RECOMMENDATIONS: BRIAN MEDEIROS

My recommendations for the local races on tomorrow's ballot, and the reasoning behind them:

TOWN COUNCIL (seven candidates elected)
Strongly Recommended
BRETT PELLETIER
STUART HORWITZ
DON BOLLIN
ED RODERICK
Recommended
CECIL LEONARD
JAY LAMBERT
MICHAEL SMITH

Brett Pelletier and Stuart Horwitz will provide a fresh, energetic perspective on the TC, and are dedicated to balancing supporting our schools and community services with containing costs. Don Bollin has a much-respected record of being a passionate advocate for both fiscal responsibility and quality of life issues. Ed Roderick has distinguished himself during his first term as a reasonable, diligent Councilor.
Although I have concerns about some of the positions Cecil Leonard and Jay Lambert have taken over the past two years, I think those are outweighed by their positive contributions. And despite his troubling start as FTM Moderator, I believe Michael Smith showed vast improvement on day 2 and is the most promising option for the seventh Council seat. The other non-TCC candidate, Mark DeMello, has past experience, but comes off as a one-issue candidate advocating economic development to the exclusion of other concerns.
There are four candidates endorsed only by TCC who clearly would be hostile to maintaining our school and community services, and would advocate radical cuts that will cost us all more in the long run and decimate our community. Joan Chabot comes off as well-intentioned but ill-informed, buying into the TCC outlook. Jeffrey Belli has arrogantly trashed other candidates for not sitting in the audience for as many TC meetings as him (where's the attendance sheet?), yet his responses to questions shows him to be both poorly-informed about town matters and reckless enough to make a claim of "fraudulent expenditures by town employees" without a shred of fact.
The candidacies of David Nelson and Robert Coulter are especially disturbing, given their records of less-than-transparent political dealings, support for budgets that would decimate our school and town services, and support for lawsuits attempting to reverse the will of the people of Tiverton at the Financial Town Meeting.
The bottom line: don't be fooled by those trying to use TC votes on a few issues you may disagree with into exchanging solid incumbents for rookies with a personal, anti-Tiverton agenda. Councilors must make many decisions, and most will make one side happy and disappoint others. That's the nature of government. But on balance, while we may all disagree with one decision or another, we've been well-served in difficult times.

BUDGET COMMITTEE (five candidates elected)
Strongly Recommended
LAURA EPKE
LOUISE DURFEE
CHRIS COTTA
DONNA EDWARDS
JOANNE ARRUDA

These five candidates provide a vast wealth of experience, knowledge and community commitment. They have the capacity to restore the BC to the respected, non-partisan advisory committee it was before TCC domination made it an irrelevant embarassment over the past two years. The history of the other two candidates on the ballot, Joseph Sousa and James Amarantes, and their TCC ties, promises more of the same.

SCHOOL COMMITTEE (2 candidates elected)
Strongly Recommended
DEBORAH PALLASCH
Recommended
JAN BERGANDY

Deb Pallasch has long been a tireless advocate on behalf of our schools and community. She's willing to take a tough stand, standing up to TCC at the FTM to help stop radical budget cuts, but also calling on the teachers' union to accept necessary contract concessions. Jan Bergandy has served our schools well overall, but his recurring strident, often TCC-style hostility towards our teachers is unnecessary and counterproductive as we try to unite the people of Tiverton to preserve our community.

CHARTER AMENDMENT QUESTION: 20% VOTE TO FORCE BALLOT VOTE AT FTM
REJECT

The proposed Charter Amendment would allow just 20% of attendees at the Financial Town Meeting to force a ballot vote on any issue. While this may sound reasonable on first hearing, the reality is that this would make an already-bad process even worse. With it, an angry minority at the FTM could force ballot votes on every question, either as a protest or in a political move to force the meeting to continue a week later when the turnout might be different. Each ballot vote would require a half-hour at best (possibly an hour or more) to have everyone (over 1000 people this year) file out, cast a ballot, and then have them tabulated. With a four-hour time limit per FTM session, it could take multiple meetings just to get through a few issues. Of course we all hope people won't abuse such a rule, but anyone who's attended an FTM knows that's a futile hope. To avoid even more chaos, I recommend rejecting this amendment.

STATE REPRESENTATIVE DISTRICT 70
Strongly Recommended
JOHN G. "JAY" EDWARDS

STATE SENATE DISTRICT 10
WALTER S. FELAG JR.

The burden of proof when asking voters to replace an incumbent falls on the challenger. And in my view, neither challenger offered much beyond the same empty feel-good rhetoric of "create jobs/cut taxes/open government". There were few if any details. It's easy to support lower taxes, but you then have a responsibility to tell voters exactly what you'll cut to pay for those tax cuts, and this was avoided. Moreso, Wally Felag and Jay Edwards have served the people of Tiverton well, and have been hard-working and available to their constituents. Voters also should ask whether we're better represented by someone with the weight that comes from seniority in the vast-majority party, or a newcomer whose a member of the vast-minority party. And for those who care about maintaining town and school services while working to contain costs & taxes, Felag & Edwards are the clear-cut choices.

STATE REPRESENTATIVE DISTRICT 71
GEORGE S. ALZAIBAK

While both candidates displayed some rough edges at the recent TV forum, on the issues it's clear that George Alzaibak will best support our town and school services while containing costs & taxes. And the value of a representative who is part of the vast-majority party shouldn't be underestimated.

These are my views. Please share yours with CURB readers.

Brian Medeiros
Tiverton, RI