Dale brings Chicago politics to Gilford
Well, although he was not officially part of the Library SubCommittee, he did listened/show up for this meeting. And said nothing.
And, he showed up for this meeting as well. And said nothing.
And then this past Thursday night at the full Budget Committee, he spoke. And trashed the Subcommittee and all the people on it by stating that they did not do their job - they were sloppy, they only cared about their preconceived ideas of what should be (note: when the percentage rise in the Library budget is the highest in the Town, you BET it is going to draw attention, regardless of what Dale wanted).
But the recordings and the paperwork shows otherwise (click on the links above). And yes, the recording will show that I did bring up his relationship to the Library Director (his wife) and that he and his wife's company has a commercial product installed at the Library (which he didn't particularly care for, see below). Even the Chair admonished him (as you can see / hear in the video) that he was satisfied that the job was done correctly (and he covered up later in the meeting).
If he was so unsatisfied with what was being done, why didn't he speak up THEN? He had the chance - he chose not to. He could have made his thoughts and feelings known to all - he failed to voice his opinion then.
You know, I have my differences with Dale. That's fine, I expected an attempt to discredit me so to prevent the cuts to his wife's budget. But he crossed the line when he besmirched the effort, the hours of work, that Doug, Bill, and Kevin put in. While Doug and I often agree in the result, the method, and the philosophy, Bill and Kevin have their own outlook on it. But that seemingly didn't matter to Dale with his tirade.
So, Why did he choose to remain silent in the smaller meetings and unload on everyone on the Subcommittee in the larger meeting (IMHO)?
Note: after the meeting, I called Bill, Doug, and Kevin to apologize for what Dale put them through. Necessary? From my standpoint - absolutely.
So why did Dale do this? I cannot read minds, but the little bits start to add up. What I believe it comes down to is this - it is quite easy to look back and see what budget he has most vociferously defended the last two years?
The Library budget.
A recap:
He was part of the group that tried to have the Budget Committee neutered by having its SB2 sanctioned ability to change and present the budget to the town folks reduced to being an advisory committee. When that was foiled by the wisdom of Mr. Dick Campbell, he reversed his position and decided to run for the BudComm. In hindsight - the political frontal attack failed, thus a flanking maneuver. Or, inside out maneuver. Whatever it would take to achieve a goal.
He campaigned that he would uphold the highest ethics. He promised not to vote on anything related to the library. His campaign was about change (he had lots of ideas of how the BudComm should be run and managed well before being on it - many of which contradicted the New Hampshire RSAs that govern SB2 Budget Committee). A flanking maneuver.
Well, it was obvious at the time that the election was really between him and Doug. However, when he was elected, it was after he lost by a large margin to both Bill Phillips and Doug. But with another side step and he claimed victory by beating Terry Stewart (which kinda made my head swivel, as most people realized the race has been against Doug). Another flanking maneuver - changing the subject?
And then at the first BudComm meeting after the election, he announced that he would be voting on all things including his wife's budget: the Library. And he gleefully repudiated his campaign promises with the statement there was nothing legally that the BudComm could do to stop him. Another flanking maneuver to achieve a goal.
Last year, he was the staunchest supporter of no cuts to the Library budget and that budget was, shall I say, his most active participation.
And with his trashing of this year's Library Subcommittee, it was repeated. This time, the tactic was instead of going after the cuts, he went to the tactic of discrediting the subcommittee. Why not? Discrediting the subcommittee means a reversal of the cuts, force a new composition of a succeeding subcommittee, and if that new composition is favorable to him, sidestep the decrease in growth of the Library budget. Fait Accompli.
(Note: even with the lowering of $9,800 of the budget, it was still an overall budget increase).
Dale complained that we were ideologically bent on decreasing the Library budget (as that claim alone was sufficient to undo what we had done, as if that was a "BAD" thing). Well, the Trustees claimed they needed the new part time position because of increased circulation. If we were that ideologically persuaded, we would have cut the position entirely or severly cut the down the hours (and I did run some scenarios to see what that would have done). If we were going to "punish" the library, as Dale intimated, because it was turning more "into a cultural center rather than a traditional library", we could have stripped out the Programs budget out.
We did neither. We cut chairs. We cut 3 computers. We cut 7 chairs. We lowered postage. We did not cut the main needs of the library (ok, instead of buy just over 800 books in the new year, it was in the high 700s.). And since Terry Stewart had also attended the first meeting, he set the public and the rest of the BudComm straight about how the discussion went.
But Dale wanted nothing cut. Heck, even Bob K., a Library Trustee, said that they felt that their 7.46% was actually level funding (only in governmentalese!).
End result was that just over $1,000 was put back in.
But it didn't stop there. After the meeting, it was rather obvious that my bringing up his wife and his company that provides web software to the Library was, for him, out of bounds and he told me why. My response was "fine, but the next time you decide to trash a subcommittee, at least have the decency to let them know about it in advance". I felt that if he wanted better treatment, he should be willing to do the same.
His parting words as he walked away: "It is not required"
Chicago politics. Whatever it takes.
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View the meeting by clicking on the Video guy below:
