Our Democracy Is In Trouble

To the Editor:

The selectmen continue to insist that voters approved extensive economic development in the entry plaza and the core campus when they voted to buy Fairfield Hills (FFH) at the June 6, 2001, town meeting. They claim the wording of Section 1 of the Bonding Resolution, “The sum of $21,850,000 is appropriated for various public improvement projects, all to be completed in substantial accordance with a report entitled ‘Fairfield Hills Campus Proposed Work Program and Cost Estimates’” dated May 21, 2001. The selectmen also claim this four-page report was distributed to the 700 plus attendees.

On March 11 I studied the minutes of the town meeting and the May 23 and 29, 2001, minutes of the Legislative Council. With staff help, I found the report in question as an attachment to the minutes of the Legislative Council of May 23. No attachments were found for the minutes of the town meeting of June 6, 2001, because there were none. How did the selectmen find one in June? Everyone who attended the town meeting knows we were not given anything more than a paper ballot.

The report in question has been given to the council for action on May 23, 2001. The council minutes show that it neither accepted nor rejected the report. It did, however, “…move to instruct bond counsel…to draft a bonding resolution language using the parameters set out in Phase I, Phase II and Phase III of…” the report (page four). The phases listed estimated costs of water rights, environmental insurance, purchase property, playing fields, and $200,000 for a master plan. (As of May 15, 2003, the town has paid HMA Consultants $286,435.08 for the selectmen’s master plan.)

On May 29 the council members unanimously supported the bonding resolution unaware that two years later our leaders would use the phrase “substantial accordance” to justify their controversial master plan that calls for 254,000 square feet of commercial space in the entry plaza and core campus. I attended the March 17 Board of Selectmen meeting and respectfully called to their attention these errors on page one of the master plan and asked that they be corrected. They were hostile and have chosen to make no corrections. Did the Power Point presentation by the hired consultant mean your yes vote to buy FFH also meant a yes for his master plan? If such decisions were already made in 2001, why have we paid for a master plan?

More grievance, however, than this argument, is the recent “end-run” around the council and the people that the selectmen made when they arranged to have introduced into the state legislature a bill to authorize the creation of a six-member authority, all to be appointed by the selectmen, to govern FFH and to carry out their master plan. The council was never given the opportunity to discuss the duties, powers, appointment procedures, bonding power, and funding for such an authority.

Our democracy is in trouble.

Ruby K. Johnson

16 Chestnut Hill, Sandy Hook   June 10, 2003