ROCKINGHAM-How can Rockingham, where I live, or any town in Vermont, continue to carry the unbearable and unsustainable burden of taxes here?
How can our Legislature create and bring new taxes each year to the table off of which we all must eat? It is unconscionable.
How can our local boards knowingly raise the tax rate year after year, hurting our elderly and our working poor still further? It is shameful.
The answer is a lack of due diligence, a lack of care, and an apathy toward their fellow citizens.
Running for a local public office is simple. Especially in our current pandemic. Doing the job is hard. Or it should be, if you are doing it right. Anyone can run if they live in the community where they wish to be elected. What they need to possess is...
It is utterly astounding the number of negative issues impacting Rockingham these days. These are aside from our everytown woes on any given day. In Rockingham, we are faced with a merger, a jail, and the continuing destruction of our historic buildings. (Or do they call that “development”?) The...
The Rockingham Selectboard will meet on Thursday, Jan. 14, at 5 p.m., to finalize the articles for the March Annual Town Meeting. Among them is the Rockingham citizen-requested article to ask the question: “Shall the Voters of the Town of Rockingham allow placement of a detention center within the legal boundaries of Bellows Falls?” As there are forces fighting against this article and the request to exercise our democratic rights as taxpaying Vermont citizens, it would be in the best...
There are some very disturbing trends happening within Bellows Falls and actions by the village's elected officials. • The lack of care in protecting any of the interests of the village while seemingly handing the keys over to the town. This is in reference to the merger committee and village trustees' participation in the meetings as five members of said committee. The request made by village resident Andrew Smith is a significant one, calling for a current assessment of all...
The nation's founders strongly believed in rotation in office. Term limits were left out of the Constitution because they could not foresee a time when politics would become a career for so many people. There are currently petitions out in Bellows Falls and Rockingham asking for the term limits question to be placed on the next annual meeting ballots. Once they become articles, the discussion will continue, hearings will be open to the public, and we all will have an...
“They” say I made a good showing for a first run for a legislative seat. “They” say incumbents 9 times out of 10 get re-elected. “They” say an appointee to a seat is as good as it gets. Well, that's all well and good. What “they” do not say is why people desperately want change but vote those same incumbents back into office. Why would they expect a different outcome from that of the last two years? What I do...
When I step out onto my porch each day and breathe in the air constantly being renewed by the mighty Connecticut River, I am humbled. Such beauty and history and power. It's reflected in everything we do here. The independent backbone of all who settled this state and of those who live and are raised here. The active muscle of optimism. It's why, when my husband wanted to return to the place that raised him, I made a conscious decision...