Published in "The Main Line Times" on September 9, 2009
By Commissioner Jenny, Brown, Ward 2
How much more will your property taxes go up before you start wondering whether you can afford to stay in Lower Merion?
A number of people are wondering that even now — I’ve heard from many of them. Are you there yet? It’s an unsettling thought — especially for seniors on fixed incomes who have lived here most of their lives and thought they’d live here the rest of their lives. It’s also a sobering consideration for young families who thought they could afford to live here and now need to rethink their life-plans.
Maybe you think that an end to the rising taxes is in sight and you’ll be able to stick it out. If so, consider that the School District has steadily raised your taxes 92 percent since 2000. The township has steadily raised your taxes 40 percent since 2002 and, according to township financial presentations, is on pace to impose double-digit annual tax increases and/or to increase the fees it charges you for services that used to be covered by your real-estate taxes (such as trash collection).
The majority of township commissioners and school-board directors don’t seem to believe that there is a limit to the amount of taxes and fees that you, Lower Merion residents, can afford to pay. And if they do understand that principle, they seem unable or unwilling to do anything about it.
Will you be able to sustain more tax and fee increases? Will you be able to afford to stay in Lower Merion?
It doesn’t have to be this way. We don’t have to tax our seniors, our young families and those of lesser means, out of the township. Yes, we have to tighten our belts; we have to acknowledge our economic conditions; we have to make reasonable adjustments; we even have to make hard decisions during difficult economic times. But we can do it — if keeping Lower Merion a place where people of diverse incomes can afford to live is our goal and if fiscal sustainability and affordability are our values.
I have heard from a great number of residents, townshipwide, who disagree with the township’s spending and borrowing plans. There are other commissioners who also disagree with these plans — but all of the commissioners need to hear from more of you. Please contact me at jenny@commissionerbrown.com and let’s work together. Yes, we can have excellent municipal services and schools without sacrificing fiscal sustainability and affordability.
Jenny Brown is Lower Merion Township Commissioner, Ward 2, Gladwyne/Penn Valley.
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| Published in "The Main Line Times" on September 9, 2009
By Michael Berry, Committeeman, Ward 14
To the Editor:
Last month Commissioner George Manos wrote a column about the current board’s compliance with the Sunshine Act. His column presented a series of “facts” to attempt to show that the board is “more transparent than it ever has been.” The problem, however, is Mr. Manos has his “facts” wrong and continues to defend a leadership that insists on breaking the law.
Mr. Manos first seems to shrug off the board’s Sunshine Act violations, estimating that the township holds hundreds of open meetings and then claiming “the issue of openness... arises over just two: the Ad Hoc Budget Committee and the Ad Hoc Capital Improvement Plan Committee.” Mr. Manos fails to mention that Pennsylvania’s Commonwealth Court has expressly held that ad-hoc committees, even temporary ad-hoc committees, are subject to the Sunshine Act (Patriot-News Co. v. Empowerment Team of Harrisburg School District Members, 2000), and the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania held just two years ago that the public’s right to know is at its zenith when public finances are at issue: “There can be no reasonable expectation that the [government] will keep its finances secret from the general public.” (Pennsylvania State University v. State Employees’ Retirement Board, 2007.) Indeed, as the court explained, such information “go[es] to the heart” of our state’s laws protecting public access. Mr. Manos and his colleagues should not simply shrug off the fact that two of the most central township committees — the ones tasked with addressing taxes, spending and long-term finance — have violated the Sunshine Act just because most committees adhere to the law.
Mr. Manos next seems to mock the notion that “some constituents... would argue that they should be able to walk into any office in the township building at any time... and look at any record without fear of a challenge.” Yet the Pennsylvania Right to Know Law protects a citizen’s right to do just that, stating that an agency’s “public records... shall be available for access during the regular business hours of [the] agency.” (66 Pa. C.S.A. § 701(a).) No one is claiming that citizens should be able to rummage through every room in the township building at all hours. They are only asking for township leaders to comply with the law.
Finally Mr. Manos contends that commissioners are “entitled” to “some level of privacy” and that the board’s closed meetings are “private; they are not a secret.” Commissioners are entitled to privacy in their private lives but as elected public officials they are not entitled to privacy when they debate and discuss public issues with other public officials. No matter what the commissioners’ closed-door discussions are called — whether “private,” as Mr. Manos prefers, or “secret,” to which he objects — the simple and indisputable fact is that the public has been shut out of those meetings and has no way to know what was discussed.
That secrecy is what offends so many of Mr. Manos’ constituents and that is the fact on which the push for greater sunshine is based.
