The Teeny Tiny Power of One

Yesterday Tony asked:

So one town meeting has deflated your energy for local politics? If everyone just throws up their hands, whose to blame when bad decisions or inefficent spending occurs in government? How can changes be made to the whole process to resolve this?

No, not one town meeting.  Several, plus a series of other meetings and local elections.  Regular readers know that although the May 2010 TM was my first as a TMR, I have been through the Buck Auditorium as a petitioner and a plain old observer, too.  I’ve had plenty of time to form my opinion.  See previous posts (Billerica Politics c.2010 and Restating the Mission.)

In the latter, posted in March, I wrote: “I still believe that just one person can make a difference in whatever he or she cares about.”  I have changed my mind.  I can count the non-Islanders that have made a difference in Billerica since I have been here on no hands.  You have to be a denizen of Billerica Island — the elite ruling class — with plenty of support from fellow Islanders to get anything done.

Even Islanders have trouble.  Selectmen Bob Correnti submitted a bold anti-blight bylaw article that was resisted by another selectman, Mike Rosa, because he doesn’t like Correnti.  His article survived two amendments probably because a lot of people in the room voted for him in the last election.

And while you would think the Planning Board would have a big hunk of sand on the Island, it appears not.  TM has rebuffed the PB over the past few years, and has taken the ZBA’s side when a dispute between those two groups rears its head.

Not everyone is throwing up their hands.  Just me.  Oh, and the 80% of registered voters who don’t vote in local elections.  I will not worry about bad decisions and inefficient spending.  The Island Taxpayers Association has my back.  And the Finance Committee, of course, who we know is looking out purely for the interests of us mainlanders.  The Islanders must know what they are doing, because no one ever runs against them.

The April 2010 election was it for me, not TM.  When the Parker School came to TM last fall, I saw the gallery full of Parker parents, and my democracy mojo was working overtime.  Most of the other TMRs I met this year ran for their seat because of a specific issue, and I thought the parents would dash to the Clerk for nomination papers.  Not so much.  There were fewer total people on the ballot this year.  Precinct Six is a ghost town.  (Still 6 empty seats… anyone?)

How can changes be made to the process?  First, we have to be honest with ourselves.  Our process is not perfect and we are not perfect.  But you will find few on the Island who think reflection is beneficial.  But since you asked:

• Explore other forms of government.  As Rick asked recently (Theater of the Absurd), would a city form of government serve us better?  I wrote a column on this subject about a year and a half ago (I’ll have to see if I can dig it out.)  I like the mayor-aldermen system that cities like Somerville, Newton, and Medford use.  About 20 TMRs already act like alderman already.  You know the ones — you see them at the microphone for every single article.  The other 220 of us just sit around and say yea or nay once in a while.  We can do that from home.
• Failing that, it is imperative to increase the amount of citizen participation several times over.  Expand the Island.  If you expand it large enough, it will merge with the mainland and there will no longer be a gulf between them.
• TM should act on things mainlanders care about.  Face it, the non-voting 80% (mainlanders) don’t give a damn about nepotism on the FinCom.  Scan the rest of the warrant.  Can you find anything in there that might capture a mainlander’s interest?  You might say the budget, which should.  But notice even the TMRs didn’t care about the budget since they didn’t even hold some of the biggest line items (debt service, e.g.) and not one single change was made.
• Stop it with the blow-in/townie stuff.  Ever wonder why 99% of Islanders are townies?  They want it that way.  While we’re at it, the town Republican and Democratic clubs should stay the f— out of all local elections.  (There’s a reason most citizens are unenrolled.)
• Help citizens submit articles to the warrant, then give them the benefit of the doubt.  Rather then hoot them off the stage, help the petitioners amend their articles.  Al Ramos, who submitted the nepotism article, was abused during the process.  Think anyone else wants to go through that now?
• Stop protecting your own.  While the result of the nepotism vote was no shock, the margin of defeat was.  The subtext is, “Don’t cross me or any of my Island associates.”  Look, we’re all friends here, sometimes family.  But this is business, and government’s activities is more important than taking the same side as people you care about personally.  TMRs often forget they represent about 3,600 people on average.  TM as a social event/knitting circle would be fine in a tiny town with 1000 people, but not here.  We are too big.
• Give up the “small town” fantasy.  The town was small once, but it will never be again.  Hanging on to such romanticism is unproductive.  We can preserve our rich New England history as we clean up the rest of the place.
• More press coverage and opinion.  I’m getting sick of saying it.  We have the dismal Topix, two blogs, an Island message board, and another board intended for high-level TM discussion that is never used.  That’s it.  Sad.
• Remember what community really is.  And that it’s 100 times more important than politics.

Tony, thank you for the question.  At least someone is interested in what direction we are taking.