On Brookline

“In a free country, every power is dangerous which is not bound
up by general rules.” –Thomas Jefferson

Those who watch football know that often there is a moment when a running back makes a spectacular break from the pack and heads long distance into the end zone…only to have the touchdown called back on a holding penalty. As the team returns to the huddle, there’s no recrimination or angst over the lost score.

Why so?

Well, on replay we see that were it not for the holding, the running back would have been tackled at the line. The rules exist to make the sport competitive, and to ensure that the contest is fair by evening out advantages of size and might. And often, a spectacular play is a disadvantage rooted in size and might.

This is the only way I can make sense of the overwhelming approval of last Tuesday’s $6.2 million override ballot in Brookline. All indicators (especially economic) would suggest a vote closer than the final result. But even a World Languages program (which is only half-funded and will likely be killed after a year by the school committee) was decisively approved at the polls.

The Bush League.

In many ways, the override campaign conducted by town government through its proxy group “Yes for Brookline” is akin to the march to Iraq by the Bush Administration. Bush created the White House Iraq Group. The Brookline Selectmen ginned up an Override Study Committee. Donald Rumsfeld organized a military psy ops operation to bamboozle the press. Town government operated a PR campaign to stoke fears among the electorate.

The message in both instances was this — be afraid, be very afraid.

As the mailer above shows, the tactic of the pro-override group was to create irrational fear over lost property values, child dullards and unsafe streets, should the override fail. These town officials [see the list of donors to Yes for Brookline] raised $35 thousand ($6.00 per vote) to spread the hysteria. And, I suspect, outspent the forces-of-no by 17, 500 to one.

Once again, we see that those in town government will say anything. How could 40 school department employees be served layoff notices, as says the mailer above (sent the Saturday before the vote), when Superintendent Bill Lupini’s “non-override spending plan” recommended only 15 cuts in headcount? Inside the mailer, “Yes for Brookline” says that a vote for question 1B will “restore World Languages” to the budget. But the $800 thousand is new spending. How is it being restored?

Brookline Government’s Proxy Campaign.

The override vote can be explained as a time when Brookline town government set out to influence an election in a way that sets a new low for ethical conduct among our local institutions. Don’t forget, these are the institutions (and people) which will directly benefit (through salary increases) now that the override has passed.

The atrocities began as word circulated of pollsters calling voters to test a variety of scenarios for an override voting instrument. The poll was conducted before the selectmen had proposed language for the ballot, and those who received calls say they saw a lot of what they were asked in the eventual ballot. Two weeks ago, we learned that it was “Yes for Brookline” who commissioned the survey (at $4 thousand).

Now, it just so happens that Selectman Betsy DeWitt (left) is also chair of “Yes for Brookline”; and it was DeWitt who introduced the language that the Brookline Selectmen ultimately approved for the ballot.

The issue that results is this: Was the ballot put before voters produced to address the financial needs of the municipality, or to meet the political needs of town government? We can only know by looking at the survey and its results.

I’ve asked DeWitt on several occasions if she would release the survey, and she won’t. So, I’ve asked the State’s Public Records Division to intervene [read the letter here].

The Schools Get Political.

A tenet central to democracy is that is only allowed through free and fair elections. Parcel to that is the absence of government interference in these elections. Alas, on May 6th, Brookline crossed a dangerous threshold. Not just because we let the people who will benefit from the vote commandeer the election, but because our system is designed to protect the individual from the coercive influence of groups.

I started hearing of school-based electioneering a few weeks before the election. It seemed that kids were coming home with pro-override materials (like this from the Lawrence School PTO) and banners began to appear outside school buildings (like the one to the right) urging the school community to vote. There were numerous override information sessions for parents at schools, with school officials as presenters.

It was clear that the school administration and parent groups (PTOs) were engaged in a viewpoint specific campaign, both in and out of these public facilities. This is evidenced by an e-mail distributed after the vote by Brookline High School Headmaster Bob Weintraub [note the reference to "BHS override captains" in the e-mail].

The reason we allow a PTO to solicit funds in a public school is because it is a non-political/non-advocacy organization. The minute they begin expending those funds to influence an election they enter the realm of political advocacy. As such, they are required to disclose those expenditures through campaign finance reports.

On Friday, I sent a letter to the Massachusetts Office of Campaign and Political Finance asking them to investigate the use of public resources to influence a local election [read the letter here]. And to insist that the PTOs disclose the expenditures made to influence the ballot questions.

Oh sure, the school-based campaign was a clever one. The banners, for instance, never really said how to vote, they just encouraged the school community to vote (so says Schools Superintendent Bill Lupini). Whether that is legal under the campaign finance laws is yet to be determined, nonetheless it is unethical. All of this made worse because it involves institutions of learning, that I presume, instruct students that the ends don’t always justify the means. Or do they?

Ask yourself what the response would be were another group to adorn school fences with signs that read: “Brookline Conservatives Vote on May 6th”. What if pro-life parents wanted to conduct a raffle at the Heath School? It’s just parents raising money, after all.

This apparent selectivity in views is the most chilling revelation of all. It is the slippery slope that, at best, divides a community and, at worst, turns the majority against the minority.

When those with the reins of government abandon their constitutional authority in favor of their political imperatives, they commit an act of violence on our body politic. Our town government not only allowed the abuses within our public institutions, they encouraged them. And we’ll carry those bruises with us for a long time.

As the remarkable Taylor Branch wrote, on the legacy of Martin Luther King, in a recent New York Times column:

“Our nation is a great cathedral of votes — votes not only for congress and for president, but also votes on Supreme Court decisions and countless juries. Votes govern the boards of great corporations and tiny charities alike. Visibly and invisibly, everything runs on votes. And every vote is nothing but a piece of non-violence.”

What does it say about a town government that would go to such lengths, create such distortions and tamper with our institutions to prevail on a ballot question that will provide them only 2.5% more revenue to their $200 million budget? What will it say when they won’t abide by the voter’s wishes (as they surely won’t on World Languages in coming years) and begin applying override funds to purposes other than those voted upon?

What responsibility will they take for creating hysteria over measures (like “drastic cuts”) when they are faced with having to make them next year, or even this year?

It says that they’re willing to win at any cost. Even if it means that they have to hold people down in the process.

What will they do next? And who will be there to call them back? Time to get out of the stands and on to the field.

Update: I’ve heard from the more visible override opponents who tell me they were never invited to the override sessions held for parents at the public schools. (I’m not sure that they have to be invited as a matter of campaign law.) While it may make for good politics to present one view, it’s a lousy academic. Says a lot that our so-called education officials wouldn’t insist that the other side be invited in order that people might be fully informed before their vote.

Makes you wonder what else is going on…

Update (2): If you haven’t read the e-mail linked to above (and here) from Brookline High School Headmaster Bob Weintraub, you really should. According to Weintraub, only those who voted for the override were thoughtful, selfless and care about the community. Those of us who think $70 million is enough to run a school system without having to put the elderly out of their homes are, in the binary, selfish, stupid and have a distorted view of community that says we all need to sacrifice in these challenging times.

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Reader WD tells us that institutional abuse can be tacky, very tacky indeed:

Jim,

I also found it disturbing that the Brookline schools, which act as polling places, were adorned with banners imparting not-so-ambiguous political messages. I’m registered in Precinct 13 and vote at the Runkle School. I couldn’t help noticing the yellow banner above the entrance with the words “THANK$ FOR YOUR $UPPORT” printed on it in bold, black letters. I thought Runkle should be ashamed of itself, but I wasn’t surprised.