With Westport’s May Town Meeting now less than two months away, Town Moderator Steven Fors, like moderators across the Commonwealth and Rhode Island, is scrambling for answers about how to deal with Town Meeting at a time when gatherings are outlawed.

“Funny you should ask,” Mr. Fors said when called early Thursday morning about what might happen with May’s town meeting.

“I am president of the Massachusetts Moderators’ Association and last night I must have had 35 emails from moderators and others around the state grappling with that,” he said.

“There’s a lot of grappling going on but as far as anything concrete …”

One thing is certain — in towns like Westport, Town Meeting is the only mechanism to approve the budget and make a whole range of important decisions. There is no default that might, for instance, allow selectmen to step in and make the decisions in place of Town Meeting — “It’s constitutional.”

There do appear to be some delaying tactics that might be employed if needed, Mr. Fors said.

Town Meeting’s date is not legally set until the Board of Selectmen post the warrant, Mr. Fors said. “They can change the date anytime up to a week beforehand.”

Town moderators too, have some authority to put things off.

Massachusetts state law allows the town moderator to postpone the meeting because of an emergency of some kind, Mr. Fors said, but state law also says that Town Meeting must be complete before June 30.

That law was created, he said, for situations like weather disasters, not something as open ended as the present coronavirus concern.

“Legislation is being drafted to try to address things like this where the end date is uncertain,” Mr. Fors said, adding that “it will all have to happen very quickly.”

Beyond that, “There is a mechanism, or at least some history of situations where towns may petition the state” for permission to operate one month at a time under the current year’s budget if Town Meeting is somehow unable to conclude its business.

For instance, the town might carry on through July on a budget of 1/12 that of the previous year, same for August. 

But that would likely end in September in the face of deadlines for tax bills.

Also left undecided, he added, are all the non-budget warrant articles normally resolved at Town Meeting.

The moderators’ back and forth ventured into other possibilities, Mr. Fors said.

“One possible possibility” would be to see if it might be possible to require that participants  be seated at least four seats apart, something he said would be an adventure to try to coordinate.

Holding Town Meeting remotely, similar to the way many colleges are dealing with classes during campus shutdowns, is something that had been discussed even before the virus situation, Mr. Fors said.

“But that is far from being worked out and bug free — look at the chaos in the Iowa Caucuses.”

“This year’s experience may add fuel to that fire.”