letter to the editor

Does failure deserve reelection?

Mon, 05/14/2018 - 4:30pm

Dear Editor:

We have had an unusual election campaign for selectmen. Two “career” selectmen, both on the public payroll, inundated the town with their reelection posters. Both were reelected. The truism holds: we get the elective officials we deserve. In my sixty years of life here, I don’t recall ever seeing such expensive campaigning for selectmen. Apparently, Harmon and Lewis desperately wanted to be reelected. Both highlighted that they are hometown boys, as if this somehow made them more qualified for the positions than others. That is an implied insult to those who were not born here and a dangerous road to go down. Hometown people can be as qualified or unqualified as anyone else.

It’s a good rule of thumb to be wary of people who are desperate to be elected; often ego drives their candidacy. But the bottom line is results. Who could disagree with Harmon and Lewis’ call for more good paying year-round jobs, more affordable housing, low taxes, and so on? Everyone wants such things. The problem is that they have not been successful, in the ten years or so as selectmen, in implementing any one of these goals. Does failure deserve reelection? Apparently, the majority of voters in a very small turnout believed so. Why? Whose interest is being served? Granted that these are difficult aims to achieve given the demographics, the economics, and the resources available.

The reality of our situation in Boothbay and in thousands of American small towns calls for multiple and alternate ways of thinking about these problems. Having, over the years, observed Harmon and Lewis closely, I think that their being local “boys” is a liability, not an asset. They have great in-reach but no out-reach. They have no skill or experience in negotiation with developers. And they have a proven record that shows that they don’t have the ability, the experience, or the background to think either outside the box or creatively within it. They are capable stewards of the small nuts and bolts of town business. Otherwise, defined by their own goals, they have been failures.

Fred Kaplan

Boothbay