On Town Meeting
Anne Stephenson
By Anne Stephenson, Ph.D.
Campus Outreach Coordinator
Clean Air-Cool Planet
Monday night I went to Town Meeting. I didn’t want to go… but I know that most who attend are there to nit-pick over the budget, and those who think the town should be spending more rarely go. So I went, mostly in response to this wonderful, clear, op-ed written by my friend Molly Colman on why we should support the budget as written by the Town Council. Those who have been to a town meeting will appreciate it I think.
Molly is a neighbor of mine in South Berwick. We serve on a number of committees together, and until this spring, co-chaired our sustainability committee. Molly considers local activism to be the most important form of civic participation – and she goes to every open hearing, meeting, and workshop that she can manage to attend. This isn’t always to forward an opinion of her own, and I’ve never heard her “get on a soap box”, except maybe, at the end of the day amongst friends. Instead, she goes to be present, and to help convene conversation in a town that has had divisive town politics for years. She is a professional convener in fact. Town meeting has been a location of shouts and tears and if last night’s relatively tame meeting was any proof, Molly’s presence and her call for greater positive, civic participation has been met by many.
South Berwick is a funny town – it’s big – but it’s between bigger towns – Dover, Portsmouth, and Portland. We don’t have a newspaper of our own and although we’re proud to be Mainers, many of us South Berwickians hop in the car or on the train to work in Portsmouth or Boston. Molly stumbled on the fact that we were missing a forum to be a community – a place to have healthy civic dialogue – and so she created “The 236 Diner” a blog named after the busy road that takes us out of town that should, but doesn’t, have a diner. Until she actually starts cooking eggs for us all in the morning before work, her blog is the next best thing, and it’s given the town a place to meet outside of Town Meeting – and Town Meeting is the better for it.
So, that’s the positive. My friend Molly makes me think every day about what it means to be a neighbor. And what it means to do the work I do, not just at Clean Air-Cool Planet, but as a South Berwick citizen. With her encouragement, I work with my neighbors on sustainability programs and we have invited a number of interesting guest lecturers to town. At the urging of many in town, the Town Council formed a municipal Energy Committee and Molly and I serve on it.
But here’s the catch. Debate last night revolved around cutting the budget anywhere one could. At times, the quality of ambulance service was threatened. But of particular note to me was the endless debate about our capital budget reserves. Couldn’t we use those for on-going expenses? Why do we need $10,000 in reserve for our municipal buildings? In the context of Town Meeting, all money is fair game, but putting money aside for future capital expenses is particularly vulnerable. As our Energy Committee prepares to meet next week for our second official meeting, I wonder – how will we ever get any efficiency project done that requires any initial expense? Even if the payback was within a year, I have trouble imagining an efficiency line-item making it through last night’s gauntlet. Perhaps I just don’t have the faith in civic participation that Molly does, but can citizens spend now to save money, fossil fuels, the planet, later?
Individually yes. Even if you asked them outright, yes. But in the budget? That seems to me a different question. At the end of Town Meeting, I’m not certain a cogeneration, insulation, or renewable energy line-item would be left intact. Last night, some of my neighbors turned themselves into IT, phone network, and ambulance repair experts and questioned the veracity of the budget claims. Certainly that is within their right as voters, but I doubt that some speaking up last night could be experts in all of those fields. If presented with an efficiency project, how many of the auditorium would stand as experts? Everyone?
But I am new to Town Meeting, not just in South Berwick but in my work. My colleagues Roger, Christa, Sara, and Julia, work with Local Energy Committees across New Hampshire to reduce municipal greenhouse gas emissions, and to begin municipal efficiency projects. So I call on them to tell me how other towns have been successful with energy projects when presented to the town at large. Town Meeting is a way of life here – and the passing of the warrant article about climate action in New Hampshire Town Meeting in 2007 made for a busy time here at Clean Air-Cool Planet, as the prime mover for the Carbon Coalition. It meant for extraordinary civic discussion about climate change. But that was a resolution – no funds were up for discussion. Now we put the rubber to the road, or our money where our mouth is, etc. etc. So, what is the next step for Town Meeting? Are neighbors able to collectively hedge against future fuel price volatility?
For me, until and unless Molly, with her wonderful faith in civic civility, convinces me otherwise, I am an Energy Committee member who is a little pessimistic. We will achieve great energy savings for our town – of that I’m certain. But if I have anything to do with it, those savings will be placed in a dedicated revolving loan fund for energy projects and my neighbors won’t be able to touch it come next Town Meeting.
Tags: budget, Local Energy Committees, town budget, town council
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