Letter: Is the FTM the best way to decide a budget?

Posted 5/23/17

To the editor:

Would all of us in town be better served by eliminating the financial town meeting and allowing everyone to vote via a ballot and a voting machine?  

We need something …

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Letter: Is the FTM the best way to decide a budget?

Posted

To the editor:

Would all of us in town be better served by eliminating the financial town meeting and allowing everyone to vote via a ballot and a voting machine?  

We need something to replace this old and drawn out town financial meeting, for there are many people who feel that it is so disturbing they cannot attend and then all of us suffer the consequences. Some feel that attending will not make a difference. There is always overcrowding, a lot of frustration, and more than a modicum of anger.

This type of meeting is equal to the effects of always changing the voting districts in that it seems to discourage some people enough to stop them from voting and has an undercurrent feeling of (“what is this supporting”?)   It almost feels manipulative.

What we need to find is a forum that works for all, a way of investing everyone or at least more of our townspeople in community decisions. We all deserve to have a part in deciding what is good for the whole town and all of the citizens in it.

One of the main issues this year is educational finance. It is shame on us if education has become big business at everyone’s expense.  

And by the way, we would not have to frustratingly go into the midnight hours to accomplish some kind of an outcome.

Barbara Anne Flanders

Barrington

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