Easy To Be Hard

Ken O’Brien

As I was watching the early part of the Southbridge Town Council Meeting last Monday night I was genuinely excited.

There were two reasons for this.

First, and perhaps foremost, was that I was finally going to be able to say something positive about our town’s Economic Development and Planning Department. Followers of The O’Zone know that I have been a relentless critic of this office and its Director. But, really, they make it so easy to be hard. Most recently I pointed out their failure to have the Southbridge Technology and Environment Park mentioned in a web-site devoted to promoting business-ready sites in Massachusetts.

Pizza, Palaver and Planning In Southbridge

Ken O’Brien

Todays’ Southbridge News featured a front page article titled “Master plan generates interest, ideas.”

Mark Ashton wrote, “Maybe the timing was finally right, or the stars were properly aligned for a change.
Maybe it was a matter of putting enough information into enough hands in enough offices and organizations that their group efforts could no longer be ignored.
Maybe it was just the free pizza.
Whatever the reason, or reasons, last Wednesday’s Master Plan Visioning Meeting in Southbridge Town Hall drew….nearly a hundred people…”

Sunday Photo-'Toons 1.33

Ken O'Brien

Planning Piffle

Ken O’Brien

Cassandra Acly

Back in January The O’Zone addressed the vapid nonsense of the hyping of the most recently announced round of Master Planning for the town.

The article cited references to the last round of this exercise in mental masturbation financed by state grants (i.e. tax dollars) to justify the continued existence of the town’s Planning and Economic Development Department that has grown from one person 12 years ago to four now.

On Saturday Go Local Worcester ran an article titled “The Fastest Growing Communities in Central Mass”. 

Sunday Photo ‘Toons: The Next Generation

Ken O’Brien

Well, it’s Sunday again.

Once again I’ve taken up the challenge of trying to provide a little levity regarding the dire madness in which we are immersed. Heaven knows, the pressure is becoming intense.

I hope you won’t find the effort too disheartening.

UPDATE: Is Southbridge Being Hyde-Jacked?

Updated at 8 am, 3/19: Hyde spokesman admits “some work” going to Canada.

Ken O’Brien

Nine days ago The O’Zone published an article titled, “Is Hyde Mfg. Moving Jobs To Canada?”

Yesterday The O’Zone published a follow-up piece titled, “Is Southbridge Being Hyde-Jacked?”

In both articles I was quite straightforward in saying that what I was reporting was based on anecdotal information from current and former employees of the company.

In addition I indicated that, rather than having any animosity toward the firm, it had a warm place in my heart.

However, the company is a foundation of what remains of employment in Southbridge as well as its industrial base.

So, given these factors, I was seeking any kind of denial that what I had been told and was therefore reporting lacked substance.

In what is now bordering on a week and a half there has been no such denial. 

Hidden Camera Captures Southbridge Economic Development and Planning Department at Work

Southbridge’s Rogue Regime

Ken O’Brien

John Adams famously observed that a republic is “a government of laws, and not of men.”

This view was subsequently enshrined in the Massachusetts Constitution of 1780. Article XXX of the Bill of Rights states:

“Art. XXX. In the government of this commonwealth, the legislative department shall never exercise the executive and judicial powers, or either of them; the executive shall never exercise the legislative and judicial powers, or either of them; the judicial shall never exercise the legislative and executive powers, or either of them; to the end it may be a government of laws, and not of men. “

At January 23^rd’s meeting of the Southbridge Town Council, the ruling majority threw this concept out the window