Government should be messy.

Last night's Board of Selectman's meeting went rather smoothly, I would say. The taxi regulations issue was on the agenda and the board got through the discussion of meters, the List and license ownership with a couple dozen concerned taxi drivers in the room without a single person raising their voice. They approved all of the warrants for the special town election with only one long-ish explanation form town counsel. They discussed capital expenditures for 2008 without a problem. It went rather smoothly.

Maybe too smoothly?

Personally, I like it when issues are discussed from both ends by the BOS. I like to see two opposing viewpoints hashed out. I like to see which ideas have merit. I like it when two passionate opinions are weighed against one another.

Happily, last night, there was a short discussion of proposed and (apparently un-workable) "random voluntary drug testing" for BOS members, which was defeated three to one. That was a little sticky. And there was a really interesting political pot-shot at me at the end of the meeting. (Apparently the fact that a privately funded web site that houses the government study committee information has a link to my site, yackon.com raised the hackles of a particular Selectman. Great. I haven't even gotten all of my signatures yet and the grenades are already in the air...)

The thing is, I love this stuff. Some people are conflict-averse, but me, I'm one of those kind of people who loves to jump right into the conflict and sort stuff out. Like breaking up a dogfight. Yeah, I might lose a pint or two in the process, but in the end, given an open and honest debate, the work of the community will be done. I'll wear the scars like a badge of honor.

So if I'm fortunate enough to serve, I'll make you this promise. I will never strive for quick, painless, neat-as-a-pin meetings. The Board of Selectman meetings are not held in a church. They're in a courthouse. Where conflict is often tackled and resolved. I'm happy to get my hands dirty in that way. At the same time I promise not to turn the meetings into something that would be better suited for a tough-man competition cage match. That's not my style either.

Nantucket first!

It's primary day!

Get out there and vote, folks! Vote for the best ideas. Vote for change. Or vote your wallet. Or your conscience. Or your future.

Polls close at 8 pm. Results on the YACKon.com home page shortly thereafter.

Nantucket first!

Why do town government meetings need to be taped?

I don’t know about you, but I have a pretty full schedule. There’s work. There’s family. There’s fun. There’s obligations. I have a calendar on my computer and I add little notes and reminders to it and they blink and beep at me and tell me where to go and who to meet and what to buy and who to call. Sometimes I forget to put a little reminder on my calendar and I miss an event. (Like the clean team this Sunday…sorry guys!)

Here's a meeting I recorded as a podcast. It has been downloaded over 200 times since January

So with all that’s going on in the average Joe’s life, how in the world can they hope to go to every important meeting on the island? It’s just not doable.

But, if meetings were televised, or even better, recorded, digitized, shortened and loaded on the town web site, I could grab a sound file of a meeting for my ipod and listen to it in the car, or while I do the dishes, or when I’m lying on the beach (which I wish I had more time for).

Here’s the thing.

Government is not just about electing people you like to do a job you don’t have time to do. It’s also about public participation. It’s about listening and reacting. It’s about writing letters and calling your elected representatives, or stopping them on the street and telling them what you think.

As a political kind of guy, I thrive on feedback. I want to know if what I’m saying or writing is resonating with people, or if I’m full of poo. I need to hear from the rest of the island to understand where the island wants to go (which is one reason I started YACKon.com and made it possible for an on-going, island-wide dialog to take place).

But it seems as though the majority of folks on this island are non-participants. They read the newspaper once in a while which gives them the broad strokes of a policy, but they never get the subtle nuances of what’s going on in their town and county government. Why? No time. We’re too busy trying to make ends meet and get our kids to band practice.

My feeling is, if we can make it easier for people to know what’s going on in government, if we can make it possible for more people to participate, government will gain valuable insight from the feedback that results. And government will better understand how to govern.

Plus, it really will not take that much to get meetings online. Or on TV. Comcast could give us the tools to do it. The town has a website and people who attend meetings now can press the record button. Loading sound files on the web is pretty simple as well.

I’d be happy to do it all myself. For free. If I had more time.

Nantucket first.

What would you change?

People on Nantucket really don’t like change that much. (Uh, you think?) We rail against new developments and the closing of long-standing businesses. We bemoan the loss of “the good old days.” It’s a knee-jerk reaction, mostly. If it’s different, it’s guilty, until proven innocent.

But the thing is, there’s a long list of things about this island that really do need to change, now. Here are some of the things I feel are on that list.

Housing options. Anyone who thinks that market forces will rally to create the housing we need for the people who need it are missing one important point when it comes to the free market. The free market favors people who have money and is painfully inhospitable to those who don’t. The housing market is a perfect example. Left to its own devices, housing prices have officially risen out of reach of all but people with six-figure incomes. There have only been three sales of homes below $500,000 this year. And that is a scary thing. The Housing Needs Covenant and other efforts by the housing office have been attempting to create a second, more affordable tier of housing to meet the needs of a range of essential community members. But more can and needs to be done.

Subsidizing growth. Growth costs the island in so many ways. In declining harbor water quality. In traffic. In sewer costs. In roads. In trash disposal. In the need for more fire and police services. In schools. But many of these factors are not taken into consideration when the town charges for things like sewer hook-ups, building permits and other permits for new construction. And as a result, everyone who pays taxes in this town continues to subsidize the building of new homes here. This needs to change. We need to do the math and look at all of the ways in which growth is driving costs up and make growth pay its own way. And then some.

The loss of community. Pick up the local newspapers on any given week and you’ll see headlines about assaults, drugs and other dangerous crimes. The Nantucket Police Department is working overtime to catch and prosecute criminals. In fact, drug arrests have doubled over last year. Chief Pittman and everyone who wears a badge deserves our thanks and our support, but they also need our help. Get to know your neighbors. Make a point to introduce yourselves. Be visible. Go for a walk and say hello to the people you meet. This is how you can let the negative elements in our community know that we are watching and that we stand together as a community against them. And let the positive elements in the neighborhood know you care. Take responsibility for the people in your neighborhood. The young people and the old. This island can be a safe and care-free place in which to grow up like it was when my wife, Barrie, was a child here, but it will take all of our efforts to make that happen.

Naysayerism. “We don’t do things like that on Nantucket.” “It will never work.” “That’s illegal.” “Wait until you’ve been here a while before you bring your ideas to the table.” “That’s just the special interests talking.” Have you heard any of these well-worn phrases lately? My feeling is, a good idea is a good idea, and sometimes on Nantucket the worth of a good idea can be measured by the things that are said against it. Instead of debating the merits of an idea we often hear many of the above phrases used to marginalize progressive thinking. That’s not an honest open debate. And it’s not productive. If we truly want change for the better, if we really want a more livable island, if we want to ensure that we have a future here, we have to overcome the entrenched negativism that is pervasive in our community. Anything is possible if we have the will, as a community, to make it happen.

The re-branding of Nantucket. Nantucket stands for something. For the beauty of nature, the ocean, and the beaches as well as the unique shopping experience and the amazing restaurants and the wonderful year-round community. But this vision of Nantucket — this sense of who we are, and how it makes us feel to be here — is being battered by outside forces with the same intensity that Sankaty Bluff is attacked by ocean storms. The more we allow the idea of Nantucket to be changed by money and greed and mainland sensibilities, the more our idea of Nantucket erodes. It’s true, we are a resort community. But we need to take steps to ensure that we remain part resort and part community. Because, in the end, the economic viability of the island depends as much on the people who live here as it does the people who visit.