BY DAN VALENTI

PLANET VALENTI NEWS AND COMMENTARY

(FORTRESS OF SOLITUDE, MONDAY, MAY 9, 2016) — As a Letter to the Editor writer wrote last week to THE PLANET, Pittsfield has wasted too much time, energy, and resources on what the letter writer called infrastructure — building a new high school, a new parking deck, Streetscape, an “innovation center” while ignoring its greatest resource: We The People. The writer used the example of the carousel, a project that, despite official non-cooperation and even opposition, came into being without any public money and solely through the work of more than 400 volunteers. Such is the type of exponential energy that can, with leadership, be tapped for the good of all.

It won’t happen, however, with the current approach of the municipality to (and against) its people. The new Taconic High School project exemplifies this perfectly, because it involves the two most arrogant and hostile groups toward citizens: the Pittsfield School Committee (SC) and the School Building Needs Commission (SBNC).

From the beginning 10 years ago, the THS project has been “fast tracked.” The plan was to deliberately under-maintain the current THS for those years, point out the building’s problems, and set into motion an “un-opposable” allowance.

The Suits realized that with a compliant SC, the new $200 million school would be a done deal, despite declining enrollment. Want proof? The only SC member in that time who actually legislated for The People, Terry Kinnas, was harassed and dismissed. Moreover, stacking the SBNC with submissives too tractable and docile to vet the new building project assured Easy Street. Again, The Suits saw to it that the lone member who advocated for Mary Jane and Joe Kapanski would be opposed on every turn. That’s why Chuck Vincelette, The Man From Mensa,  resigned in frustration.

The SC and SBNC made sure to schedule the key public meetings at inconvenient times. Scheduling school committee meetings at 6 p.m. eliminates decent families who have supper to prepare after a long day of work. Having meetings at 3 p.m. leaves out the duly employed. Violating open meeting laws and not properly publicizing meetings in advance allows the SC and SBNC to claim “the public had a chance for input” all the while knowing that wasn’t the case. The final nail in the coffin was to not allow a vote or referendum by The Little Guys. The Suits didn’t care what ordinary citizens thought of the project.

We all know the city can’t afford to build that school, yet it will. It will not concentrate of serving its people, the way the carousel project did. It will, rather, exclude citizens from the democratic process by insisting on building these phony, unnecessary projects that temporarily distract the apathetic from the steel-toothed jaws both above and beneath that tempting piece of cheese.

People don’t need organizations that “have the privilege to continue the work that supports our mission to foster the ongoing growth and vitality of downtown Pittwsfield, Massachusetts through vision, leadership[,] and advocacy and to position downtown as the creative and business hub of the Berkshires for the benefit of all.” The 45 monstrous words in quotes, read them again.

Downtown Pittsfield Inc (DPI). authored those words in an e-mail sent May 6. That’s the language of bureaucracy. That’s the language of the dead. That’s the language of an officiousness that lost touch with its constituents.

In the upcoming budget deliberations, if there is one cut that should be made and can be made with no one being hurt, it’s to DPI. Sure, the cut will be symbolic. It will save taxpayers far less than $100,000 a year. Nonetheless, it will at least send the right message. Let the downtown merchants organize themselves into their own guild. Having government do it for them gives them government in all its worst forms — political, ineffective, and inefficient.

Maybe the city can take the money it saves, convert it into all ones, stack them in a heap, and light them afire. It can be held downtown. It can be billed as a “pep rally.”

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“I say thank God for government waste. If government is doing bad things, it’s only the waste that prevents the harm from being greater.” — Milton Friedman

“OPEN THE WINDOW, AUNT MILLIE.”

LOVE TO ALL.

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