NORTH PROVIDENCE, R.I. — Brian Quirk says he is "sick" of a town government motivated by revenge, power, and old school political ties.

"North Providence has a permeated culture of acceptance of corruption," said Quirk, an independent candidate for mayor. "I feel, and people in this town feel, that it’s not fair."

During his 30 years in town he’s seen disgraced leaders investigated and jailed. He filed an ethics complaint against the mayor that went nowhere. And, his struggle with "systematic harassment and relentless and unjustified vengeance" from one of his neighbors — Joe Giammarco, a candidate for town council, who was eventually arrested for throwing blocks of wood at Quirk’s home — became a chapter in the book "Scoundrels: Defining Corruption Through Tales of Political Intrigue in Rhode Island."

Quirk is running on one idea: get rid of the mayor’s position. He proposes a council-manager style where the town’s seven member council would appoint a professional, educated, manager, creating a "controlled system focused on transparency and the law."

"It shifts the power to the council," Quirk said. "The council members become impartial, unbiased because they don’t have loyalty, allegiance to an individual in that power."

But does it? That depends largely on personalities — both of the councilors and the appointee, said Dan Beardsley, the executive director of the Rhode Island League of Cities and Towns.

"Simply changing from an elected mayor to an appointed manager just puts the decision making in the hands of someone that has a different title," he said.

After running through at least four town managers within the last five years, East Providence is moving opposite to Quirk’s idea. The city is putting a mayoral position back on the ballot in November, said Helder J. Cunha, an East Providence councilman and assistant mayor. Cunha said it’s clear the council-manager system isn’t working for East Providence.

"Just look at the data," he said. But, the problem hasn’t been with the city managers themselves, said Cunha. It’s been with councilors "impulsively" voting to remove individuals they don’t agree with, he said.

"You have three people who don’t like a person and the city manager is gone," Cunha said. "With a mayor — there’s more accountability — you’d have more people involved."

To that point, Beardsley said: "People are what they are." The system is not universally "less corrupt" — it depends on the people who work within it, he said.

T. Joseph Almond, the elected town administrator in Lincoln, echoed this idea. Proponents of the council-manager system can "say things like it’s not political," he said. But any leader is influenced by his or her council, he said.

"It can work well in some places that are politically stable to begin with," he said. "We are a political system. If the political instability is there, nothing is going to work."

Almond said he would not consider North Providence "unstable," but noted it is an "older political system with the more classic ‘this team or that team style of family politics.’ "

At a recent meeting in North Providence, a majority of the council dismissed the idea of changing to a new system change. Council President Dino Autiello said he doesn’t think Mayor Charles Lombardi, who has held that office since 2007, has too much influence. Quirk should be "beholden to the office he’s running for," Autiello added.

Quirk laughs at the notion of a balance of power. He points to Lombardi’s "micromanagement" of several town departments, and the two ethics complaints he successfully filed against the town. One complaint was about the mayor’s decision to keep Maria Vallee as the town’s controller despite her allegedly mishandling town money, and the other about a construction project that never went out to bid.

"The system enables him to hide these problems," said Quirk.

Paul Caranci, the former councilman who wore a wire for the FBI, recording meetings and phone calls with three council members who were eventually arrested, is on Quirk’s side. Nothing will eliminate corruption totally, he said, but a new system could reduce it.

"Look at it pragmatically," he said. "Is it easier to corrupt one individual? Or four out of seven individuals?"

jtempera@providencejournal.com

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On Twitter: @jacktemp