Typical TM demographic: Older, white, with 2 much time on their hands
If this is material that passes for a hatchet job these two country bumpkin impersonators may want to start patronizing a better arms dealer.
First off they need better props. Who in Amherst still reads a newspaper? Yes an older crowd for sure, which is the prime make up of Amherst Town Meeting. But invoking that particular demographic is pretty much preaching to the converted.
Over one-third of the registered voters in our little college town are "college aged youth," and they have not picked up a newspaper since the last time they used a phone booth.
And if you're going to call out people by name at least get their names right. "Suzie" la Cour, the Business Improvement District director, may have been a cheerleader in her youthful past but her name is Sarah.
And her husband Niels left Town Hall Planning Department for UMass, at least according to former Town Manager Larry Shaffer's announcement on the floor of Town Meeting, because he got a $10,000 raise. So who wouldn't leave?
Just as one must assume Hope Keenan recently left her marketing gig at the Business Improvement District in favor of a UMass job because of better pay.
Or maybe it was just to have less dealings with entitled socialistic has-beens-and-never-weres who wish for our downtown to stay forever locked in the Eisenhower era.
When asked why he frequented a fixed game the gambler responded, "Because it's the only game in town." Which is why of course 13-of-20 Amherst For All Steering Committee members are Town Meeting members.
And anyone who has spent so much as one night in Town Meeting knows all too well how outmoded, cumbersome and naive it is.
Can you imagine a multi-million per year corporation being run by a group of 135 or so (out of the 240 who bother to show up) rank amateurs who come together 10 or 12 nights per year to run things?
Apple Inc would be in the business of selling real (organically grown) apples.
The other laughable charge directed at Amherst For All Steering Committee is that they are "All white, with no disabled and no low income." Talk about the pot calling the kettle of color.
Anyone looked around the floor of Town Meeting lately? (Or anytime over the past 256 years).
Amherst Town Meeting counted standing vote May, 2014
Amherst For All is now over two-thirds of the way to target goal of 3,215 signatures of registered voters who agree it's time to study our current form of government and come up with a better one.
Thus these two Town Meeting cheerleaders will someday soon be out of their obviously all too coveted volunteer job.
44 comments:
Antiwhite? Ageist?
Well I'm old and I'm white and I'm a Town Meeting member, so it's all good.
Larry,
https://pbs.twimg.com/tweet_video/CUN0E_wWUAIBQEo.mp4
It just seems so appropriate for any discussion of Amherst politics....
I guess we can assume that they're worried.
Rich Morse
I know Sarah La Cour - Gertrude you are no Sarah LA Cour
The vast majority of town in Massachusetts have town meeting and we are the smartest state in the country. Amherst is a top rated college town. Maybe, just maybe town meeting has made Amherst the great place to live, learn and visit that the Amherst For All trumpet on their website. It's a strange argument to make that Amherst is so great, the government has to be changed. Someone please, please explain what these people want and why?
Funny, because all the pro-charter people I see are older and white. I don't see any difference.
The bathrobe, the toaster, and the hairstyles are all of the era that Mary and Mike want to roll the town back to: the 1950s.
Amherst Media is require to provide these two equal time, seeing as Amherst Media's entire video archive of Town Meeting sessions is all Amherst For All needs.
BIG difference.
Although it is hard to see brains, personality and a sense of humor.
if you wonder why some doubt the effectiveness of TM, just watch the last meeting. Several folks who spoke did not understand the articles before them, despite being among the more straightforward type. Many were confused and clueless. Is this who you want making important decisions? Really?
What unearth do you people have against white people who are your elders?
Amherst For All is a fraud. It professes to not know what the right type of government Amherst should have when it's really a push to convert the town to a mayoral system. The lack of honesty doesn't bode well. Start dishonest you'll end dishonest.
The Charter question has to be approved first by the voters with 9 Charter Commissioners elected on the same ballot.
That's the way it works.
The Charter Commission then comes up with a new government, which almost certainly will not have a representative Town Meeting.
Why are these folks so afraid of bringing the conversation before the voters???? This is a long arduous process, with many opportunities for debate. They say they are pro-democracy, but then go about doing everything they can to thwart democracy.
Curious
My stomach is turning as I watch this. Denigrating individuals like this, going down a list of names and "exposing" their private interests in Amherst for All. It's simply disgusting throwing shade like this. God, what a crotchety bunch of cranks. I can't wait til they lose or they are DEAD so this town can move forward.
