To the Editor:
It seems like the petitioner desiring to rescind our May 12 Town Meeting vote to increase the number of Mattapoisett Select Board members is mixing apples and oranges. His misinformation of the different town projects continues to muddy the waters in his recent letter to the editor. His disrespectful profiling of its supporters is mean spirited as well.
Let me be clear. The vote on May 12 came after nearly an hour of discussion regarding the benefits of adding additional knowledgeable and skilled members to our Select Board. There was much discussion in the community prior to the meeting about this issue. The Mattapoisett residents who chose to attend Town Meeting knew this was going to be discussed and that a vote would be taken.
During our Town Meeting, there were many votes taken where the hands raised were clearly in support of the motion that a hand count was deemed not necessary by the Town Moderator. On this issue, the Moderator chose not to have a hand count because the number of hands raised in support of the motion to increase the number of Select Board members was very clear and not only a mere 20 votes as the petitioner reports. And what about the other votes on May 12? Do they need to be rescinded as well? There was certainly less discussion on other items as we allocated hundreds of thousands of dollars for the work in our town.
Over the past year, Select Board members had to recuse themselves from voting due to conflicts of interest. Additionally, when Select Board members were not in attendance at the meetings, only two members made decisions impacting progress made on town projects. Town Meeting voters understood that bringing additional expertise to our Select Board is what makes sense at this point in our town’s history.
Let’s move forward and reject the petitioner’s request for a Special Town Meeting and bring more workers on to the Select Board to move our town projects forward. We don’t need to waste time, effort and money rehashing what made sense to the May 12 Town Meeting voters.
Liz DiCarlo, Mattapoisett
The views expressed in the “Letters to the Editor” column are not necessarily those of The Wanderer, its staff or advertisers. The Wanderer will gladly accept any and all correspondence relating to timely and pertinent issues in the great Marion, Mattapoisett and Rochester area, provided they include the author’s name, address and phone number for verification. We cannot publish anonymous, unsigned or unconfirmed submissions. The Wanderer reserves the right to edit, condense and otherwise alter submissions for purposes of clarity and/or spacing considerations. The Wanderer may choose to not run letters that thank businesses, and The Wanderer has the right to edit letters to omit business names. The Wanderer also reserves the right to deny publication of any submitted correspondence. All letters must be typed and submitted directly to: news@wanderer.com.