The Hobart Civic Association hosted a “Meet the Candidate Night” at the Hobart Community Center on October 27, 2007 for the upcoming Stamford Town Board Elections. All of the candidates were on hand: Kelly Keck (D) for Town Supervisor, Barbara Doyle (D) for Town Board, Donna Houghton (B endorsed by D) for Town Board and Mike Triolo, BJ Spinney and Rudy Stripp (R ).

Though the intent was to be fair to all candidates, they must have missed their mark. It was clearly staged to favor the R’s. But that’s no big surprise.

The surprising thing was the quality of the questions (all from members of the audience.) Though it started out with a series of thoughtful meaningful questions it quickly devolved to things like “Will Kelly Keck keep his job in Albany” and “Why does the paper say that the Donna Houghton is not endorsed by the Democrats” (of course Donna Houghton has been endorsed by the Stamford Democratic Committee).

Mike Triolo took the prize for the most REPUBLICAN response ever (see fake FEMA press conference). He works for the Catskill Watershed Corporation (CWC) (Funded by the NYC DEP) and was asked if, during his time as a town board member, he encouraged the town to utilize all of the programs the CWC has to offer (including the 59.7 million dollars that they have been sitting on in the Catskill Fund for the Future account for many, many years), his answer was perplexing. He explained that he, as the Economic Development Director of the CWC, presented a “Dog and Pony Show” to the Stamford Town Board (of which he was a member) but no one was interested in what was available. So he basically told himself about all of the programs that the DEP funded through the CWC but decided that he had not convinced himself to utilize them, as he made no attempt (when he put his Stamford Town Board hat back on) to introduce resolutions to his colleagues that would tap into this immense funding source.

Kelly Keck on the other hand was “spot on” as usual. Armed with the HR&A study that the CWC had commissioned after the signing of the Memorandum of Agreement (MOA) and the 5 year Filtration Avoidance Determination (FAD) and a book called “The Small-Mart Revolution,” Mr. Keck attempted to explain to the seemingly disinterested audience, exactly what the town was entitled to and how it could be used to revive our local economy while protecting our natural heritage. The Democrats all had real visions for real progress but the Republicans seemed to think supporting Industrial Wind Turbines, bashing New York City and being “native” to Stamford was enough to get every vote. Question after question about the future was answered by others as “there’s nothing we can do” but Kelly, Barbara and Donna kept coming up with progressive ideas to move forward as neighbors faced with a privatized public infrastructure. Ideas like reducing the town’s dependence on fossil fuels, sharing services like road maintenance and office space and first responders. Like comprehensive planning and basic zoning laws and like micro-enterprise development, water protection efforts and programs for our youth.

On the national stage, the Dems would have ruled, but here where the Status Quo is seems to be idolized, it was nothing more than depressing. If this was a random sample of the voting population (which it luckily was not) we wouldn’t have a chance in hates to pick up any seats from the “good ole boy network.” Fortunately the R’s and Invenergy stacked this audience so it was nowhere close to a real representation of what will happen on November 6th (our internal numbers look much more promising)… BUT this is what we are up against here. Folks who don’t want anything to change because they feel “Safe” from the impacts of the rest of the world. Folks who may be nice people but have no real desire to do the work it requires to build consensus to build a better community. Folks who pine for the days when every family was farm family and can’t even visulaize adapting to the changes of our society, our country and our planet.

It’s a long hard slog and the only way we can hope to see anything change is by getting involved, asking the hard questions and demanding accountability!!!

SPEAK OUT …. GET INVOLVED…. OR TAKE WHAT YOU GET!!!

Dave