Swampscott voters approved an article on Tuesday to establish a biannual Town Meeting. 

Town Meeting Members passed Article No. 21, creating a fall annual Town Meeting in addition to the existing spring session. Since 2020, Swampscott has held 11 special Town Meetings alongside the five annual ones.  

“In prior years, we’ve always had a fall Town Meeting. It’s become a normal course for us,” said Select Board Chair Katie Phelan. 

Town Clerk Jared LaLiberte said he is not certain how many towns in Massachusetts hold biannual meetings. However, he told the Swampscott Tides he consulted with at least three towns in preparation for the article.

“With the nature of local government being more involved, it’s growing more common,” LaLiberte said. 

Town Meetings occurred for over 300 years, according to Secretary of the Commonwealth William Francis Galvin. The meetings allow residents in towns to gather and vote as a legislative body, as they did in Swampscott on Monday and Tuesday nights. 

Only towns in Massachusetts have Town Meetings. Cities, instead, are governed by a city council or a board of aldermen. However, not all towns have Town Meetings. A few in Massachusetts are governed by town councils. 

Town Meetings can either be open – where all the residents vote on all matters – or representative, with elected members from each precinct serving in a legislative body. Towns with fewer than 6,000 residents are required to hold open Town Meetings. 

Swampscott is among roughly 30 Massachusetts communities that use a representative Town Meeting format, according to McClung. 

The new fall Town Meeting will be held annually on the first Monday evening in December.

“Setting this cadence will allow folks to know well in advance, and allow folks to plan ahead of time so that the meeting is well attended,” Phelan said.