Sunday Photo-'Toons 1.27

Ken O’Brien

Sunday Photo-‘Toons 1.9

Ken O’Brien

Well, town elections are only a little over a week away 

Just as spring is marked by the blooming of flowers, so this season sees campaign signs sprouting all over the local landscape.

In the spirit of environmental preservation, The O’Zone confines its campaigning to cyberspace.

With that proviso, let’s season your Sunday breakfast or brunch with our unique mixture of cynicism and sass.

Respect

Ken O'Brien

During her remarks at the start of December 19th's town council meeting, the council chair said:

"...we [the town council] represent the entire community, you are not, the people sitting here in the audience, are not the entire community. You are part of the community, and as we are trying to be respectful of you, we require, expect and demand that you be respectful of us as well."

You've got to love the dichotomy of the parallelism in this statement.

The chair is saying. "... we are trying to be respectful of you".

To quote the words of that interstellar sage, Yoda, "Do or do not... there is no try.”

Decorum?

Ken O'Brien

Southbridge Town Council Rule 19a. says:

"Councilors Forum will be an agenda item on each regularly scheduled Town Council meeting. The purpose of Councilors' Forum is to conduct Council business."

At December 19th's council meeting the council chair began by lecturing the assembled citizenry of her intention to see that proper decorum would be maintained during meetings. Any interruptions by catcalls or applause would result in removal of the offenders from the hall.

As a less than subtle punctuation to this admonition, one only had to notice the presence of four police officers in the council chambers.

Apparently, however, adherence to proper decorum is more a function of how favorably your conduct is viewed by the chair rather than by its actual propriety.

Snark Trumps Smart Again

Ken O'Brien

At last night's meeting the town council chairman once again demonstrated her ignorance of procedure.

In a none-too-veiled reference to the previous chairman Steve Lazo she remarked that unlike the case of the charter review committee she was not naming the chairman of the bylaw review committee. Rather, she would allow the committee to elect its own chairman.

Apparently she has forgotten that the town council rules provide that, unless otherwise stated, the council's conduct shall be governed by Robert's Rules of Order.

Southbridge Town Council Reorganizes

Kenneth M. O’Brien

At its first meeting following the June Town Elections the Southbridge Town Council elected its leadership for the coming year.

Councilor Catherine Nikolla was elected Chairman of the Council.

Councilor Denise Clemence was elected Vice-Chairman of the Council.

As my only comment on this outcome, allow me to offer my proposal for the Town's new promotional campaign going forward.

PUBLIC SAFETY OR PUBLIC SNAFU?

Kenneth M. O’Brien

Recently there has been a lot of controversy on this site regarding the Southbridge Police Department.

The night of the recent Southbridge Town Election the wife of the police chief appeared on this blog and ridiculed critics of her husband in light of the election results (the second comment).

What was notable was that, as others have commented, there was no attempt to answer or deny the questions that were raised by such prior posts as “Ain’t That A Crime”, or “Liquorboarding The Lazos”.

The Obama Town Council

James J. “Joe” Marino
Guest Contributor

Why are our taxes the highest in the area and our sewer and water rates out of sight? The answer is simple. We have a liberal council with the mind set of Barack Obama , just keep spending and spending our tax dollars. We have a town manager who hasn’t seen a tax he doesn’t like and a town council who goes along to get along to take care of their friends and relatives. We have a council with no backbone to make cuts and who are only thinking of themselves to get reelected.

Barack Obama forgave a billion dollar loan to his Muslim friends and we who are on social security can’t even get a pay raise. If we can’t get a pay raise why is the town council giving out pay raises and ridiculous contracts?

The Sleaze Factor In Southbridge Politics

Kenneth M. O’Brien

It would be nice if politics were transparent.

In reality, we all know that it is not.

But, when there is an organized effort at deceptive rumor-mongering, then it deserves to be exposed.

Regrettably, for reasons that I have addressed previously, that is unlikely to happen locally.

Anybody who has not been living under a rock in Southbridge for the last five years knows that there is a clear division that is represented on the town council.

In my experience, one of these groups has acted in a concerted manner. Increasingly, that group has also acted in a manner that, in my opinion, is both deceptive and unscrupulous.

The other group reminds me of nothing more than the famous words of Will Rogers. “I’m not a member of an organized political party. I’m a Democrat.” That is not to say that members of this group are all Democrats. They are in fact split 50/50 between registered Democrats and Republicans.