I find it funny (as in funny, strange, not funny, HA HA) that experience in town governance and planning is considered by these folks to be "cause" for denigration. Service on Town Meeting, being elected to and serving a leadership position on The Select Board and donating countless hours as a member of The Planning Board is apparently something to ridicule? Wow! What a sad state of affairs.
1977
"The food here is terrible"
"And such small portions"
--Annie Hall
2015
"The elected and appointed boards here are terrible"
"So let's keep everything the same"
--Mary Wentworth
Is there still time for me to get on Mary's Enemies List?
I really like the company.
Rich Morse
I've already heard from prospective advertisers who want to be just like Peter Vickery.
let's see: I have a Masters degree in planning, I used to work in town government as a *gasp* planner, & now I work at UMass. The Amherst For All folks seem like my kind of people. They have my vote now for sure. Thanks Dinglehoppers. You have convinced me - your side is not the side I want to be on.... but then, it sounds like you probably wouldn't want me anyway.
The sad thing is that they have a point about how incestuous Amherst is...
What is it that will actually change? The schools will continue to be the same, so will the police and fire departments. Public works will continue to pave roads and bring us water and sewer. As for development, it wasn't town meeting that killed The Retreat. Taxes will continue to be high because people want services. What are you expecting to magically transformed?
I can't wait until you are DEAD. (How's that feel?). And you call Them crotchety.. You don't get much mire crotchety than you.
Not only that, they call for your death.
Has anyone else noticed how infrequently we have contested Select Board or School Committee races these days? And, of course, Town Meeting seats are seldom contested either.
These people have us just where they want us. Make volunteer service to the town SOOOO unpleasant, that no one will want to run, leaving them with plenty of room for their crazy dog and pony show to flourish and enabling them, in the process, to wield undo influence over the nature of the conversation and any Town Meeting votes that require a 2/3 majority.
Why would they want ANYTHING to change? The system is working for them, just not the rest of us.
anon@8:52 has it completely right.
Yep. Unfortunately.
Forming a committee is not a tactic to hide intentions or be dishonest. If you want to change a town government, state law requires that you form a committee and do a study first. You can't skip the committee and just suggest your changes.
Amherst for All is following the process correctly.
Yes, but it should say, "We are doing this to eliminate town meeting and have a mayoral system."
No it should not.
Because if the Charter Commission is formed and they do NOT come back with a mayoral system (simply a dramatically downsized Representative Town Meeting for instance) then those who signed under that pretense could file a lawsuit for false advertising.
Also, once enough signatures are accumulated to put the Charter question on the ballot, anyone, including Gert and Orville, can get themselves on the ballot as well, to run as potential Charter Commission members--the ones who research and craft a proposal for change, which will again be brought to the voters for an ultimate decision.
So, again, Gert and Orville and Co., What, exactly, are you so afraid of? Put your name and ideas out there in a way that is Representative and Accountable --something you claim Town Meeting already is-- and see if enough voters agree.
Or do you think you won't pass that test?
Town meeting was already downsized, remember?
Seems to me this is for people that like democracy in principle, but not in actuality.
It's complete fantasy that "Representative Town Meeting" is the most democratic form of government. ("Open Town Meeting"--yes, but Amherst doesn't have that any more). "Representative Town Meeting" is another name for 240 person city council.
Where on any given night barely over half of them bother to show up.
Why should they? There is a shadow government that actually runs things -- that is what Orville & Gert have stumbled onto without realizing it.
They have met the enemy and the enemy is them.
It's all about who gets elected. Why don't more of you just run for town meeting? The number of votes needed is low, so if you just mobilize you could oust some of these people. It would save all this extra effort.
Why don't you just run for the Chater Commission?
Although you can't do so as an Anon.
"Why should they? There is a shadow government that actually runs things -- that is what Orville & Gert have stumbled onto without realizing it."
All these years
I've been wrong.
Ponziville isn't a mirage utopia
after all.
WAAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHHAHAHAH!
-Squeeeeeaky Squeaks!
P.S. HEY-HEY HO-HO, YOU KNOW WHAT HAS-GOT-TA-GO!!!
8:51
"Orville and Gert" stumble upon a "shadow government"--the numerous appointed and elected cronies who work in Town Hall, and inadequate Town Meeting members.
"Orville and Gert" immediately get to work...to keep town government exactly the way it is.
Shouldn't "Orville and Gert" be out getting signatures, while "Amherst for All" stays home making snarky videos?
I love this video. It's just what the charter reform signature drive needed!
It's not reform. It's a study, wink wink.
The dreary paranoid thinking in this video gives me hope that town meeting is doomed to fail.
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