To the editor:

Tiverton’s Budget Committee has been taken over by a special interest group whose primary objective has been to have enough power to successfully strip funding from various town services under the guise of fiscal responsibility. This subset has been able to put forward a budget that does indeed bring the tax levy down, but some would argue it may bring the town down as well.

It is glaringly obvious to many in our town that we cannot keep taking funds from the town’s reserve fund (now holding less than one month’s worth) in the hope that Tiverton will never need a “rainy day fund” to draw from in an emergency. We cannot keep denying the repair, maintenance and service needs and expect our community to remain an adequately funded, attractive place to live. That is what this voting block has done for next year, and the lead agent of this group, now a budget committee member, has done through his petitioner’s budgets in the past.

We cannot expect to have a functional, well-staffed and well-equipped town without paying for it. If the committee is concerned about people’s inability to pay the taxes, as they claim, they could potentially work on a tax relief program so that those truly in need could apply for a reduction in taxes. Rather than running the whole town into the ground in sympathy for those who cannot afford the extra $45 a year on a home valued at $300,000 (as per Sakonnet Times April 27, 2017 page 8), appropriate adjustments can be made to ease the burden on those who truly cannot afford to pay.

Not only have Mr. Katz and Mr. Caron and their voting block reduced or eliminated funds from the budget recommended by the Town Council, they have now successfully blocked the alternative, a petitioner’s budget put forth by those who see the town’s needs differently. That is more than hypocritical on the part of Mr. Katz since he has put forth petitioner’s budgets repeatedly. No doubt the Town Charter needs to be re-examined and a better budget review process developed. At a minimum, Mr. Katz should not object to others using the mechanism he has used repeatedly. That can only be seen as a real power grab and the height of hypocrisy!

One has to ask, what motivates this special interest group? What outside organizations fund their endeavors? What drives them to devote this much time to effectively making Tiverton a depressed community? They cannot want people to be attracted to our town because they publish intensely negative information about our community on a regular basis. Witness the letter by Mr. Caron regarding the library. How dismal was that? They clearly don’t want people to apply for positions here because they refuse to acknowledge and support the work done by those already employed by the town. Witness the suspicion raised by that block in response to the building inspector’s plea for additional staff to complete the legally required work of his department. They do not want public involvement in this process. Witness the decision to silence public comment at the outset of their meetings. Unfortunately, there are more instances when this group intentionally acted together but did not act in the best interest of the residents of Tiverton.

Tiverton’s current approach to budgeting is clearly flawed, but it won’t be the tax rate that drives people from Tiverton. It will be our town’s growing reputation as a Town with declining services, devalued properties, and more than its share of acrimony.

Gayle Lawrence

Tiverton