It has finally come. This week, Thursday. Our selectboard opens a meeting at 8 am at the town office and will recess and go as a board to meet with a professional mediator to consider terms for negotiating a solution for the Rule 80B Complaint, Jackson v. the Town of Paris.
There is no more putting it off, no more time to create spin, no more pretending that if we refuse to look it will go away. No more looking for excuses for why our elected officials have dragged their feet and tried to go in every direction except straight ahead to deal with the crisis caused by a vengeful firing of a competent and widely respected town manager.
And no more looking for ways to avoid the simple fact that from March 2010, if there had been even a conversation - a series of questions and answers - a discussion - between (a) the selectboard that replaced the recalled and disgraced individuals, and (b) the former town manager, this town would not be one meager little step away from court and the threat of thousands of dollars in court and legal costs - because there are those who are, even now, counseling not to negotiate.
And still, even, at this eleventh hour, the individuals who perpetrated the firing are nowhere; and the focus is not on the wrongness of their actions - or the hundreds of people who made their political will known on this topic. And still, courage in decision-making by our elected officials is missing. By default the whole focus has become about the cost. It did not need to come to this...
Shame.
