I didn't attend or watch Town Meeting this fall even though I'm on the Community Preservation Act Committee, which had an article on the Warrant. One of the reasons I decided to stop being a Town Meeting member is to do other things in the evenings. On November 5th, while Town Meeting was struggling with decisions about building sidewalks and funding for a proposed mural, I was participating in a training workshop put on by the Conscious Communications Institute about how to handle conflict gracefully. From what I've read and heard, maybe we should have switched places.
Amherst is governed by a mixture of volunteers and professional staff. Some of the volunteers are on committees, some are in Town Meeting, some do both. Given the high number of Town Meeting seats for which there is no contest, serving on Town Meeting is more like volunteering than being an elected representative. The staff are knowledgeable, conscientious and dedicated. All of us and our town do best when everyone treats each other with respect, at least acting as if they believed everyone else is trying to do the best they can for the town.
When I was on the Select Board, I realized that the seating arrangement in Town Meeting means not only that everyone can see the Select Board and Finance Committee (or whoever else is sitting at the front of the room), but also that the people in the front of the room can see the faces of Town Meeting members. Sometimes those faces expressed a dismaying amount of emotion - anger, hatred, triumph - toward their neighbors who were putting in hours serving the town on a major boar'd or committee. Generally, the people serving on committees feel an obligation to behave and speak respectfully in public, but some other people do not, especially when addressing "officials." I believe the unpleasantness is one of the reasons why few people run for Town Meeting seats, and why some of those who are elected don't attend or leave early. Unfortunately, the Lewis Mainzer's suggestions for improving Town Meeting seem to have fallen on deaf ears.
We could improve the functioning of government and our sense of community if we engaged in open, respectful dialog about what the issues that divide us are.
Two statements made by candidates after the election in October come to mind. According to the newspaper, Dave Keenan, commenting on the composition of the Select Board, described Eva Schiffer and Carl Seppala as the "political right." That must have been a surprise (and a laugh) to both of them. What is "political right" and "left" in Amherst? How do we make these distinctions? Are they based on national or even international issues? State? More local disagreements? There's a lot of overlap and nuance. It could be a very interesting discussion.
Then there's the Charter vs Town Meeting debate. Robie Hubley said "I think that some people tried to use the charter like a campaign base and it didn't work." My observation, as a person who supported the Charter last spring and Paul Bobrowski for Select Board in the spring and the fall, is almost the reverse: some anti-Charter people want to claim a Select Board win by a very well-known and respected individual as a referendum. I supported Bobrowski because I respect and like him; I think he would make a good Select Board member; and he asked me first. I also think it's good for people to serve on a committee or two before running for the town's highest offices. It's true that I and others got to know him better as we worked together for the Charter proposal, but Charter supporters are not a cabal plotting the overthrow of Amherst's government. A little while after the election, a woman I've known a long time who had supported Hubley called to chat about it; in the conversation she asked whether I wasn't "concerned" about Bobrowski's "ambitions." I said "huh?" When I asked, "What ambitions?" the answer was "all those committees he's on." I'm still flabbergasted. I'm also wondering: is there a perception that people are serving on town committees or supported the Charter to do Š what? Build their careers? Are there rumors to that effect? If so, let's expose them to sunshine and fresh air.
Michael Greenebaum wrote a column defending Town Meeting's rejection of the work and advice of staff and fellow volunteers (nine committees for the sidewalks; five for the mural). I hope the proposed coordinating group for Town Meeting will succeed in providing the information about every article that members suddenly decide they want, but it seems to me that if members truly want and expect to be informed of every detail of each proposal, they have to attend committee meetings where those details are discussed. Not everything can be brought to Town Meeting, especially when no one can accurately predict when an issue will be discussed. The column ended with a plea to Town Meeting members to show up; according to Greenebaum, almost half weren't there for those votes. Maybe we don't have 200 or more people able and willing to devote so much of their lives to local government.