the committee are to be sent, and set out in full the proposed initiative or referendum that is the subject of their petition. Promptly after the affidavit is filed, the Town Clerk shall issue the appropriate petition blanks to petitioners' committee.
C. 
The petitions shall be signed and filed and Council action taken thereon in the following manner:
(1) 
All such petitions must be signed by 15% of the electors registered to vote on the date on which the petition blanks are issued to the petitioner's committee by the Town Clerk. The petitioners shall have 30 days from the date of issue to collect the necessary signatures and file the completed petition with the Town Clerk, who shall transmit it immediately to the Board of Canvassers for signature verification. If the petition is determined to have sufficient valid signatures, the Board shall submit the same with its certificate to the Town Council without delay. All petitions provided for under the terms of this section for which sufficient signatures have not been gathered shall be null and void.
(2) 
When an initiative or referendum petition has been certified as having sufficient signatures, the Council shall promptly consider the proposed initiative ordinance or reconsider the referred ordinance, in the same manner as provided for adoption of an ordinance proposed by a member of the Council. If the Council fails to adopt a proposed initiative ordinance or fails to repeal the referred ordinance, as the case may be, within 45 days after the date the petition is certified, the Council shall cause the proposed initiative ordinance or referred ordinance to be placed before the electors of the Town for a vote as provided in Subsection D below.
D. 
Any petition to initiate an ordinance or to repeal an ordinance upon which the Council has not acted favorably shall be placed before the electors for a vote at the next general election if one is scheduled to be held 90 days or less following Council action thereon, or at a special election called for the purpose. Any such special election shall be scheduled to take place no less than 45 nor more than 60 days following Council action.
E. 
The results of the vote of the electors on any petition placed before them under the terms of this section shall be as follows:
(1) 
If a majority of the electors voting on a proposed initiative ordinance vote in its favor, it shall be considered adopted upon certification of the election results, and it shall be treated in all respects in the same manner as ordinances of the same kind adopted by the Council; provided, however, that any ordinance enacted pursuant to the initiative procedure shall not be repealed, or amended as to substance, less than one year following its adoption. If conflicting ordinances are approved at the same election, the one receiving the greatest number of affirmative votes shall prevail to the extent of such conflict.
(2) 
If a majority of the electors voting on a petition to repeal an ordinance vote for repeal, it shall be considered repealed upon certification of the results of the election. No ordinance so repealed shall be reenacted by the Council less than one year following its repeal.