Talk to the Hand - Update

In yesterday’s blog I brought attention to the fact that the minutes of the July 28th Town Meeting from Hell had neglected to mention Article 3, other than that it had been defeated, even while the other articles got a full write-up.

I asked if some of you might want to call the Middleboro Town Clerk’s Office and ask that the minutes be beefed up a bit to reflect the existence, if not the importance of Article 3.

The Middleboro Board of Selectmen didn’t want Article 3 on the ballot. But CasinoFacts.org had collected too many signatures on their petitions for them to ignore. Still, they did their best. When, a month after the meeting, a resident asked if the Board couldn’t mention Article 3 in their letter of support to the Secretary of the Department of the Interior, they proclaimed it to be “irrelevant”.

Well it's not. And I guess your calls worked. The minutes, which have been moved and can now be found at this link, have been updated. And though Article 3 still only gets the same amount of lines as were dedicated to the Pledge of Allegience and the National Anthem, at least they now read:

The Moderator informed the meeting that Article 3 has no force in law, and that it is only a public opinion question.

ARTICLE 3: A motion to see if the Town approves of the creation of a Gambling Casino Resort Complex within the Corporate Boundaries of the Town was defeated by a majority vote.

Well now, that’s better. What’s even more interesting now is that, if you look at the next paragraph which describes Article 2, you can begin to see a story unfold. No, the town didn’t want a casino, but it had been convinced it would get one anyway, and coerced to vote for the agreement or face financial ruin.

But Article three said it all.

Power to the People