CPA Mud

It is an old political trick to attack the individuals expressing a view, rather than the merits of their views, when one is unwilling to have an honest and open debate about an issue. Dismissing the position of three thoughtful, responsible Egremont citizens by labeling them as "libertarians," which the leading proponent of the CPA did this week, is a classic example of that trick.

Laura Allen has been the chairman of the Egremont finance committee for many years. She has served with distinction, and no knowledgable Egremonter has ever criticized her performance in protecting the interests of Egremont taxpayers. She is known for her thorough investigation and analysis of financial issues. Bill Weigle has served Egremont as a selectman, a member of the finance committee and in many other capacities for over 50 years. Kevin Zurrin single handedly uncovered the billing problems at the water department, and is also known for his indepth analysis of town issues. Rather than dismissing the views of people with that level of distinction by labeling them, it would be better to listen to the reasons they take the position they have.

But if they are going to be labeled, at least the label should be accurate. Bill Weigle is a life long democrat. Laura Allen is hardly a libertarian; her public positions over the years disprove that contention. Kevin Zurrin may be a conservative, but he is not a libertarian. Furthermore, libertarians are not opposed to all taxes. 

I would have hoped for an open, honest dialog on the CPA. If the proponents intend simply to attack the opponents, and continue with misstatements and mischaracterizations like they made Tuesday night, that will not happen.

Turner's Compensation

In looking through the town's finances, I was a bit surprised to find that Bruce Turner makes almost $100,000 per year.  He makes somewhere in the vicinity of $75 to $80 thousand from the school  district, another $15,000 or so as the town's accountant and $4,000 or $5,000 as a selectman. 


Shouldn't there be some sort of limitation on how many paid positions someone can hold?  It seems that half the town employees are at the public trough multiple times.


Why doesn't the town try to hire people who aren't subject to conflicts of interest?

Police Again

I went to a court hearing in GB yesterday, the subject of which was a motion to suppress the evidence in the May 2013 drug bust of two young men at French Park because of the break-in to the evidence locker by Officers Kemp and Pezze.  I wanted to see if there would be any revelations about the chaos surrounding the police department during last year.  There weren't.


On the legal aspects, I suspect the judge is going to rule against the motion because he believed the testimony that the break-in didn't compromise the evidence.  Officer Carlson had carefully sorted and inventoried the drug evidence and placed it in sealed plastic bags.  Officers Kemp and Pezze broke in to the evidence locker and looked at what was there, but apparently didn't open or disturb the plastic bags themselves and their contents.


One of the defendants' attorneys tried to argue that the whole police department was in such a state of chaos that  blame and responsibility should have fallen on the entire department and the selectmen, not just Officers Kemp and Pezze, but the judge thought that argument went too far, saying the hearing was only about whether the evidence should be suppressed, not  whether a cancer had spread through government in Egremont.


Four officers testified - Shaw, Carlson, Kemp and Pezze - and it was pretty clear that they had coordinated their testimony long before the hearing.  A number of questions that I had hoped would be addressed weren't.  For example, the saga of Officer Pilone wasn't mentioned, nor the selectboard's rejection of Chief Shaw's recommendation that Officer Carlson be fired.  And Chief Shaw testified that he had recommended Officers Kemp and Pezze be suspended and not reappointed, but never said why he had changed that recommendation or, if he didn't, why the selectboard overruled him. 


So I came away from the hearing still uncertain about what really happened during 2013 but still suspicious about a cover-up.  Who was involved in the cover-up remains a mystery.


The one outcome that was very clear was that Selectman Brazie's public statement at a selectman's meeting in June that "there was no break-in to an evidence locker" was comparable to another politician's statements that "if you like your health insurance you can keep it."  At least that politician has apologized publicly and profusely.


 And you wonder why I'm suspicious?   


     

Egremont Zoning

Egremont has something called a zoning bylaw, but it isn't really.  It's what lawyers call a land use bylaw, because it doesn't create any zones, but rather just says what you can and can't do with land in Egremont.

Several years ago, the planning board proposed a rewrite of the bylaw that was rejected by the voters at a town meeting because it made too many changes, including some controversial ones that didn't go over well.  That proposed revision didn't even try to create zones.

Now the planning board is proposing major changes in the bylaw that will create zones and make other changes.  There's a public hearing on it scheduled for December 9.

New Marlborough very recently went through the same process.  That process culminated last week in the voters soundly rejecting it - by an overwhelming margin -  apparently for two primary reasons:  it made too many changes for townspeople to accept; and it wasn't adequately "sold" to the townspeople through the meetings, publicity and hand holding that are critically necessary for this type of action.

