82. Town meeting, May, 2016
It is perhaps hard for those of you who live in the “outside” world, with your paved roads and superstores to imagine our small town of Hancock, ME. While Hancock is officially a town, “village” would be more appropriate. There are 2,394 of us — 80 per square mile. We are 96.6% white. I suspect French Canadians are counted as the other 3.4%. (When Susan and I arrived in Maine in 1969 it was not uncommon to see signs in store windows proclaiming, “French Canadians — sometimes ‘Canucks’ — not served here”.)
The median income for a Hancock household is $32,778 earned by hard-working, generally impoverished, survivalists who pull lobster traps, cut pulpwood, dig clams, and do other hard manual labor to make ends not-quite-meet. Our “downtown” consists of a (great) general store, a Congregationalist church and a post office. Farther afield are an auto repair garage, three restaurants and a garden shop.
But enough about our village. I deploy keyboard to write about its annual town meeting that I attended Tuesday night — primarily in the role of anthropologist. New England town meetings are a “legendary”, part of the mythology of our country, a vestigial expression of an earlier, simpler time.
There is a genuine, yet friendly, divide between “Pointers” and “real citizens”. Outsiders like myself are looked upon with some suspicion having been here less than the accepted standard of 20 years for true residency. Further suspicion is prompted by our being from “the Point” where the “rich” people live, squatting on their coastal properties. Finally, we “Pointers” tend to talk funny and to be “over-educated” to a fault.
Fair enough. It is their town; I just live here.
Hancock held its town meeting in the gym of our elementary school. (After grade eight our students go off to the big city of Ellsworth, and its consolidated high school.)
Outside the gym I was greeted by a democratic candidate for our legislature (with whom I had previously met) and a Democratic candidate for the state senate whom I did not know.
Once inside, I was asked to check-in at a table near the door where my residency and voting status were ascertained and where I picked up materials for the meeting: the town’s annual report, voting cards — lest written ballots be requested — and a summary of the proposed Town Budget totaling $4,274,057.57 — an increase of 2.37%.
Most importantly, we received the “Town Warrant” which is the list of issues to be addressed and resolved by the citizens of Hancock.
78 items were set forth. Some were mundane: e.g. “To see if the Town will vote that orders of the Municipal Officers for the closing of roads in winter … shall be final determinations of said closings.”, [There must be a story there.], or “To see if the Town will vote to allocate $3,500 from Excise for Street Lights.”
Others were more consequential: e.g. “To see what sum the school administrative unit will be authorized to expend for Regular Instruction. Recommend. $2,265,087.24. (The Board of Selectmen, School Committee and the Budget Committee recommend approval.)”
To set the scene: seats were arranged across the small basketball court, over the “Hornets” insignia. (Note the alliteration: Hancock Hornets.) On the wall above the stage were the three stanzas of the school song. It begins,
”This school is our school,
This school is your school…..
and ends,
“This school was made for you and me.” (Woody Guthrie lives!)
Bleachers were extended (for some who craved a superior, i.e. more elevated, view). The seating could have accommodated @250; there were in fact only about 75 of us.
Participants were uniformly neatly dressed, typically jeans and a jacket or sweater.
The moderator, dressed in a dark suit and tie stood on the small, presidium stage. Below on the floor to his right was a table at which our four Selectmen (all men) sat.
The meeting began on time with a presentation of the “Citizen of the Year” award to Eunice Phillips. The citation was read (and probably written) by our local author, Sandy Pippen.
By far the most controversial and perplexing of the issues to be addressed was warrant #76: “To see what action the Town will take to meet the Town’s long term obligations with respect to trash disposal….”
This is a complex issue that asks whether we wish to remain with our current solid waste disposal system (PERK), tipping fee $84 per ton, or switch to a new plant (MRC), still under construction, that utilizes a new technology and promises lower tipping fees of $70. This same choice faces 187 other communities in Maine.
With tax credits and other variables the actual cost per ton comes out to about the same amount. What, then is the question? In short: “tried and true” (a New England favorite) versus “never been done before”, (the sort of thing that loonies from Massachusetts might attempt).
It was not difficult to maintain decorum; indeed, I suspect it might have been more difficult to disrupt it. People stood to ask their questions. Those questions were generally knowledgeable and well thought out; e.g. “If we switch to MRC what will happen to the PERK plant?” After receiving an equally thoughtful answer, perhaps from representatives of both PERK and MRC, they would say, “Thank you” and be seated.
There was one “fly in the ointment”: an elderly man — of course, most of us were elderly — whose question rambled into autobiography. I feared for a moment he might begin discussing recent bowel movements. But the audience was polite and patient bearing his rambling with good grace. Eventually the moderator asked if he had a question. He responded that, in fact, he had four…. More patience.
Life dispensing its usual surprises, I went to learn about “them” and learned instead about myself. I am much more comfortable with the new than my neighbors. An academically endorsed, albeit untried, process such as the anaerobic digestion suits me fine. My neighbors, less so.
I was also reminded of how few real decisions I actually had to make as an executive. Most were made for me by excellent colleagues armed with cogent data. My Hancock neighbors actually have to decide this matter and many of them have done their homework accordingly. The decisions I did make were largely instinctual, rarely (philosophy-to-the-contrary-not-withstanding) the result of logical argument. My neighbor’s instincts in this matter turned out to be different from my own. Fair enough. I have no reason to believe my judgment in the matter to be better than theirs.
I left with two impressions:
_ I understood why our “founding fathers” had reservations about democracy.
_ Just as I do not share my neighbors view about waste disposal, so, too, I do not share Washington, Adams and Jefferson’s views of the dangers of democracy.
The village will survive. It is in good hands.
