BRATTLEBORO — My favorite moment at this year's Town Meeting was when the assembled representatives (among whose ranks I feel privileged to belong), with the esteemed moderator Tim O'Connor once again at the rostrum, arrived at Article 7: “To see if the Town will ratify, approve, and confirm the Selctboard's appointment of a Town Attorney for a term of one year.”
A gentleman rose to call attention to Article 2. For a few moments no one seemed to know which Article 2 we were talking about.
Mr. O'Connor, understandably confused, went to Article 2 in the Town Warning, wondering what the library budget had to do with the attorney. Eventually some representatives called the moderator's, and others', attention to another Article 2 included in the Town Report - the one that had gone to town-wide vote several weeks earlier: “Shall the Selectboard instruct the Town Attorney to draft indictments against President Bush and Vice President Cheney for crimes against our constitution,” etc.
The gentleman wanted to know if our town attorney had done his job, and was therefore deserving of being re-upped. (The answer turned out to be, “Not yet.”)
For several minutes confusion reigned - were we talking about the library budget or arresting Bush and Cheney?
A true Marx Brothers moment! I thought. Ah, if CNN could see us now!
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Town Meeting representatives then proceeded to go through the remaining 19 articles in about three hours with an hour's lunch break - a truly welcome change from the last several years' meetings which extended mind-numbingly into the early evening hours.
There were, of course, some spirited debates, particularly around how much money would come out of the Representative Reserve Fund to repair not only the Church Street wall, but roads and sidewalks as well.
Here, Acting Town Manager Barbara Sondag had the best line of the day. Talking about fixing the 3-way merge as drivers come off of Park Place (to make it less dangerous for trucks) and discussing calming of traffic there, Sondag muttered, “We've tried to calm traffic with our potholes - but no one's thanked us!”
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The other big issue that drew many comments was a new capital improvement budget. The town made a strong appeal, seconded by several town meeting reps, to spend the money now as the work will only get more expensive down the road and conditions will deteriorate even further - conditions that have been ignored for far too many years.
That was the “pro” argument. There was not much in the way of “cons” except its adding to the overall budget and therefore taxes.
Town meeting representatives broke for lunch with only two articles to go. One was the town school district budget, around which there was healthy discussion and questioning of school board members, before the budget was passed as requested.
Then, under “other business,” Dora Bouboulis presented a resolution which expressed the disgust on the part of the “voting body” with the idea of invading Iran.
It starts off: "whereas, in the lead-up to the Iraq War and Occupation, the Bush Administration and its Congressional allies used unreliable sources, exaggerated threat assessments, etc., and goes on to “now therefore be it resolved, that the Representative Town Meeting Members of the Town of Brattleboro call on our representatives in Congress…to ensure that no preemptive military attack, strike, or invasion by the U.S. against Iran take place….”
It is a page long, but that is the gist.
Steve Carlton, a children's therapist in civilian life, made an impassioned speech saying he'd just seen a heart-wrenching program on TV about the war, and emphasized the importance of sending the message that we won't repeat the same mistake. The resolution passed overwhelmingly.
A second resolution, put forth by Kurt Daims, who also initiated the indictment resolution, gave further instructions regarding what to do with Bush and Cheney. The resolution gave instructions that there would be no pardon of them upon their leaving their term of office. This was voted down with one representative standing up to point out that “this is a bit premature, since they have not yet been indicted for anything.”
The representatives, under “other business,” also thanked the Finance Committee for their work, honored Senator Jack Burgess who passed away last December; and thanked Joerg Mayer for his personal honesty and his service to the town. Meyer died a few days later on March 27.
With several real live hours of sunlight left to the day, which most reps set aside in their schedules with no commitments all day, it felt like a gift from the gods - for doing our civic duty, for coming out into the clear at last from our recent fiscal fiasco, for seeing to it that democracy, at least in this hamlet, is alive and well.