The Egremont planning board has a long history of proposing changes that fall flat with the townspeople. The planning board too often has come across as an imperious, "we know best" group that is viewed by townspeople as trying to inveigle them into creating more power in the planning board under the guise of protecting something.  In my opinion, that reputation is deserved. 

Perhaps that has changed.  And perhaps the planning board will learn from the New Marlborough experience.  The planning board needs to really reach out to townspeople - all of them - to discover what they think and to make changes to their proposal reflecting what they learn, even if that means dropping it completely or making changes that the individual members of the planning board don't agree with.  Holding a few public hearings isn't enough.  The people whose voices need to be heard include the ones who don't come to public hearings.

Town government has become increasingly cloistered in recent years.  The town hall denizens too often listen to themselves and their friends and make little or no effort to reach out to the citizenry.  Let's hope that doesn't happen for the zoning bylaw proposal.  

The Flynn Campaign Against Laura Continues

Flynn sent the following email to Laura, with copies to Bruce and Mary, after this Monday's meeting:

"Madame Chairman

 

I and other members of the Egremont Board of Selectman  were disappointed that you were not in attendance at last night’s meeting of the Board.  This was especially disconcerting considering that Mr. Tom Scanlon of the firm Scanlon and Associates was at the meeting to brief us and the community on the results of the recently completed audit his firm performed on the Town of Egremont finances for fiscal year 2012.  You being chair of the Finance Committee, I would have expected that you would have been there with your entire committee to hear his report and the factual discussion of the Management Letter, the Significant Deficiencies, and other matters.  However and fortunately, the Finance Committee was well represented by Tom Berkel, Ed Scarbro, and Ralph Noveck.

 

For your benefit and that of the entire town,  Mary will post the official management letter and accompanying report on the town’s website on Wednesday or Thursday when it is received as the Board of Selectmen released it officially to the public last evening as prior to last evening it was only an unofficial draft. 

 

Lukewarm Regards

 

Charles Flynn"

 

Laura sent the following email response to Flynn, with copies to Bruce, Mary and the finance committee members:

 

Your snotty e-mail to me of 11/5/13  is further evidence of your never ending campaign to force me off the finance committee.  You might spend your time more profitably doing your homework before taking hasty and often ill-advised actions at selectboard meetings.   My very best contributions to the town take place in the long hours I spend evaluating and making recommendations about town actions and in actions by the selectboard and others, not in attending selectboard meetings, especially if ill.  In my opinion the town would be better served if you attended fewer of them.

 

 

 

 

 

The Police Collective Bargaining Agreement

At the recent special town meeting, four of the six members of the finance committee voted no on the proposed collective bargaining agreement.  Their reasons included that the agreement was unclear in many areas, including the most important area:  What do the police officers get paid and what raises do they get?   Here's why.

Below is the actual page from the agreement.  You might think there was language following the table explaining how it is to be applied.  You would be wrong.

How do these numbers apply and to whom?  There's no explanation. What's the meaning of "Hiring Level A" or any of the others?  There's no explanation.  Do these specified levels mean  officers can only be hired (and paid) at one of the specified salaries?   It would be easy to just say that, but it doesn't.  There's language on the next page that reads "The Board of Selectmen reserves the right to hire experienced part-time officers at level C as long as they do not exceed part-time employees on the seniority list, and the Board also reserves the right to place new full-time experienced officers at a pay scale appropriate to their level of experience up to Level C."  I've read that sentence 25 times and still can't make sense out of it.  Does its existence mean that the numbers in the table only apply to new hires, not to existing officers?  And if the Board "reserves the right" to hire part-timers at level C, the clear implication is that they can't hire part-timers at any other level.  Is that what it means? Or does it mean "no higher" than level C?  It could have said that but it doesn't.  For full-timers, does it mean that level C is the highest level they can be hired at?  It could just say that but it doesn't.

Let's say the intention of the agreement is to provide for minimum and maximum pay levels for officers and to provide for each officer to be paid one of the specified amounts.  (Of course, we have to imply that because the agreement - rather astonishingly - doesn't say it.) And let's suppose that there is an existing officer who was paid about $39,000 for the fiscal year ended June 30, 2013.  Presumably he is to get a raise up to $39,839 for FY 2014, but how does he know, or anyone know, that he's in "Hiring Level B"?  Maybe there's a record somewhere that he was designated to that level when he was hired, but the levels in past agreements were designated by numbers (1, 2, 3, etc.), not letters, so there won't be any such record.  And even if there were a clear record, the agreement uses the word "hiring" for each level, indicating the schedule is only for new officers, because it would have been easy to just leave out that word if the idea was to name each existing officer to a specified pay level. 

