Defining "Elective Office"

Barnstable Town Charter:
Section 3-2 Eligibility
"Any voter shall be eligible to hold any elective town office provided that, no person shall simultaneously hold more than one elective town office."

Dictionary.com
e·lec·tive -adjective
1. pertaining to the principle of electing to an office, position, etc.

of·fice –noun
5. a position of duty, trust, or authority, esp. in the government, a corporation, a society, or the like: She was elected twice to the office of president.


There has been a lot of discussion on Greg Milne's attempts to serve on both the Town Council AND the Charter Commission. While some people see the obvious clarity in our town's charter - that you cannot be elected to two town wide positions - others try to play games with words.

The town charter says ONE "elective town office" per person (at a time). It is obvious that "town" means town-wide, and courtesy of dictionary.com we see that "elective" refers to an election and "office" is a "position of duty, trust or authority, esp. in the government". I think it would be VERY fair to define the Charter Commission as a "town-wide elected position of authority in and/or over the government".

Serving in both positions would not only be a violation of the town charter, but it would also be a direct conflict of interest. Charter Commissioner Milne would have the ability to directly impact his position as Town Councilor Milne. Whether sabotaging the effort to maintain his Council seat, determining a number of Councilors that makes his reelection easier, changing the term limits for Town Councilors, or a whole host of other options, Milne could have direct access to change the power a Councilor has (albeit subject to voter approval).

Frankly, this issue is only brought up by the town's costly vocal minority. By playing with words and saying that "other towns do it, so it must be OK", they have tried to place their friend onto a board that they could not be voted onto. Enough is enough with them and the Milne situation. It's time we stopped listening to the advice of COGers - they are the same group who tried to force people to create an "elected" position out of thin air by signing their flawed and illegal Meeting of the Voters petition.

Open Meeting of the Voters - Correcting the Errors of the COGers

Next Tuesday - May 06, 2008 - There will be an "Open Meeting of the Voters" for Barnstable Residents at the Knight Auditorium in Barnstable High School Auditorium.

It is your responsibility to make it to this meeting if you can. The meeting will be open to ALL topics, though many of the COG persuasion will try to make it about their agenda. You need to be there to add common sense to the debates. Those who agree with the COGers (and are less satisfied with this town than most) are going to try to make this meeting into a roast of the Council. It is time to let the COGers know that they are the minority, albeit a very loud minority.

The fact is that the steam behind this "meeting" was started out with a COG agenda. They were able to gather 300 signatures to their petition to call a meeting. Now, I have practice getting signatures, and I could get 300 signatures in a day, just from people who want me to leave them alone. Anyway, when they turned their petition in, it was ruled invalid for a few reasons.

First, their petition contained language that "elected" a prominent COGer as the "Moderator" of the meeting. Two problems with that - You cannot VOTE for and "ELECTED" position by signing a petition. You must have an ELECTION that all voters can participate in and people can run for. Two - the Charter, which allows for the meeting, never even mentions any "Moderator" position. So their rigged "election" is a double phony.

Second, their petition contained language that would have given it subpoena power. In order to force someone to appear at an event (court, town meeting, governmental inquiry, etc...) you must have subpoena powers. This petition tried to use such powers to FORCE a specific list of people to attend, when a petition cannot have subpoena power, nor can the Town Council President. So, no one can force anyone to attend the meeting.

Third, some members of the COG meeting drive sought to limit attendance at the meeting to only those that signed their petition (and the people the wanted to FORCE to come). In my opinion, not only does such a measure break the Open Meeting Law (which the COGers have accused the Council of breaking in the past), it also would have unfairly restricted your right to government oversight and free speech. The Charter NEVER restricts who may attend an Open Meeting of the Voters.

Because of the highly illegal and unauthorized language contained in the COG petition for an Open Meeting, Town Attorney Ruth Weil correctly ruled that their petition was invalid. However, the Council, which has the ultimate say on whether or not an Open Meeting occurs, decided to hold one anyway. This meeting will have no limits on who may attend or what may be discussed. No one will be forced to attend (I know that at least one town official will not be attending), but I recommend that we send so many people over to that auditorium to shout down the COGers, that we have people flowing into the parking lot. Hope to see you there.

Barnstable Students Performing Better than Average in State Colleges

A major problem facing our educational system nationwide is the decreasing literacy of high school graduates. Many teenagers who have "graduated" high school simply cannot read, write or do arithmetic. Education's three "r's" are simply not being learned by a growing number of students.

Many people have suggested the following reasons as causes for this problem:

