TOCCO

SMITHFIELD — It appears that the gloves are coming off today in the dispute between Town Council President Stephen G. Tocco and his opponents.

As the council prepares to hold its scheduled meeting at Town Hall at 7:30 p.m., Tocco will face pressure from three angles. A “resignation rally” has been scheduled for the Town Hall steps at 7 p.m. After that, the council will take up two motions, one to reorganize the council — translation: replace Tocco as president — and one to strip him of his office altogether.

Also today, the Board of Canvassers is scheduled to meet at 8:30 a.m. “for the purpose of revising and authorizing” a recall petition, according to its published agenda.

James W. Archer, Republican town chairman and one of five residents who on Wednesday signed an affidavit launching a recall drive with Tocco as the target, yesterday questioned the role of the canvassers in the issue and indicated he was surprised by the intervention of the canvassers.

“I don’t fully understand this, as the [board] has no authority to deny our recall,” Archer said by email. “The charter is clear — if five registered voters file the necessary affidavit, the recall goes forward.”

Acting Town Manager Dennis G. Finlay said yesterday he did not know which members of the Town Council asked that the sanction motions against Tocco be placed on the agenda. The information came through Town Solicitor Timothy F. Kane, he said. Neither Kane nor most other members of the council could be reached.

Councilman Ronald F. Manni, however, said that he and his fellow Republican Michael J. Flynn were behind the motion to strip Tocco of his council post altogether.

Flynn said that the motion invokes sections of the Town Charter dealing with the hiring and firing of town employees and interference with the town manager’s administration.”

“If the councilmen want to deal with the employees they should go through the town manager,” said Flynn, who was one of the authors of the charter when it was adopted in the 1990s.

When asked to predict the outcome of the motion, Flynn laughed and said, “I’m two and they’re three. But things are at such a state where we just have to take a look at it.”

Flynn said that if the motion fails there is a provision in the charter allowing judicial review.

Manni said he also will move to unseal the minutes of the July 20 closed council meeting at which the panel accepted the resignation of Town Manager Stanley J. Usovicz Jr.

“I feel the people have the right to see those minutes if they have questions,” Manni said. “That was when the council finally decided to happen to Stan.”

Usovicz cited his mother’s health for departing, but it had been widely charged for months that Tocco had been pressuring the manager to fire certain town government department heads so that they could be replaced by patronage appointees. Several department heads have resigned or announced retirement since the issue erupted with force in May.

If the council votes for “reorganization” it is likely that Tocco will be replaced as president by one of the other two Democrats on the panel — the Democrats hold the majority.

Tocco would not be removed from the council under this scenario.

Today’s steps in the Tocco case follow hard on the heels of developments that unfolded last week.

Tocco said on Wednesday that he would call a press conference about 10 days from then to discuss his political future.

Also on Wednesday, the town’s General Assembly delegation, all three of whom are Democrats, said that they had conferred with Tocco over lunch and had urged Tocco to step aside.

“He said he’d think about it,” reported Sen. John J. Tassoni Jr.

“The decision is in his court,” said Rep. Thomas J. Winfield. “I think there is a lot of public sentiment against him. A lot of people have been expressing their opinion …. They want him step down.”

Tocco was dismissed as chief of the Rhode Island Capitol Police on July 20 and was transferred to a civilian state job after The Providence Journal disclosed that years ago he had negotiated bribes and carried thousands of dollars in bribes on a number of occasions both to Gary Garafano, deputy public works director in Providence, and to Louis S. Simon, public works director in Pawtucket during the administration of Mayor Brian J. Sarault. Simon and Sarault pleaded guilty and served jail terms. Garafano was convicted after a trial in 1993 and was sentenced to prison.

Tocco testified for the prosecution in a deal that allowed him to escape criminal charges.

He committed these acts while he was also an officer of the Capitol Police, he testified.

tmorgan@projo.com