First
Let me say that some people in this town tried to fix the problem, but they really did a lousy job. The new government propsal was just stupid and most people knew it. This town can not do things quickly. It took 20 years just to get 5 corners with lights. It will take 50 years to change our government. People who are in power are afraid of losing and others who vote are afraid of change period. I'm not up on the amount of money that we are paying our police or fire, but we were warned by Bob Kimball that the Quinn Bill would kill us. I guess it is. I've been reading some of the replies to the last fincom meeting and what about that surprises anyone in this town? The only problem I have with your discussion is the statement about teachers. I work for the school department and I just got my retroactive amount for the very '' significant'' (I think you called it) raise. For the period from Sept. to now I received $99. That is about $1 a day. Now that is significant. You probably haven't been in a school for a long time nor had a child attend the school system for a long time. Take if from a parent, the system has changed drastically within the last 10 years and not for the better. They don't have the teachers to teach different subjects. There are very few electives and maybe you don't know it but there are teachers teaching 6 periods a day just to have enough sections of a course so that class size won't be 35. You can't always ask teachers teach an extra period in their subject, because that is not where the need is. It is very complicated, it's not as simple as asking a teacher to teach one period a day more. Plus, are you going to give them more than 1% if they work extra? NO
You expect them to work for nothing.
You won't even find that at Walmart.
Where have you been during the last few years when the school department has lost a huge amount of teachers with layoffs and retirements? They did not hire the same number back. Hence, fewer teachers, fewer course selections, less everything.
I looked at my tax bills for 2003 and 2005. My property assessment has increased by $50,000. but my taxes are less this year than they were in 2003.
Is there anything else that cost the same as it did in 2003. Certainly not our homes, not gasoline, not milk, not a thing. Why should salaries stay the same when costs increase?
Why don't we just increase our tax rate to the 2003 level and we would have enough to make everyone happy. If my bills look like this, then everyone's
look like this. There is a saying in business, '' you get what you pay for.''
If you pay very little, you will get very little. I don't work for the personnel board so I don't know how the hiring system in this town works. But if it's not like a business then maybe it should be. But like I said in the beginning , nothing happens in Braintree quickly. That would be another 20 years.
