To all of you that submit thoughtful, properly presented, fact-based letters to try to help this community, God bless you! To those that seemingly just want to see their name in the paper and bully others, while deliberately twisting and misrepresenting information to undermine efforts by those who are trying to honestly do their jobs in this community, well, it’s just more B.S.
We’ve had quite enough of that and what we need is more positive, constructive feedback and, yes, criticism where warranted to help and not hurt our community.
It was the misrepresentation of information that killed the much-needed property tax, for example. A modern town of this size cannot adequately pay for its infrastructure without one, people.
In a letter two weeks ago I mentioned that local Tea Party folks received signs from the Koch Bros. Foundation to flood the town with “Vote no on the property tax,” and filled the paper with paranoid conspiracy theories about the tax. (The Times edited Tea Party out of my letter for some reason.) This misinformation misled many people who had not attended the Town Hall, where the need for the tax was explained in great detail, and the tax was resoundingly voted down, showing the potential for damage to a community by those who make enough noise with their B.S.
Yes, we need to make sure our taxpayer money is spent responsibly, and we have the ability to do that by being actively involved in oversight to the town council. The town tries to find other income sources, income to meet our looming deficits, and even those are being attacked.
It takes money to keep up a town, just like your house, and our “house” is going to be pretty shabby soon. Enough B.S!
