The Republicrat takes as its premise that our two main parties are different sides of the same coin:
Often the usage of “Republicrat” expresses the sentiment of “ordinary citizens” who see all politicians as serving the same special interests and make little distinction between the two parties.Wow! How often have you felt that way lately? The Republicrat is off to a flying start with several posts in just the last 3 days. Welcome!
The Whitestown Buzz so far has only one post from the 13th . . . but it is a very intriguing one. Seems that the Town Board intends to pass a law that will allow non-residents of the Town to serve on the Town Planning Board and the ZBA, as long as they own property in the Town and reside in either Oneida County "or an adjoining county within the State of New York."
That certainly is curious wording! I wonder what developers the Town insiders plan on putting on the Planning Board and ZBA?
We'll have to follow the Whitestown Buzz to find out.
5 comments:
An incredable insult to the actual taxpaying residents of the Town of Whitestown.
Are the residents really that dumb that they would allow a law like this to pass?
Oh No - If they do this they'll be setting up a regional planning board. One with members who don't live in the municipality. You know, one like we'd get if the towns and villages in the area were consolidated.
And, you think consolidation is a good idea?
A "regional planning board" is a BAD idea if it does not come with a true merger of local government, because then the board would effectively pick the "winners" and the "losers" within the region, making some people pay the bills while giving the benefits to others. Piecemeal "consolidation" does not work.
With a true merger, everyone shares the decisions, the costs, and the benefits.
People will actually have MORE control over their government with a "right sized" merger/consolidation than they do now.
I was idealistic when I first moved to Whitestown 10 years ago.But I have gotten used to these types of "good old boy network" dealings as part of the problem so common with most upstate NY communities. A Good Example in Whitestown: Shannon spent thousands of dollars clearing acres of park-land to build a "proposed" new municipal building. The clearing and spending continues as they now build a "doggie & ATV park" having purchased the old St Annes building for their use.
No one seems to know what will be built at the park, but clearing and planting of new trees continue at tax-payer expense. The fact is that the good old boy network in Whitestown is just as pervasive as in New Hartford or Utica. They look after their own and stick it to the taxpayer when they can get away with it...unless the OD Editorials or blogs like this one weigh public opinion against them enough to get them to back-off. The free cell phone for board member issue a few years ago was another good example... The codes department mess is another one... The lack of a viable community plan for growth, or lack of...consolidation of services plan...the Sullivan controversies...The Shannon controversies...the town clerk controversies...the down-trodden organic-horse farmer...retaining the tazer pointing ex-NYM police chief on our force...
Welcome to another dysfunctional and outdated upstate New York community.Maybe the new Whitestown Buzz will help. Good luck, as the other unfortunate aspect of living in upstate NY is the apathy,ignorance, and lack of focus of most of the community which allows much of this to go on un-checked until the window finally closes. Keep up the good work "Strkeslip", I'm glad someone still reads and cares about what goes on in the community enough to try to effect change.
Mr. SmallBizMan
I hope in some small way, you have stepped forward
and made some of your opinions known to the town
board. We can complain all we want, but our strength
is in numbers. They can be defeated, if we hang to
gether. Come to meetings, write letters to the editor,
to the town council themselves. They truly are cowards when confronted by a crowd. I think apathy
resides in us all, if we let it. Stand up and fight!
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