• Insufficient funding (highly unlikely considering the MASSIVE amount of money THROWN @ schools today)
• Underqualifed teachers (possible, but unlikely a major cause)
• Class sizes are too large (a favorite excuse, but shrinking class size does not necessarily equal better grades)
• Lack of student discipline (the fact that today's kids rarely listen to adults certainly plays a role)
• Lack of accountability in school district overview - simply put, parents/citizens aren't holding School Committees responsible for declining performance with increased funding (parental involvement is one of the most underrated factors in education)
• Not enough time being spent on basics (In my opinion, we spend too much time with art class, music class, Spanish, social studies, multicultural club, computer class, "health" class and other secondary classes in elementary & middle schools when many of these children can't read, write or do math, and they have no knowledge of American History.)
• "Passing" students who should be held back (We are not doing any favors to our children when we pass them because we don't want to "hurt their self-esteem", etc..., even though they failed the class. If they don't know it, they don't know it and they aren't going to learn it when they move on to more advanced material. This then handcuffs teachers who have to reteach what they learned last year or "dumb down" the class in an attempt to catch those students up, while the rest of the class learns little or nothing.)
• Too many cooks? (With federal regulations, state regulations, local regulations, regulations at individual schools, PTA, Teacher's Unions, etc..., it seems that everyone wants to determine school policies. Maybe having TOO much government oversight is a BAD thing.)
• Complacency & No Competition (In theory, Public Education allows for a utopia of learning for our children. Everyone has access and it is free. Because the vast majority of schools are public, the vast majority of the best teachers teach in them. Maybe that idea is not such a good idea. With no real competition to gage performance against, people simply assume that schools are doing the best job possible, and if they need a little more money in the budget, "it's for the children". The extra few dollars per person is not that much to bear (unless it's an override), and many people simply do not notice the massive amounts of money being spent on public education. In theory, communism is the perfect government utopia - but we know it doesn't work. Why can't we admit that the utopia of public education may not work either.)
• Costs going unnoticed (Did you know that Massachusetts State Law MANDATES that local school districts spend at least $10,000 per student per YEAR? Do we really need to spend THAT much money? Do we really need $50, $60, or $100 MILLION dollar schools? If someone told you to hand over $10,000 per child for their education, there is no way you would pay that much for the education without shopping around first. Why do we let our town simply pay itself $10,000 per KID? Because we don't pay it as a personal bill - we have the federal government chip in a little, the state gives us a little aid and less lottery money... and the rest is part of our property tax bill. But parents don't have to hand over that $10,000 per child, they have others pay for it... and a dollar apiece for 1000 people is a lot easier to swallow that $1000 for one person.)

ANYWAY, enough with my rant, and back to the main topic - High School students needing remedial work when entering college. I saw an article in the Boston Globe about this topic, and it led me to more research on the state website. I have included links to my major sources of info below.

According to a study just released by the state, 37% of high schoolers who graduated in 2005 and entered a public college (State College, State University or Community College) the following September were taking at least one remedial course in reading, writing or arithmetic. That is NOT good, because many of the normal, regular entry-level courses in these institutions are basically remedial courses - reintroduction to things students should have already learned - simple math and grammar classes.

However, Barnstable High (and Sturgis) students are outperforming the state average at 33% and 32%, respectively. To contrast, 100% of students at Springfield High, that's right 100%, enrolled in remedial classes. I glad that all Barnstable students are doing better than average, and while some bloggers in town have been overcritical of our schools, they are doing all right, but there is always room for improvement.

The study also included some other interesting information about other key statistics relating to the transition from high school to college. Barnstable students outperformed the state averages in SAT scores. While less students from Barnstable than the state average attended public schools, they were more likely to stay for a second year. Sturgis students had the same first year of college GPA as the state average (2.8) and Barnstable High students were just below at a 2.7. However, both Sturgis and Barnstable High Students took about three more credits than the state average. So, their relatively average GPAs came with more classwork.

While this is relatively good news about the educations received in our town, the fact is that the education in the entire country is breaking or is already broken. The education that students receive today pales in comparison to what was received 10, 20, 30, 40 or more years ago. What are the problems and what are we going to do to fix it?


Boston Globe - "Many Mass. graduates unprepared in college"
Massachusetts School-to-College Report: Class of 2005 Summary Data.pdf
Barnstable High - School-to-College Report: Class of 2005.pdf
Sturgis Charter Public School - School-to-College Report: Class of 2005.pdf

(ALL STATISTICS FOR CLASS OF 2005 HIGH SCHOOLERS ENROLLING IN A PUBLIC COLLEGE IN MASSACHUSETTS)

Barnstable Average SAT Scores:
Math: 547
Verbal: 554
Combined: 1101

Sturgis Average SAT Scores:
Math: 546
Verbal: 574
Combined: 1120

State Average SAT Scores:
Math: 536
Verbal: 526
Combined: 1061

Overall % of Students enrolled in remedial college classes Fall 2005
Barnstable: 33%
Sturgis: 32%
State: 37%
Springfield High School: 100%

% of Students who enrolled for Second year of state college in Fall 2006
Barnstable: 85%
Sturgis: 88%
State: 81%

Average First Year College GPA
Barnstable: 2.7
Sturgis: 2.8
State: 2.8

Average First Year Credits
Barnstable: 29
Sturgis: 29.2
State: 26.5

Vision for Hyannis?

Main Street Hyannis has seemingly finished the improvements that it began years ago with the repaving of the commercial boulevard. Now with lighting finally installed and operational, the work that was set out to be completed is done.

We have been left with the telephone poles still up on the street, even though we have been asking for them to be removed for decades. The water pipes need replacing. The 500 Block is still a mess, though there might be some hope with a renovation plan underway for that parcel. We have a gigantic Transportation Center with hundreds (or thousands) of NEVER used parking spaces, and the P&B garage still across the street harassing traffic. The traffic flow on Main Street still makes zero sense. I could keep going, but we all know the problems.

I have a few questions - What is the long-term plan for Downtown Hyannis revitalization? Who has the vision and is working on it?

What is the long-term plan for capital asset improvement, replacement & repair for the Hyannis Water District? Who has THAT vision and is working on it? Do we have the necessary infrastructure to encourage REAL growth?

I don't want to know tiny little details about small projects - I want "big picture" info. I've seen the "Comprehensive Plan" on the town website, but that is not a VISION. At best, it is an uninspired short term plan, with plenty of "goals" and "actions" that are just vague enough that they have no meaning whatsoever. We need a plan that tells us what we are going to do and WHY.

Right now, interest rates are plummeting and we have a AAA bond rating... If we ever wanted to take out bonds to pay for capital improvements, NOW is the time... Provided that we actually NEED what we're going to put that bond up for... And, from what I can see, we need plenty of things...

So, will someone please stand up and let us know what is going on?