BY STEVEN JUPITER
BRANDON—This past week, I attended the annual Brandon Fire District meeting, along with dozens of other folks from town. It was my first time attending this particular meeting since I moved to Brandon in 2016. It was also the first time for several other people in the room, even for some who’ve lived here for decades.
I attended this year because there was a particular issue on the agenda that warranted attention from The Reporter (see Fire District article in this issue). Many of the other folks in attendance were there primarily to discuss that same issue. And many ended up frustrated that this meeting was the first time they’d become aware of the details of it.
“We hold open meetings. Our minutes are available to the public,” said Bill Moore, chair of the Prudential Board, gently admonishing those who claimed they’d been unaware of specific decisions the board had recently made. And he’s right: these meetings, like those of the selectboard and school boards, are public. The agendas are posted ahead of time. Their minutes are generally available online within days. Many of them are recorded and uploaded to PEGTV. Anyone who wants to stay on top of what’s happening in town is free to attend any of these meetings or access the minutes and recordings.
Yet most of us don’t. At least not until there’s a particular issue that irks us. But often, by the time we’ve been irked, the decisions have been made and can’t be undone, leaving us feeling angry and powerless.
We all lead busy lives. We have jobs, kids, and other obligations. It’s hard to make time to attend meetings on weeknights when so many other things compete for our energy. It’s also true that many of these meetings are boring, even for the people running them. It can be tough to stay focused on dull material at the end of a long day, especially in winter months when most meetings start after dark.
But, if we don’t attend, we have no one to blame but ourselves when these various boards carry out their duties without our observation and input. And even when the paper shows up, all we can do is report what has already happened. Citizens have to be involved in order to have a say.
There are, of course, people who do regularly attend meetings and speak up and try to influence outcomes, as is their right as members of the community. But most of us wait until something comes to a head to start asking questions, and one of the most common is “Why haven’t I heard about this before?” The answer is often simply that we weren’t paying attention.
I want to make clear that I am absolutely not accusing any board of any wrongdoing. We’re lucky to live in a community where people volunteer for these positions in order to make a positive difference. But we won’t agree with every decision they make, and sometimes we might even vehemently oppose some course of action that a well-meaning board has approved. If we want influence, we have to show up.
In a few short weeks, we will have Town Meeting, a wonderful tradition that hearkens back to colonial times. Where I grew up in New York, such meetings did not take place. It’s a truly special thing to be able to gather with your neighbors to plot the course of your town, to voice your opinions, to demand explanations from town officials. That sense of local democracy is one of the things I love about living in New England.
But Town Meeting isn’t enough. We need to voice our opinions throughout the year, even when we’re tired. Even when it’s boring. We need to ask questions. We need to demand information. Not to be gadflies but rather to have a say in how our town is run and how our tax dollars are spent.
We need to show up.
