Opinion: Take action, and take heart

Dear Editor,

Thank you for publishing Supervisor Don Castellucci’s “Year in Review” for the town. I depend on published sources for local politics since my trophy bride has forbidden my attending Owego Village Trustees meetings. She is afraid the Mayor will direct the Sheriff to silence me (as he did with Kevin Millar) since I used “Trump-like language” describing the wrap-it-in-vinyl anti-preservation crowd. My strong Tompkins County accent clearly identifies me as a smart-alecky outsider.

Our one-party Village administration wants new terms in office. Before you sign anybody’s petition, please review the New York State Board of Elections Campaign Financial Disclosure record. If you are comfortable with the almost $40,000 these bureaucrats have mostly self-invested for the previous election and forward into the March contest, then sign the petitions. If you feel railroaded, by entrenched bureaucrats, who plan to spend 10 times more than this ordinary citizen thinks reasonable to retain an office, then in the words of Deep Throat, the Nixon Era mole, “follow the money” to determine their motivation before you sign up for one-party government. 

What possible advantage can these politicos hope for? There is no advantage to the taxpayers. The canard of holding the line on taxes is obviated by endorsing the more than 40 percent increase in sewer rates. Our money, as tax or fee, is still disappearing along with Village services. Unlike Newark Valley or the Town of Owego, we cannot see the Owego Village budget online.   

This note is a prayer to take action and take heart. Paraphrasing Charlotte’s Web author, E. B. White, writing to a distraught man, “As long as there is one upright (voter), as long as there is one compassionate woman, the contagion may spread (but) the scene is not desolate. Hope is the thing that is left to us, in a bad time. I shall get up Sunday morning and wind the clock, as a contribution to order and steadfastness,” and I will not sign any petition endorsing a trajectory designed to dissolve our beloved Village.

Sincerely,

Peter C. Gordon

Owego, N.Y.