On Brookline

Archie has filed Part II in his series on The Town of Brookline’s rather poor attempt at a Whistleblower Policy.  In this installment, he can’t find evidence that the Town has such a policy…and then he has to file a public records request to see what’s been done around establishing one.

Click here to read Part II in the series. 

I recall being at a Selectman’s meeting where former Selectman Michael Sher was pushing for a hotline where municipal employees could call and make anonymous reports of waste and fraud.  This idea came out of revelations (first reported by your publisher) that the Town’s DPW employees were selling scrap metal for a “flower fund” (read: slush fund).

After going on a bit during the meeting, current Selectman Michael Merrill turned to Sher and said, “I’m tired of listening to you telling us that we can’t do anything right.”

That was a seminal moment.  Note the use of the pronoun “we” in Merrill’s statement.  Here was a Brookline Selectmen, elected by residents to oversee the use of town resources, taking offense to another selectman’s claim that we need to rein things in.  It was clear to me that Merrill views criticism of a town department as criticism of the Board.

It’s as if he graduated from the Kenneth Lay School of Management.

How then can we possibly trust the Brookline Selectmen to protect the taxpayer’s interests through an effective whistleblower policy?

It’s becoming clear that we can’t.