Editorial
A problem?

It's very hard to sit somewhere and judge what is going on in other people's heads. Many times we can only base action off their appearance and the background information we do know.

Things came to a head between the Ashburnham Board of Selectmen and the Ashburnham-Westminster Regional School Committee in the last 11 days. And they came to a head for the second time in less than 12 months.

The rhetoric between April 8 and today sounds an awful lot like the rhetoric during the early part of June 2007. At that time, the members of the two boards disagreed over the terms on a new lease that allowed the town to rent two classrooms at Oakmont Regional High School. In what can only be described as a "we're playing nice, we promise" meeting (just days before the override election) did it appear some compromise had been reached, those terms (a waiving of the rent outlined in the signed lease) were not supported by the School Committee members.

It is unclear how much those feelings played into the decisions that were made last week, when the Ashburnham Selectmen voted to remove $70,000 of the district's funding from the town's operating budget.

Some say yes there is mistrust because of the discussions on the lease, others say the two parties have moved past it and this was its own problem.

The more basic question is, how can this happen twice with the same groups of people? Yes, each group must represent their particular constituents, but these problems do not result in advocating two different perspectives.

The discussion to change the funding did not happen in detail until the night the vote was taken by the Selectmen. That has to change. Discussions need to happen with all the parties in the room or everyone will begin to submit their requests by citizen petitions, which the town officials will have no ability to control.

One thing that is certain is the entire School Committee and the entire Board of Selectmen, and possibly even the entire Advisory Board, need to have regular detailed discussions. There does not seem to be a way for the groups not to have the public meeting discussions on detailed decision processes. The only other solution is put everything in writing each step along the way.