Our Town and Sanitary District are separate government entities. They have agreements to cooperate in many areas. Courtesy and respect have characterized the relationship.

That is changing. Incumbents for re-election to the Sanitary District Board are being challenged by friends of one Town Council member. The Mayor has also weighed in on the campaign to tip the election in favor of the challengers. What is the Mayor doing?

At a candidates forum on Sept. 21 the Mayor jumped into the debate and falsely accused the Sanitary District of impeding the Town’s efforts to develop the State Trust Land (STL). She charged that the District is refusing to commit to “cover” the STL. The District won’t even reveal “the capacity that can be handled,” and the “State won’t release the land until they find out if the Sanitary will cover the land.”

The Mayor’s charges are false. In several letters the Sanitary District repeatedly disclosed its available capacity and stated that it can handle STL development up to a certain population density. The Sanitary District has been very clear that beyond that, any STL developer will be required to pay for added capacity if the population density exceeds that limit.

There’s more. The agency in charge of the STL is conducting studies in preparation for an auction of the STL. “The Sanitary District was in no way holding up the process.” The problem, according to the STL agency, is that “the Town has some unreasonable expectations as to the number of homes and price point that the land could support.”

The Mayor has crossed the line. She has injected herself into the Sanitary District elections through false accusations. Those accusations are refuted by the same letters and other public records that she has received in her official capacity as our Mayor.