SB2: April 2008 Archives

March 12th, 2008   Email to the Selectmen

I am addressing this message to the attention of Mr. Charest and Mrs. Crawford.

Congratulations on your reelection. Your service is appreciated whether or not we are in agreement.

Since we use secret ballot to elect town officers, you have no way to know how and why I voted but I would like you to know that I did not vote for either one of you and why.

The reason? I think you did not act in the Town's best interest in endorsing the expenditure of $375,000 to cost out the athletic facilities/community center/senior center project (in that order) that the people of Moultonborugh have not yet agreed they want. I'm so old I think $375,000 is a h--l of a lot of money. At several Selectman's meetings leading up to the hearing when you gave your approval to this article, you stated many reasons why this is inopportune at this time. You heard them all, and agreed with many - too much money, rising taxes, school funding impact, retirement benefits costs, and on and on. However you finally stated that you were so impressed that 300 people had signed a warrant article that you decided to support it. If you indeed feel that the wants of 300 people is in the best interest of the 4500 inhabitants of the Town after you had such misgivings before the 300 (voters?) came forward, I say your thinking is wrong for the Town. The voting almost approving SB2 and the 353 write-in votes against the two of you demonstrates that I am not alone.

End of rant. My request is that on Saturday, Town Meeting Day, you will do the right thing and recant your approval of this warrant article.

Yours Respectfully,

Robert Damarell

www.LaconiaDailySun.Com                April 9th, 2008

To the editor,

The traditional Town Meeting is not a hiding place for backward antiquated thought. People, like Mr. Horne and Ms. Pam Finer are offering advice on improving Meredith’s government and some folks just don’t understand the advantages of SB-2. The public’s perception is that if truth has fair play it will always prevail over falsehood. The public, up to a point, is gifted with a charitable bent. But let us not be mistaken, through God’s grace they possess a mesmerizing charisma and charitable nature. They are forgiving until they become fed up with rhetoric which stokes up a controversy about how the town’s gentry know more than they. Mr. Obadiah Plainman 11 a recently resurrected gentlemen told me that one should listen carefully when the better sort of people tell you that they know more about what is good for you; this method of government leads to dictatorship and that can be upsetting. When a certain individual implies that the folk in the street are the mobs or the rabble, heads rise. Well I enjoy being and am proud to be the “rabble”. My breakfast friends enjoy being the “rabble for freedom” and detest hearing that there are folks out there that style themselves as a “better sort” or imply that the common folks are a stupid herd. The common citizenries, the “poor ordinary folk” work hard to meet their responsibilities and pay their property taxes. Cantankerous Yankees get rankled up when someone proclaims themselves to be of the better sort and look at the rest of their neighbors with contempt. Some folks don’t like it when others put on aristocratic airs. We are allergic to snobbery and are proud to be a part of the rabble and a Plainman. It was the “Rabble In Arms” or Continental Army under Gen. Washington that threw out the army of George III, the English king when he trampled on the rights of the American people. New Englanders have the spirit of rugged individualism and are fiercely supportive of their community. Self-reliance and civic involvement is part of Meredith and American character. Meredith will prosper if you permit the people to be heard. We can not fear the people. Give the little guys the credit they deserve. They will involve themselves in the community if they can. Note that our Town Manager holds selectman workshops meetings at the inappropriately, outrageous hour of 4 p.m. and selectman meetings at 5:30 p.m.. When you want to keep the people uninformed that is a way to do it. Hardly a time that the working people can attend to involve themselves in government. Why not hold a public meeting at 7 p.m. so that the average guy can get home after a commute, eat, shower and go to the public meeting and enjoy the beneficial consequences. It is no wonder that we hear defamatory protestations by a “well bred man” with a Ph.D., who makes scurrilous comments in the Sun and has little esteem or affection for the straight talking plain folk wanting them to fall in line. If SB-2 will shake up the local establishment then so be it. Perhaps some folks ought to sacrifi ce some of their vanity and become enthralled in a democracy that includes the right to vote. The Town Meeting is inconsistent with true liberty. The no-nonsense people have a right to be displeased rejecting those who hunger for personal privilege. We have recommitted ourselves to freedom and will recreate a great new awakening in democracy. I sense a great emotional tide of revivalism that is sweeping the Lakes Region. It sweeps away “pious fraud” and reviews the doctrine of democracy and the right to vote. There was a Great Awakening in America in the 1730s generated by the likes of Jonathan Edwards (“Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God”). Edwards wanted to recommit America to the spirituality of Puritanism. Some voters in Meredith want to recommit to democracy, liberty, tolerance, individual merit, civic virtue, rationality and the right to vote by secret ballot. With undisguised pride and optimism I still say “Power to the People” and “Uraahhh” to Mr. Horne and Ms. Pam Finer for bringing to our attention the importance of the diligent, unpretentious, “self-created and self-willed man” who believed in reason and threw off hateful malicious oppressors and bigots. The Plainfolk recognize and want better representative government, a right to vote at a time of their choosing and conveniently by secret ballot. VOTE YES FOR SB-2.

