Plainville is in trouble

Hello Fellow Plainville Residents:

The truth is, we are BROKE. Flat BROKE. We have no money and we are going to lose police, firemen and school personnel because of it. We are going to have a significant reduction in town services across the board if we don’t pass the override on June 29. Was there a mismanagement of funds? We don’t know for sure. Over time, decisions were made by people in charge and we, the townspeople, voted to approve these spending choices. But really, does it matter at this point. We are BROKE and if we don’t pass the override, we will
decimate our town in all areas. This is no joke.
If you are just learning about this now, shame on you. These conversations have been going on year after year. We should be more frustrated with how the finance committee, an appointed advisory board, is just now coming out of the woodwork. Presentations that were made months ago to the selectboard and others are being done over again because the fin com wasn’t there. The financial advisory group didn’t have consistent fin com representation. And while the town departments have spent months trying to work together, the fin com is doing everything they can to pit them against each other. If you had a chance to attend the FinCom meeting this past week it was nothing short of an attack...with members implying that schools are not important and that the education that is provided to our students here is not worth it. Shame on them.

At this point, does it matter how we got here? Are we going to punish ourselves with a reduction in property value and town services because of decisions, we, the townspeople, approved at our town meetings? That doesn’t make sense. YES, the history of how we got here is important so we don’t repeat it. But the blame game is a losing game for everyone. The TOWN needs this override. YOU need this override if you want Plainville to continue to grow and thrive. Forget selling your house if our schools lose 38 staff and our class sizes increase. People move to towns for the great schools, which we have. If we don’t pass this override, this town will stop growing and we fear, cease to exist.
COVID 19 made matters worse. The town, the state and the nation are being hit hard. State revenue (and therefore Chapter 70 money, which funds a portion of the schools) is down significantly. We have all had to make sacrifices during this time. Many of us are working from home; teaching our kids; cutting our own budgets because of a job loss. So an override now just doesn’t make sense in our budgets. And we're angry. Pissed off that our town is in this position AGAIN and we just don’t want to give “them” more money to spend “poorly”. But you
and I voted for the selectmen (these and the ones we’ve had in the past) who appoint the members of the finance committee. We take their recommendations at town meetings and vote based on what they tell us, because we trust them. They know. They’ve done the work or so we think because that’s why we voted for them. Sorry to say...if you want to blame someone, well look in the mirror because we can only blame ourselves.

And after we approve the override, get involved then. Address revenue concerns, press the selectboard about that. Volunteer to be on the finance committee. Educate yourself and know what is going on with police, fire and the schools. It’s all public information. The more you get involved, the more you can impact a change so we aren’t in this position again. If you are against the override, you are dooming our town to failure that will take years to recover from. Our children will suffer and they are the lifeblood of our community.

And please, for the love of all that is good, stop asking about the money from Plainridge. For once and for all, that money is used for infrastructure ONLY. That is how we can do the roads, build the town hall and police/fire station etc. We CANNOT use that money as part of any operating budget. STOP asking about why we can’t use it for other things. That is not how the agreement works AND it’s unreliable money so why would you want to run your town with that anyway. Considering it’s been closed the last few months, we’ve gotten nothing from them...like a commission check. For any of you that work on commission, you know, it’s unreliable! And the money set aside from Laidlaw? Don’t ask..the minute you spend it will be the exact moment we have an issue and need it. Leave it alone.

So, here’s where we are at. It’s our fault we are in this mess and we have to fix it. Vote for the override now and get involved immediately to see how the money is being spent. Question everything along the way and be a part of the solution. Say YES to Saving Our Services. Oh, that means you have to vote at the town meeting on both proposed budgets (or just the one with the override money included) AND vote on June 29 to pass the override!