Fairhaven: you’ve been heard. Your decency, your civility and your respect for true leadership spoke loud and clear in successfully recalling a Selectboard member in Dan Freitas who had denigrated the office he held.
Whether he resigns as he promised or not, you will soon be thankfully rid of his standing in the way of moving our town forward on the right path.
And now the next steps are clear. First we need to broaden the Selectboard from three to five members. This is long overdue and a no brainer for most to see. We can’t be held captive by a tyrant Selectboard member who only needs one silent buddy to ruin any progress. There’s an article on the warrant for the upcoming Town Meeting to get this done. Please advocate and vote to get that article passed.
Second, we need to take advantage of the complimentary assistance the Department of Revenue is offering us in the form of a renewed financial and management best practices review. This review looks at how Fairhaven operates and is structured, and offers recommendations based on the experience and success of other communities. Those recommendations are then reviewed and implemented as Fairhaven sees fit. Another no-brainer. Mr. Espindola has been appropriately advocating for this for months, and there’s no reason whatsoever not to accept this assistance. Please communicate your support for this review to the Selectboard.
These steps, along with the moving demonstration of wisdom and goodwill that you just showed, will help restore the pride in our town government that we all deserve.
Phil Washko, Fairhaven
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