The Politics Of Expediency In Southbridge

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Ken O’Brien
There’s an old Chinese proverb that says, “If yousit by the river long enough you will see the body of your opponent floating by.”
The pollution swollen river that is Southbridgepolitics has flowed on for many months since The O’Zone first began. Over thattime this forum has documented the many distortions of process, reason andintellect that have dominated the decision-making process that has governedthis community. 
These have come at an ever-increasing cost to anever-diminishing base of taxpaying citizens who have borne the burden ofgrotesque abuse and exploitation while a favored elite has benefitted.
For whatever reason, that has become totallyinexplicable to me, the voters have continued to endorse this profligacy.
It is my hope that the mostrecent developments relating to this incompetency will deal the fatal blowto these sycophants so that we will soon witness their metaphorical bodiesbeing swept out to sea.
For a year five people deliberated every other week,subject to a schedule posted on the town website, to evaluate all the elementsof the existing Town Charter. Chaired by Councilor Laurent McDonald andVice-Chair Gary Fontaine joined by Deborah Gregoire-Lefebvre, Dennis Martinekand Kenneth O’Brien, the Charter Review Committee also held two televised publichearings, provided a public comment form on the town website and provided adetailed report also available on the town website.
Compare that to the opacity of theproceedings of the current Bylaw Review Committee.
Once the Charter Review Committee issued its reportit was caught up in the turmoil of a town council torn by dissension and then deadlockedby the passing of its most seasoned member.
The following special election resulted in a clearchange in the balance of power that has persisted to this day.
Shortly after their “validation” at the subsequenttown election the new council majority dispensed with the Charter Review Committee’syear-long work in two subcommittee meetings and a couple of council meetingshighlighted by a sudden “change of heart” by one of the councilors on herprevious vote on one of the most contentious issues relating to the Board ofHealth.
The bastardized recommendations were subsequentlysubmitted to the state legislature by the newly elected State Representative.There it went through a long process of vetting that resulted in one of theprovisions being eliminated.
Finally, the legislation was adopted by the House ofRepresentatives, despite vocal opposition at a public hearing by a number ofcitizens, including the Charter Review Committee’s Chairman.
Following another lengthy wait, the proposals weresegregated into ten separate Senate bills that were passed by that body lastThursday (September 6^th).
At that point the Southbridge Town Manager,Christopher Clark, decided that it was time to take a victory lap.
Aware that the Town Clerk had already stated that itwould be too late to include the ballot questions for the November elections,he told the Southbridge Evening News, that “He proposed working with theCouncil to set a special election date for sometime early next spring, sincethe next planned election after November will be the June 2013 annualballoting.” (Southbridge Evening News, September 12, 2012, page 1)
Apparently he was unacquainted with the terms of thelegislation that he was extolling.
Each of the Senate bills adopted and sent to theGovernor’s desk contained the following provision, “…this act shall be submittedto the voters of the town of Southbridge in the form of the following question whichshall be placed on the ballot at a regular or special town election to be heldin the year 2012….”
Further compounding the misinformation was the reportin that same Southbridge News article that, “The texts of all of them [theSenate bills] (which include how the questions will appear on the ballot) areavailable as PDFs at the Legislature’s website.” (Southbridge Evening News,September 12, 2012, page 7)
However, the reporter apparently never grasped thespecifics of the legislation, because he never pointed out to the town managerthat the election had to be held in 2012 and as a result he never got aresponse to that oversight.
This incident also illustrates the grossincompetence of our current State Representative, Peter Durant.
All of these repercussions stem from his legislativeproposal, H3900,submitted on behalf of the town of Southbridge.
If he was doing his job as a legislator he wouldhave been fully aware of the developments related to his bill as it wasmodified by the Senate. He would have been aware, prior to last Thursday, thata mandate to hold the election in 2012 would be unrealistic in terms of bothtiming as well as the projected cost of $9,000 following so many other demandson the financial resources of the Town Clerk’s office in 2012.
Apparently, however, our “conscientious and fiscallyconservative” point man in Boston dropped the ball (assuming he ever had a firmgrasp on it). As far as I know (and I am open to being corrected)this was the most significant assignment he was given by any of the communitieshe represents, and he blew it!

In summary, this is merely the most recent and mostclearly apparent example of the slapdash way Southbridge has been run for fartoo long.
I can only hope that it finally illustrates in clearand decisive terms to the voters of Southbridge why those in charge have to bewashed away.
I’ll be sitting by the river watching.