Contrary to the predictions made by some, town meeting managed to carry over into Wednesday evening. My Tuesday evening votes can be found here.
Article 15 was to appropriate $406,000 to complete the construction of the Library. This is basic housekeeping; the town must approve the appropriation of the funds, but those funds will be appropriated via an increase in the grant we get from the state. It should cost the taxpayers nothing.
That said; there was mention of "...unanticipated expenses related to the award to [sic] the contract to JK Skanlan..." This vague explanation bothers me. I'll be honest - I didn't have time to investigate this before town meeting, but I'm looking into it now. I'll report on what I find later...
I voted "Aye"; it passed.
Article 20 was to appropriate $68,000 to fund the Administrative, Management and Technical employees contract. This contract, and the ones mentioned in articles 21, 22, 23, 25 and 26, were just negotiated. This funding is needed for the back pay owed on these contracts for the past few months. I voted "Aye"; it passed.
Article 21 was to appropriate $31,000 to fund the police sergeant's contract. I voted "Aye"; it passed.
Article 22 was to appropriate $110,000 to fund the police officer's contract. I voted "Aye"; it passed.
Article 23 was to appropriate $140,000 to fund the firefighter's contract. I voted "Aye"; it passed.
Article 25 was to appropriate $65,000 to fund the DPW employee's contract. I voted "Aye"; it passed.
Article 26 was to appropriate $22,000 to fund the library employee's contract. I voted "Aye"; it passed.
Article 28 was to add another Network Computer Technician to the IT Department. There is no additional cost here; this position effectively replaces a similar role in the Police Department that is not being filled. I voted "Aye"; it passed.
Article 29 passed on the blanket vote, but it's worth mentioning that this was to appropriate money to notify inactive voters. Basically, if you haven't voted in the past few years, you'll be getting a letter saying that you'll be removed from the list of registered voters. So get out and VOTE in May.
Article 31 was to appropriate $30,000 for a robotic camera system for the Civil Defense room (old Selectmen's Meeting Room) at Town Hall.
First, let me give credit where credit is due. I had a conversation with Moderator David Vieira, in which he mentioned the Comcast contract and the potential for Comcast to fund this expense.
Moderator Vieira gave me the idea, so I ran with it. I stood up on town meeting floor and asked why we weren't asking Comcast to fund this instead of paying $30,000.
I think I heard crickets.
There was a rather pregnant pause - and a deer-in-the-headlights look from Selectmen Kevin Murphy - before town manager Bob Whritenour said the Comcast contract was not up for review for another two years. To which I suggested that we wait two years and get this free.
Selectmen Murphy, the proponent of this article, should be given credit for the concept - more public access to government. It's a good idea, and when I was on the conservation commission, we discussed various ways to get our meetings back on the air after the volunteer producers stopped.
However, the problem is not so much a lack of equipment, but a lack of volunteers. Anyone with the time can do the taping - the cameras are there to use. The problem is that no one is using them. Installing $30,000 worth of equipment when there is no one to do the work is, frankly, a waste of money.
I voted "No"; it failed.
Article 32 was to raise and appropriate $55,945.36. Basically this was a housekeeping article which made adjustments to the Debt Service Budgets. The $55,945.36 will be added to town's tax rolls, but this amount spread across all of our property owners is insignificant.
There was some controversy, as we initially had no figures to review. The article had to be tabled so that the town treasurer could assemble the figures and put them on the overhead projector. I voted "Aye"; it passed.
Article 33 was to transfer $100,000 to the Community Preservation Act Open Space Reserve. I held this article with the hope of amending it, and I learned something in the process.
First, recommendations made by the Community Preservation Committee cannot be amended on town meeting floor. Frankly, I don't like this, since it is effectively ruling by committee. An unelected group of people (the Community Preservation Committee) make a decision that an elected body (town meeting) cannot modify. We can only vote it up or down.
I had wanted to amend the article so that this $100,000 would be put toward the Affordable Housing Reserve. I'm all for open space - I'm a member of the 300 Committee and I've previously opined about their efforts - but Falmouth already spends 55 percent of our Community Preservation Act funds on open space.
The biggest issue concerning the people of Falmouth is 40B development, but the only way we can get control of 40B's is to have enough affordable housing. Hence my attempt to put this $100,000 toward affordable housing.
Because I couldn't amend the article, I urged a vote against it. However, I was but one of a handful of "No" votes; town meeting overwhelmingly approved the transfer to the Open Space Reserve.
So, either town meeting really likes open space, or they don't care about controlling 40B, or both. You decide.
Article 36 amended Chapter 1, Section 1-2 of the Code of Falmouth to track non-criminal complaints. Someone held it to get clarification. I voted "Aye"; it passed.
Article 38 was to amend the sign bylaw to reduce the size of signs for shopping malls from 132 to 100 square feet. This was one of those "what where they thinking" articles. The Falmouth Mall isn't by definition a mall anymore (a mall has to have an common interior corridor), so this is a pointless change and frankly a waste of time. I voted "Aye"; it passed.
Article 41 was to replace the current part time assistant in the Veteran's office with a full time assistant.
I voted "Aye"; it passed.
This particular article should never have generated the controversy that it did - it really was a no-brainer. It was controversial because the selectmen and the finance committee didn't support it.
Selectman Ahmed Mustafa has, for many years now, requested this change. Massachusetts' law Chapter 115 requires towns to have a veteran's agent and to provide certain services for veterans; 75 percent of what we spend is reimbursed by the state. The caseload is growing and the potential for Falmouth to lose some of those reimbursements - we have to file the paperwork - is growing.
However, this change to a full time assistant kept getting pushed-off over and over again because of budget constraints. Selectman Mustafa finally stood his ground, but the other selectmen didn't support him. Indeed, I've previously opined that Selectman Murphy wanted to spend $30,000 on a camera system instead of $11,000 on this position. So much for spending priorities, eh?
Fortunately, town meeting agreed with Selectman Mustafa, and the position was created. Unfortunately, no funding was attached to the article.
Here again is more evidence of the other selectmen's failure to support Selectman Mustafa. He forgot to add the funding to the article, but any one of the other selectmen or the town manager - all of whom review every article on the warrant - could have asked Selectman Mustafa if he wanted to fund the article, but they didn't. Their silence is evidence of their lack of support.
The lack of funding created yet another controversy as Joe Netto tried to amend the article to include the necessary funding. However, town meeting rules don't allow this. If there is no funding in an article, it cannot be added because that would be out of the scope of the article. Mr. Netto's persistence tried Moderator David Vieira's patience, and a few folks called to ask me about Moderator Vieira's outburst.
Truth be told, Mr. Netto deserved the tongue lashing. He is on the Town Meeting Rules and Procedures Committee, so he - more than anyone in town meeting - should've known that his amendment was out of order.
Never fear though; now that town meeting has made it clear that we want the position, I'm sure the town administration will find the $11,000 to fund it.
Article 42 was to send a letter "...requesting that Congress set goals to end the occupation of Iraq..." Mr. Tork should've done a referendum, but I've previously opined about this, so that's all I'll say. I voted "No"; it passed.
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