Sorry Times, June 24th, 2024

 Hello Pepperell community,

It is a painful day for us as we struggle with difficult financial decisions and voting on the override article.  Thank you to all who have participated in the search for understanding and best answers.

 Whether the override passes or fails, I believe we need changes in our town leadership.  Many financial demands are beyond our immediate control.  However, I believe our Town Administrator , Select Board and finance committee have failed us.  We have been pursuing the wrong development strategies, wasting time, effort and money on commercial and residential growth, trying to change our town into a more urban place to live.

​I have been pushing back, with many allies, on that strategy.  My personal experience, as a Select Board member, has taught me how dishonest and unethical my opponents are willing to be to advance their cause.  Their contempt for Pepperell voters has been staggering and offensive .

I have held off sharing complaints with my voters, preferring to ignore mudslinging attempts to diminish my professional Select Board work and paint me as  being both dishonest and a fool.  They have treated Department Heads, staff, committee and boards and our State Senator and the public with disrespect in attempts to bully their agenda forward.  

I hope, as a reader, you will learn that I'm not interested in sharing the dirty laundry of day to day work in town government.  I believe, right now, we are up against very stubborn and determined leaders that create structural barriers to finding the helpful answers we need .  Positions proposed to be cut reduce important income streams from the building dept.  Closing the conservation office that generates millions in grant revenu can only be explained as examples of retribution due to internal town hall conflict.  Much of my time has been trying to put out committee or commission fires started by our Town Administrator.  We need consensus building, respectful leadership.  Current Select Board members and the Town Administrator need to hear from voters that they won't tolerate their autocratic ways anymore.    

I have my own regrets in not having worked effectively much earlier to inform the public of the problems I see.  I wish I had worked harder for financial savings actions and income streams so that the 2024 Town Meeting would not be so catastrophic for us.

We are a hard working and deserving community.  For lots of reasons, this struggle is not fair.  Some like minded citizens  will be joining me soon in public meetings and messages to ask voters to better understand where we are and help find the pathways to  fiscal responsibility and the successful lives we work so hard for.

Thank you for trusting my work on your behalf,  Tony Beattie, Pepperell Select Board Clerk