Richard Gunnar Juve

Meredith

www.Laconiadailysun.com     April 8th, 2008

To the editor, Mr. Peter Miller promises to study the hybrid “charter” forms of government (allowed to be adopted by towns and cities as set forth in the state Constitution) and share his findings from time to time. What information he will be presenting was already presented in The Laconia Daily Sun on March 24,

2008. The restructuring of local government is stated in state law Title III Chapter 49-B. The forms of government allowed to be adopted are: 1. town council, 2. town council with official ballot, 3. representative town meeting, 4. budgetary town meeting and 5. official ballot town meeting. It was spelled out what they were, and that before any could be voted on by the people the new charter as construed by the charter commission must be reviewed and approved by the Secretary of State, Attorney General and commissioner of the Department of Revenue Administration. This process takes at least three years after it is first initiated, and who knows how twisted the meanings written between the lines. What SB-2 offers is rather straight forward and simple, the residents of Meredith will be regaining the right to cast a ballot in deciding articles on the warrant. All the Statutes — RSA’s— are available at the state’s website. Mr. Peter Miller needs to study more that the state statutes, he needs to study history. He has a tendency to construe and present as fact. An instance is his statement on February 14 that Town Meeting is “our direct link to the America that was conceived and created by the architects of our constitution,...” FACT: Town Meeting existed long before any thought of separation from England. Fact is that in Exeter on Jan. 5, 1776 the people of New Hampshire in Assembly established a Congress and voted to take up Civil Government thus establishing a Constitution (before any other colony, state or nation). The Congress then went on to detail the form of government and its Bill of Rights and statutes which was sent out to the people to be voted on and amended. It was at Town Meetings throughout this State that the details of it were raised and voted on three times before final approval in 1783. It has been amended many times there after. So it shall be interesting to read from time to time what he has found as the facts are in the statutes which we can all find and in which nothing is hidden between the lines or inferred somehow by some other statute. It is by the twisted logic of inference of what is or was meant that those who would control our lives, rights and freedom prevail upon us. Mr. Peter Miller should study SB-2; find the good in it if he is so consumed with what is good for us. But you know that will not be, he will reference various (non-partisan most likely) groups, findings of negativity in any SB-2  community, and all the

achievements of other hybrid forms of local government he can to convince us to keep the form of government we have, instead of allowing all registered voters to vote because that would be the worst thing of all.

G. W. Brooks

Meredith

A response to questions about Moultonborough

www.Citizen.Com  

April 1st, 2008

Editor, The Citizen: Since Mr. Kim Dubuque wrote an "open letter to me" I must respond and expand on my points in a factual manner. I also must apologize for referring to Kim as "her". We have never met and I just made a wrong gender assumption.

In regards to the secret ballot petitions, you stated: "Could the motivating factor be that you and your core group were trying to make a point? In my opinion you were. I feel you accomplished your goal." The goal was not to make a point. The goal was to assure a fair and equitable means of voting on contentious issues. And yes, on that level it worked. As to your point, "Why were the last two petitions withdrawn"? While it may seem odd that this year there were so many petitions, I was not the only one requesting secret ballots in Moultonboro's Town Meeting. I didn't sign all of them. As for why the last two were withdrawn, I really wouldn't know as I was not one of those that requested that they were withdrawn. Perhaps that can be answered by those that did.

You further stated, "What I think, is that the petitioners became aware of the will of the overwhelming majority in the room and realized that what they were doing caused more harm than good". No. Harm or good were never factored in to the equation. Look at the issues that were on the table. I signed the secret ballot petitions that I felt strongly about. Period. Others did the same. I would tend to doubt that they withdrew the petitions as they were "swayed by the overwhelming majority" as evidenced by dwindling volume of voters after the community center vote.

As to the volunteers, you stated, "Another point I would like to make is I find your insinuation that the citizens who circulated and presented the petition for the community center intentionally inflated or sought out non registered voters to sign it, at the very least offensive. Anyone who knows the people involved with this project knows them to be hardworking and well intended members of our community". The point that was finally made successfully by voting down the $375,000 study funding is that most agree that a community center is worthwhile. The RSPT however drew a line in the sand and never looked for a middle ground. It was all or nothing and a very valuable lesson learned as evidenced by the new strategy of this team to think about how to phase this out and make it more palatable for the public. I have no doubt that those involved in any of the projects on any of the committees works hard. That was never an issue for me. I commend them for their hard work. I commend the selectmen for doing the jobs that they do. The issue I have is when they are swayed by a petition that is one third invalid and never thought it relevant. The RSPT and supporters continually referred to the opposition as a "small vocal minority". Apparently it is not.

As for your last issue, "I would also like to address Mrs. Punturieri comments about our select board. It is easy to accuse using generalizations. For those accusations to be plausible you need to use facts. Knowing the members of our select board, I find it highly unlikely that any of them would publicly ridicule a citizen for speaking his or her mind". I would invite Mr. Dubuque to take a look at some of the film footage of some of the selectmen's meetings available in the library, to view for himself some of the indignities that transpired. They are too numerous to mention and the issues have been decided. Enough said.

Linda Punturieri

Moultonborough