To the Editor:
Donald Trump has been in office less than six months and already he has been held accountable for stealing food from the poor and elderly, taking money to help disabled students, firing an incompetent F.B.I. director and too many other infractions to keep track of. A lot of progressives want Donald Trump “Fired!”
Yet the same voters seem to give our local, elected politicians a free pass for their failures. The school districts have never been given the 100 percent reimbursement for transportation. Instead of insisting the state repair the bridges and roads which our taxes are supposed to pay for, state Rep. William Smitty Pignatelli wants to pass a law to allow towns to raise the gas tax to do it ourselves while the state keeps our money. The school choice money has stayed the same for over a generation and yet the Beacon Hill gang has given themselves generous raise and benefits. The pipeline is going through the Otis State Forest in spite of 85 percent of Massachusetts elected officials being Democrats and taking money from lobbyists, lawyers, contractors, oil and gas companies. We have lost manufacturing and retail jobs throughout the county, and everyone seems all right with that. Berkshire County is one of the poorest counties in Massachusetts. Yet no outrage at the lifetime politicians for allowing it to happen. Richie Neal has been in office for four decades and has a miserable record and has taken a lot of GE money. Speaking of GE, former Rep. Peter Larkin is a lobbyist for them, and again, no one seems upset. The only green our politicians seem to care about are what is in their war chests unless green companies donate.
Pittsfield has police and sheriffs departments with plenty of new toys yet crime is still a serious problem. No one seems to want to recall Sheriff Bowler. To add insult to injury other than parades and litter pick-up how often does South County see the sheriff? Hardly ever.
Berkshire County has three Registry of Deeds offices; Suffolk County with a population 780,000 has but one and no one questions the waste. Imagine all the school lunches that can be bought by just shutting two offices down?
The list goes on and yet no one is upset at our locally and state elected lawmakers and they are all in office for life, until they get indicted, find a better paying government position or die.
But as long as Trump is in office he’ll be blamed for everything and the Mass. delegation skates and keeps getting elected for failing and taking the citizens’ hard-earned money.
Patrick Fennell
Great Barrington