And what's the point to these specific numbers, rather than just minimums and maximums?  Do they mean the selectboard can't hire an officer at, say, $42,000 exactly?  What's the point of that?  What if an officer wants to forego, say, the uniform cleaning allowance in exchange for an extra $300 in wages?  That can't be done under the agreement?

The sentence following the table is a real mystery.  The first part of the sentence says an officer will get a raise each fiscal year by moving laterally (meaning from left to right) - which incidentally leaves no room for any merit raises.   But then the sentence uses the word "and." So does that "and" mean the officer moves laterally only if he also gets an acceptable annual performance rating?  (As you might suspect by now, there's nothing in the agreement telling you when the annual performance review takes place, who does it, or what an "average rating of 3 or better" means.)  If that was the intention, it should have said "but only if," not "and."  The alternative meaning is that the officer gets two raises, one on July 1 and one on getting an acceptable performance rating.  But that can't be right, because there's only one specified dollar amount for each fiscal year.  So does the sentence mean that if an officer doesn't get an acceptable performance review, he stays at the old fiscal year wage?  If so, what happens the next year?  If he gets an acceptable review, does he then leapfrog up to the 2016 wage rate? 

No lawyer worth his or her salt would allow these ambiguities in a contract, especially in the most important provisions, namely the wage schedules.  The voters should have told the selectboard to go back and get it right.

Special Town Meeting

Now that they've fired Reena, the hottest item on the warrant - $42,000 more for an interim chief - will likely not be moved by the selectboard.  That leaves far less controversy for the meeting and may tempt many people not to go.   If you're one of them, please reconsider.

The other item on the police budget is still there.  I suspect when the selectboard moves it, they'll leave out the part about more money for the chief's salary:  whoever they hire to replace Reena, presumably Shaw, will get a lower salary than Reena, so there's no reason to increase that amount. 

That leaves the increase in the secretary's salary - which I suspect will garner very substantial support - and the increase in what's labeled "collective bargaining."    There are two ways to approach that item. 

First, the voters level funded the police department at the May meeting.  That's a perfectly appropriate way to decide budget matters.  For example, the voters could say to the highway department "we think we should spend no more than $[          ] on highways; now you deal with spending that amount whatever way you think best, but don't exceed it."  That approach works equally well with the police department, since vacancies can be filled or not filled, hours can be arranged, part time versus full time officers can be used for specific tasks, etc.  Most people in the private and public sectors are required to follow that kind of mandate.  If they come back later in the year and say "well I spent too much, so I need more, please give it to me," they get their heads taken off.

Someone might say "yes, but unexpected items can't be budgeted at the beginning of the year, and the new collective bargaining agreement with the police unexpectedly raises their compensation."  But everyone knew a new agreement was in the offing, and the town has often had to estimate police compensation pending a new agreement.  In fact that's what we did in May.  So if the new agreement is too costly, turn it down.  (To illustrate the point, what if the selectboard negotiated an increase of $100,000 in police compensation.  Would the voters just go along?)

Equally important, the dollar increase being requested is pretty much a seat of the pants number.  It assumes certain staffing that may or may not be what actually happens.  And the contract itself is filled with ambiguities.  When the finance committee asked for explanations from Bill Tighe, he had to admit that there were ambiguities.  I've read the contract.  It's unclear on some very basic money matters.  And it says it's not even in effect until July 1, 2014, which means the old contract still controls.  So rather than just bless it, why not say to the selectboard "go back and fix it, and live with what we gave you in May"?

The Police Debacle Goes On

Out of the frying pan, into the fire.  The selectboard voted 3 to 0 tonight to terminate Reena effective immediately.  There should be an article in the Eagle tomorrow, and if it quotes any of the selectmen, I'll bet dollars to doughnuts that the quotes will just tighten the noose around their necks some more.  If you're selling your Egremont property, do it fast because your tax bill is going to go way up.  As a federal taxpayer, you owe a big chunk of your future to the Chinese.  As an Egremont taxpayer, you're going to owe a big chunk of your future to Reena Bucknell.

If any of you have the ear of any selectman, talk to him or her about thinking just a little bit before saying something that makes things worse.