On Brookline

Cause when the calm comes down
I take the truck on into town and buy whatever we can’t seem to grow
I work these hands to bleed cause I got mouths to feed
And I got 15 dollars hid above the stove - Ryan Adams

There’s a story my mother tells of being one of twelve children living through the Great Depression and those times when—as they were gathered at the table eating potato fricassee—there would be a rap at the door.  It was the parish priest collecting from the flock in order to, “heat the church.”  Each time, my grandmother would dutifully give over $5 and receive a blessing in return.

The church was heated while they shivered in the cold.  Some blessing.

I suppose I’m naive to think, even today, that those who depend on the resources of others might be embarrassed to put their hand out in a time of need.  I once took seriously the idea that, “the last shall be first.” Not any more.

Let’s face it — our current political culture exists to keep the first in line first, and the last in line last.

News out of the University of Massachusetts this week is that Bay State residents are about to be pummeled by soaring energy costs.  Fears abound that elderly, low income and even wage earners in the middle tier will choose between heat and food.  Or worse, they’ll turn to dangerous alternative heating methods which will keep public safety personnel hopping.

In the Globe story on the energy costs explosion, we read:

“It’s a tremendous amount of money out of people’s pockets,” said Robin Sherman, the report’s lead author. “People can cut back on [heating] to some extent if it gets too expensive, but there’s obviously a floor beyond which they can’t go to keep themselves in their homes without freezing.”

There’s a floor alright, but good luck trying to convince your neighbors in town government of that fact.  Because when it comes to taking money out of people’s pocket, to them there is no ceiling.

Sacrifice Among the Coffee Klatch.

Folks, back in May a group of people (the vocal minority as they call us at town hall) warned that we are the tipping point when it comes to the cost of living in Brookline.  We said that elderly and lower income residents can’t afford the additional tax burden of a Proposition 2.5 override.  Town government said it amounts to giving up a “cup of Starbucks coffee a day.”

Town government’s proxy group “Yes for Brookline” lied about the need for an override and scared parents into imposing this additional burden on property owners and rent payers.  The appeal was absolutely Rovian — kids in Brookline are going to lose teachers and aides (but the $6 million in administrative salaries was safe) unless they impose additional taxes on their neighbors.

In reality, town government needs additional revenue to fund useless positions and service contracts thrown at town hall cronies.  They have so poorly managed Brookline’s finances that there is as much debt on the books as annual property tax revenue.

Indeed, the cost of heating public buildings was an additional justification for the tax increase.  It occurred to only a couple of people on the Selectmen’s sham override study committee that if the cost of heating is going up for town government, it must be going up for everyone else.  These two dissidents even thought rising energy costs, among other things, made a tax increase unaffordable to residents.  But the orthodoxy that town government comes first prevailed, and any questions of affordability were shot down (using bogus data) by Town Administrator Richard Kelliher.

The Age of Regret.

It seems to me that we live in the Age of Regret, where our public policy is given over to impulsive acts that have people in power saying, “If I’d only known, I’d have done it differently.”  I wouldn’t have voted to invade Iraq.  I would have listened to those warning of a catastrophic housing bubble.  I wouldn’t have imposed this burden on my neighbors.

It’s as if all manner of malfeasance is absolved by a flippant “who knew?”

When it comes to Brookline town government, this site said that a town hall renovation at this time was not a good idea.  We said that the Town should make cuts in payroll and benefits as a gesture of mutual sacrifice.  But those in administration, schools and elective office said there’s no need to worry.

They rapped on the door and got their $5.  The result is that those on the margin will likely suffer a painful winter.

But unlike the lowest of life forms (the Washington pol), our local leadership won’t play the regret card.  That would require seeing past the reach of your arm.  And noticing what’s going on in back of the person handing you the fiver.

Awareness is the prerequisite to being able to say, “Who knew?”  Better to stay clueless, with no regrets.