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by Don Keelan
Between December 29th and January 12th, the Bennington Banner published two disturbing articles about the conduct that permeates Bennington’s Select Board meetings.
In his lengthy December piece, long-time and highly-respected Banner correspondent Jim Therrien described the vitriolic conduct that takes place not only at the board meetings but also on social media directed at those elected and/or appointed to manage the town’s affairs.
Meanwhile, the well-recognized columnist for the Banner and long-time Bennington resident, Eric Peterson, on January 12th, was even more descriptive in what he has been observing:
“The talk of the town is all about the increasingly unhinged behavior of a couple of members of Bennington Select Board and their puppet masters. Come Town Meeting Day, it will be up to voters to decide to choose between sanity and insanity!”
I will discuss what I think of free expression later. In the meantime, I want to remind the residents and officials—elected or appointed—of how important the Town of Bennington is to all who live outside its borders.
While we have no voice in the operation of the town government, nor should we, nevertheless, the functioning of the town is so critical to those of us who frequent all that Bennington has to offer.
One of Bennington’s gems is the Southwestern Vermont Medical Center and its related specialty services. For those living outside the town, there is no other place in Bennington County to go when they need specialized eye care, orthopedics, cancer treatments, urology, dermatology, or other vital medical services.
Since its opening last fall, the hospital has a state-of-the-art Emergency Department available 24/7.
Services provided by UCS, CLR, the Vermont Veterans Home, and numerous social action agencies that provide food, addiction recovery, and other social and welfare assistance have also been added.
However, your town provides a venue for so much else for its residents and those of us who reside beyond its borders.
Kocher Drive and Route 7 are within walking distance of the county’s judicial court systems, retail and food shopping centers, and many other amenities, making Bennington convenient.
I would be remiss if I did not mention how vital the town is to many of us because of its cultural arts offerings, notably the Bennington Museum, Bennington College, and the Arts Center. These are town treasures and the envy of many Vermont towns.
As many residents know, the town offers an outstanding recreation and swim center, a therapeutic safety net for many outside Bennington.
Many folks in Bennington, inside and outside government, are engaged in making Bennington the “Gateway to Vermont.” It takes effort to make this happen but very little to undo it. One only must look north to the “Vermont city on the lake” to see what happens when the government becomes handcuffed in its ability to deliver services.
Back to free speech and expression: On January 12th, Daniel Diermeier cited the WSJ to describe what the University of Chicago had long established regarding free expression:
“Chicago has long recognized that to ensure an environment of free expression, disruptions that prevent others from speaking must be prohibited; there is no room on a college campus for a heckler’s veto…..norms of respect, civility, openness, and inclusion are essential to enable speech from everyone at the University. …..a restrictive, hostile, unwelcoming climate will shrink expression, while a rich, friendly, inclusive climate will enable speech to thrive.”
To the residents of Bennington, your town has the makings of being the area’s Center of Excellence. Do not allow anyone to steal this from you and those of us who depend so much on your town’s outstanding and necessary services.
You all have worked so hard to reach this point. Do not allow civility to be hijacked.
The author is a U.S. Marine (retired), CPA, and columnist living in Arlington, VT.
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Categories: Commentary, Local government
This has more to do with the Town Manager and local economic development officials asleep at the wheel while drugs, crime and welfare are spiraling out of control.
Many residents of Bennington want a new direction, but the status quo will prevent that from happening. if you’re gonna make an omelette you gotta crack some eggs
Correction: You DO have a say in your town government through town meetings and duly warned town or village board meetings which are SUPPOSED to be announced publically at least 24 hours ahead. NOT keeping up with what is happening in your town gov’t means contracts with utility companies, sale of tax properties, officials behavior in meetings, lies and obfuscation are given a free pass. I used to eschew town gov’ts as unimportant, but Agenda 2030 can ONLY work if its implemented at the town level before any other levels, and it has been, from educational interference to technology incursions to relationships between the officers of town gov’t. Cover ups work when no one is shining a light on them. Attending town gov’t meetings can be a bore, but even library trustee meetings can turn into a full size novel with villians and protaganists, and if you weren’t there to see it, you wouldn’t believe how nasty neighbors can be with one another…its difficult to cover, witness, and talk about. But if you don’t attend, you don’t know that decisions are being made based on personal not profressional considerations.
PUBLIC meetings are just that… and if you hope not to be surprised by taxes, bonds, utility rates or telecomm or wind incursions… you best attend.
Meeting minutes have eroded now so pay attention to the ones that have little if any actual record of what happened in that meeting — there’s a reason why that is how they clerk chooses to record them: we held a meeting. If you didn’t attend, oh well and glad we are you weren’t there to catch us… your neighbors have all the same temptations, weaknesses and sinful nature as I or you do… expect it.
And… you are absolutely meant to attend public meetings for that reason… that is how you participate in local town gov’t… and town meeting day.
I believe Mr. Keelan is not a Bennington resident, therefore he has no standing in Bennington politics nor elections. Reading between the lines, Mr. Keelan is warning those that choose to read his opinion on the consequences of elections as well as the dangers of socialism- or democratic socialism- or whatever Bennington’s version of Burlington’s progressive politicians name themselves.
Are the two large buildings that the battery plant had for the last sixty years being used for any industrial activity???????
Bennington transformed from a lovely VT town of only ten of so years ago dotted with historic homes, antique shops, gorgeous Southern VT college, restaurants galore, and tourists buzzing all about the famed Battlefield Monument.
Within a decade, due to certain town “father’s” deep levels of corruption and backroom deals including those with Shires’ “never-ending” affordable housing, the proliferation of drugs instead of the proliferation of additional police, and the general yet thuggish embrace on the part of this government – of the BLM and “woke” culture.
What transpired over merely a decade was long-term residents of beautiful Old Bennington dumping their homes & fleeing, vital specialists and physicians leaving the once well regarded SVMC for alternate medical institutions, criminals running roughshod over the rule of law, and small businesses leaving left and right in hope of avoiding the coming blight we now witness.
Bennington desperately requires a massive housecleaning and a return to traditional VT values and traditions. And the ONLY ones who could ever hope to accomplish such are the PEOPLE of the town & its surrounding communities. Just as a suggestion, BEGIN with ENDING the humiliating “LGBTQ pride” should you genuinely bank on attracting tourism again as it once existed.
Trust me, I know more about Bennington than most people on this website.
I heard Bennington was run by in-laws and outlaws, a Peyton Place type set up where the courthouse, the police station, and the clerk’s office all covered for one another’s deals done dirty? Whatever happened to the allegations against Sheriff Chad Schmidt? Not that Bennington conducts it’s business any different than many other Vermont cities or towns. The template is mafia-type criminality, blackmail, coercion, and collusion. All white wash fraudulent deals by papering over racketeering crimes. The unions have their fingers in the town coffers as well – our money, their trough to feed off.