Comments

• On the article Letter: Bouchard 'Qualified' for School Committee

  

  Ben Downs

  12:23 pm on Thursday, March 28, 2013

  I have asked tony about the apparent conflict in his two written statements and he wrote back saying they are both his opinion and there is no conflict and he would explain it to me last night. We did meet but he did not discuss it and left before I could ask about it. I asked him to call me but he has not. I can presume he meant he did not support the 10% cut because that is what he wrote about and that he stands by his level funding comment because that is also what he wrote

• On the article Letter: Bouchard 'Qualified' for School Committee

  

  Ben Downs

  2:23 pm on Thursday, March 28, 2013

  Jeff I like it better when you refuse to argue with posters because they are anonymous than when you make wild unsubstantiated guesses. Sorry it is not me I wish I had that wit though.

• On the article Parent Takes on New Role in Wayland Athletics

  Ben Downs

  9:51 am on Friday, August 10, 2012

  Eric cut his teeth with the high school swim team and while we had some teething pains he has been a great asset at our swim meets. Good luck on your new endeavor the basketball team is lucky to have you.

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• On the article Letter: OPEB Payments and Unrealized Tax Savings

  Ben Downs

  6:54 pm on Wednesday, April 4, 2012

  Tony,

  I have left this message for you elsewhere but you might have missed it.

  How do you know that an elected FinCom will improve financial oversight? It certainly appears from the few communities that follow this method that their oversight is certainly not better than ours and seems in many cases to be much worse. Some communities can not even get people to run.

  The idea of getting more volunteers in town to form an audit committee seems daunting. Even among the petitioners this year there is a huge overlap and not enough unique individuals to form this committee let alone to see that they would all be qualified.

  Will you please let me know who is the one to turn to to ensure the line items have been "properly scrutinized and publically(sic) vetted"? I have attended plenty of meetings and watched more on WayCam but you seem to have a different standard.

  Thanks

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• On the article Letter: Wayland Should Elect the Finance Committee

  Ben Downs

  10:14 pm on Sunday, April 1, 2012

  The authors take a very sneaky approach with the data when they try and make their point that we should elect the Finance Committee. Their argument is based on a very obvious playing with the numbers. What their letter points out but they choose to ignore is that they are not proposing the most common method to select a FinCom. Why not allow time to study our options and chose the best method?

  I am sure the letter writers just overlooked the fact that during the recent credit crisis nobody but a triple A credit could get any credit. So while the list the very low number of $100 in tax savings they forget that we went ahead and agreed to a new high school because we had the triple A rating and were assured we could sell our bonds even if the market was still frozen. Wayland has a better credit rating than the United States of America, please don't tell me our FinCom does not know what it is doing.

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• On the article Letter: Wayland Should Elect the Finance Committee

  Ben Downs

  10:11 pm on Sunday, April 1, 2012

  Jeff Dieffenbach does a nice job pointing out a few of the issues but he did not touch on a few additional points that I believe have merit.

  The writers are explicit about the issue of unanimous votes but neglect that the school committee has supported its budget unanimously ever since Ms. Wagner's husband has been on the board.

  The writers discuss high taxes as being the reason for declining property values but they ignore the fact that over the last two years our property values have increased while we have had the highest tax rate in our history. It is this focus on tax rates that is misguided because as any home buyer knows it is the total monthly cost that is considered. If you took the median home in Wayland and the median home in Weston your tax and mortgage payments in Wayland would be $3700 per month while in Weston it would be almost $7000. This difference does not include additional monthly costs due to the much higher base price in Weston.

  The letter writers make a point that many of our Selectman have come from our FinCom. If they are doing such a terrible job why does the majority of the town elect them when they run?

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