Lawyerly-like Councilperson Paul Shapiro, not letting his many years as UCONN’s attorney go to waste, puts Henry M. Robert and his Rules of Order to shame at Mansfield Town Council meetings by using a parliamentary straight jacket to keep the public in their proper place, quiet in the audience listening to him. General Robert must be rolling in his grave; it was never his intent for these public forums to be battlefields, each lone voice in the audience viewed as a threat to Shapiro’s agenda. The Rules clearly note that under no circumstances should concern for parliamentary correctness be permitted to impose undue artificiality in meetings to keep the less knowledgeable of the Rules silenced. And Shapiro isn’t even a mayor yet, though that ambition is well known should he have more votes than another Democrat. But, Shapiro is pro-UCONNization of Mansfield, so such efforts to control the citizenry by legal maneuvering should not be unexpected. Unbridled UCONN expansion is not good for our town, certainly not when the town is picking up the costly tab. Hidden costs to the town abound. But mum’s the word. During the Town Council meeting of September 23, 2013, a member of the public took a note to Councilperson Freudmann that the current North Hillside Road Extension proposal was not in existence in 2009, despite the Mayor’s insistence that was when they ruled on it. Councilperson Shapiro then moved the Mayor to recess the meeting until order was restored; but, Alison Hilding had not created disorder. The meeting later resumed and the note from the public was ignored. At question was: did the Mansfield Town Council review the current UCONN North Hillside Road Extension construction proposal of 2013 and vote in favor of it, after considering the September 2012 deficiencies noted by DEEP, the harmful impact to vernal pools and the State Endangered Species noticed by that same agency in August of that same year? Of course the answer to that question is an emphatic “NO.” Shapiro notched one more victory for UCONN-ization and the silencing of resident voices, but it was not a victory for Our Town.
Arthur A. Smith
