To the Editor:
Each of us certainly has plenty to be angry about, and I know only too well how refreshing it can be to just reach out and blast somebody, but why keep fueling that particular inferno that produces no good yet costs so much? A better idea would be to try to achieve the necessarily modest perspective on our own importance and show the level of respect for other people that lets us get along.
That’s a phrase that’s rich with meaning: “to get along.” It implies actively striving to achieve accord, and it could also mean forgiving past disagreements and moving on to new possibilities. I must admit to knowing that this can be really difficult.
Angry voices demand to know why there was a Town Meeting in Waldoboro to vote again on the articles that had failed in the June 8 referendum. Didn’t the majority say they didn’t want to fund the departments of Town Manager, Planning/Development/Code Enforcement and the office of the Assessor? Can’t the Selectmen do all that? Are we being played for fools?
Unfortunately, people don’t listen well when they’re mad and many seemed to miss the answer, as explained to us by our Town Meeting Moderator, Dana Dow, who I am paraphrasing here, which is that we are required by law to have a town manager in our democratically chosen form of self-government. The voters can’t just blow that away by simply voting not to fund it. So, no, the Selectmen can’t do all that, even if they want to, because they are not qualified.
Public administration is professional work, like dentistry, medicine and the law. It deserves professional compensation and professional respect and I suspect one of the hardest-learned skills of being a town manager is to get a bunch of “spirited individuals” like us to pull more or less together rather than apart.
A vote is a decision and, like all decisions, it works best when it’s based on good information and not driven by emotion or casual assessment. Voters with limited facts will make decisions that will damage the rights of everyone, including themselves. Just marking a ballot is not good enough when we haven’t listened to all sides of the matter.
Alas, there is no understanding without listening to the ideas of others, however wrong-headed, tiresome or loony they may seem (our town officials get to do this every day they’re on the job). That’s why the vote at the Open Town Meeting June 22 was different from the referendum vote June 8, and that’s why we must restore the participatory form of government known as the Town Meeting.
Every voter in Waldoboro will soon have an opportunity to sign a petition to bring back our Town Meeting and take back his or her share of the responsibility for self-government. We are fortunate indeed to live in a place where we haven’t yet permanently lost this opportunity.
(Bob Kanewske’s letter, “Failed apparently doesn’t mean failed,” printed on page 4 of LCN’s 7/1/10 edition.)
