To the Editor:
Recent history of town meetings in Stockbridge has proven…. honestly, deceptive.
What does that mean? The attendees at town meetings, with a few exceptions, get caught up in the moment. Vote yes on this article — it’s written and explained that way so….. the vote ends up yes.
What we don’t often know is that the total cost of what we are voting for is not being put before us.
Oh, there is, supposedly, a bidding process and it just gets voted yes. The additional $100,000 here and there that gets added to the project isn’t addressed at Town meeting. The additional funds get approved in later selectman’s meetings (sometimes early Wednesday mornings) Why? Because… the project as approved ran into a snag?
Example, we (or most) were “sold” by a Selectman at the time, J. Christopher Irsfeld, on moving Town Hall from Procter Hall to Plain School. An enormously expensive project that I and others objected to because of the invisible taxpayer cost. That, along with no concrete reuse plan for Procter Hall, was an absurd vote. He was good at theatrics and salesmanship and it all was bought and is still being paid for by the Stockbridge taxpayers. The majority were bamboozled and voted for it, so it goes, eh? It continues to bleed our town coffers. Good sales job, bad results. The 2nd beginning to our current financial worries. The Plain and middle school construction came first.
Now, we have the new Monument Mountain maintenance/rebuild and “Shared Expenses” issues with other towns before us shortly.
Shared expenses? Like Police? No! Like Town Administrator? No! Do our selectmen ask the head’s of these departments their opinion or just make blind decisions on their own?
Share winter salt and sand expenses? Yes! Equipment? Yes!
We can be deceptively presented “short viewed” decisions like the Procter Hall to Plain School project — very expensive decisions, or we can ask our Finance Committee and Selectman to answer very dicey questions? Questions like: Before you come to us with the “sum of money” articles, can we get a solid bid on the project’s cost to put it before the taxpayers and voters? If it is quoted to be beyond our wishes, can we revisit the issue in a Special Town Meeting? Can’t do that? Don’t put it before us until “the sum of money” question can be definitively answered.
John H. Hart
Rattlesnake Mountain Rd
Stockbridge, Mass.
The writer is occasionally referred to as leader of “The Rattlesnake Gang.”