Michael Berry, Wynnewood
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Published in "The Main Line Times" on July 1, 2009
By Richard Kaufman, Committeeman, Ward 9-3
To the Editor:
Several weeks ago a bipartisan group of Lower Merion commissioners tried unsuccessfully to open a scheduled June 22 board meeting, the so-called “retreat,” to the sunshine and to public scrutiny.
In her article last week, Cheryl Allison reported that all five Republican commissioners and four Democratic commissioners did not attend the meeting for various reasons. Good for them and for Lower Merion residents! Transparency is not a principle that can be espoused when expedient and ignored when inconvenient.
Unfortunately, despite Sunshine Act objections, five commissioners did attend the meeting. Judging by his intemperate comments quoted in the article, Commissioner Mark Taylor appears proud of his continued defiance of the public’s calls for increased transparency.
Speaking at the request of board president Bruce Reed, Taylor criticized his Republican colleagues for not attending the meeting, which they believed violated the Sunshine Act, claiming that their conduct was “disrespectful of [township] staff.” In his typical partisan fashion, however, Taylor apparently did not view the four Democratic absences as “disrespectful.”
The township staff serves the board and the public, not the other way around. Taylor and Reed should be concerned for the public’s respect and trust of their government. The real problem is Taylor’s and Reed’s disrespect for the rights of township residents to participate in and scrutinize the deliberations of their elected officials.
Government in the backroom serves the short-term interests of some politicians but never serves the public. It’s time for those commissioners who respect the public they represent to bring township government all the way out of the shadows, and into the sunshine — where it belongs.
Richard Kaufman, Bala Cynwyd |
Published in "The Main Line Times" on April 9, 2009
By Commissioner Jenny Brown (Ward 2)
Judging by the diversity and size of the group of residents who respectfully protested the closed Ad Hoc Budget Committee meeting last week, the Sunshine Movement in Lower Merion cannot be marginalized or dismissed. There were Democrats, Republicans, Independents, senior citizens, college students, at least one high-school student, men, women, residents from eastern, central and western Lower Merion, workers and retirees. What this diverse group obviously shared was a passion to improve the results of government for all, increase public participation and deepen public trust.
It was a truly remarkable experience to see this group come together to ask their elected representatives to let them see and participate in the governing process. Commissioners Gould, Zelov and I were there, but I wish that my four remaining colleagues on the AHB Committee had been willing to come into the room to share the experience and be inspired by it.
Open government is a founding principle of our representative democracy and TRUST is the vital link between the government and the governed. Sadly the Lower Merion Board of Commissioners is damaging the public trust by shutting out the public and keeping confidential, important information that should be disclosed. Worse, by impugning the motives of the Sunshine Movement, the majority has tried to deflect attention away from their refusal to open meetings. The diversity within the Sunshine Movement disproves the claim that it is motivated by partisan politics.
Open government is not a partisan issue; it’s an American principle. At every opportunity, our Board should promote and encourage public presence and participation. Lower Merion is fortunate to have a talented and intelligent populace and we can only benefit by engaging this valuable resource. Moreover, elected officials cannot be held accountable if the public does not know of their decisions or what informs them and cannot see the deliberative process.
Of course certain topics are exempt from the Sunshine Act, but such topics are not and have not been the subject of the closed budget meetings. At the closed meeting on Wednesday staff gave a very informative, well researched and documented presentation of certain options for reducing future township expenses. Commissioners Gould, Zelov and I asked that the information be presented in a public meeting and were advised that the individual commissioners will be asked to tell the manager their reaction to the options and if a majority is in favor, the options will be presented publicly in May or June.
The problems with this approach are obvious — only some commissioners have the benefit of the presentation by township staff and commissioners do not have the benefit of hearing their colleagues’ thoughts and views on the options. Further, if a majority’s preliminary preference is against the options, the public never has the opportunity to hear the options, offer their views and influence the process. At the fall budget hearings, the public will simply be told that there were no viable options to reduce spending.
In response to the protest, one commissioner has suggested that the budget process be moved to closed sessions of the full board. Instead of driving the process further into the back room, our board should be inspired by the nonpartisan protesters to work together to open the meetings so that the proposed budget and the difficult choices it should include in these economic times will truly reflect public knowledge and participation.
In my ward bipartisanship is a foundation of the community and of my relationship with my constituents. We have had many significant issues and we have faced them, not as Republicans or Democrats, but as neighbors and friends who engage each other to meet challenges. We could never have accomplished our successes were it not for that strong bipartisan foundation and the solutions that were offered by the residents themselves. Even when we have not eventually prevailed, the bipartisan and open process has served to strengthen our bonds.
Our Board of Commissioners can still turn contention into consensus if we simply agree that openness is not a Republican or Democrat principle. It is good government and we should embrace and promote it at every opportunity.
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