Look Ma, no hands and I’m slinging cliché after cliché!

According to the Billerica.org website in a column by Joe Vines, Planning Board member and member of the Parker Elementary School Committee, Bob Casey’s motion to have the Planning Board review the project was rejected twice. No other member seconded and the motion fell into a catch basin swept along on a tide of nonchalance in order to get the project started.

The Parker Elementary School is in horrible shape, structurally. On the one hand, I, too, would like to see the project started and finished as quickly as practical. However, that’s more than just a word’s difference from as quickly as possible.

We’ve all heard the expression that haste makes waste, or measure twice; cut once. Yet, when the stakes are high and the potential for a costly mistake, yet unseen, is ever present; it seems people often choose to disregard common sense, logic and parental teachings and just throw caution to the wind in the name of expediency.

But, isn’t that exactly how the town got in the position it is in with it’s less than ideal curb appeal throughout our main thoroughfares, and our partly filled to completely abandoned malls and businesses? It wasn’t that long ago that anyone with a project and a potential buck for the coffers was granted carte blanche to build as they saw fit; the sooner the better, the more the merrier! Sometimes projects included a decent review, other times just a minimal review; most of the time the quality of the review seemed to rely more on who you knew than what the project. Other times it seem like the needs and interests of the town were sacrificed to the vision of the project designer. As long as the project made money, who cared?

The Parker Elementary School is a different case. It is very much needed and will be put to good use. But are we absolutely certain that there are no unintended consequences behind the veil, and if there are some, that they are not significant enough to be prudent? Although it may cost money to set up temporary classroom modules as Woburn did in order to build a new school over the footprint of the demolished building; it could cost even more to not do so. We do know that without at least a cursory review of the project, we won’t know what the better course would have been until it’s too late, or until the board has been cut too short or at the incorrect angle to use. “It’s O.K. pal, just throw it in the waste pile along with your dipstick, Jimma!”

This is the point at which I differed from many of the so-called “conservatives” who wanted a smaller, less costly or less adequate school. To me, conservative means not avoiding spending, but to spend wisely and cautiously; to check what you are buying, where and how it will be used and that it will not grow into a money pit later. Conservative means moving cautiously and taking into consideration facts not addressed or in evidence, but discovered only after due deliberation, sound assessments and solid decision making prior to deciding to act this way or that.

Have we done that? I know town counsel has stated that when it comes to public buildings, plans do not need to go before the Planning Board. The Dover Amendment makes it clear that schools, churches and even mosques have a certain protection and exemptions from zoning that no other project has access to. I have no doubt that he is legally correct in his interpretation of MGL 40A and the Dover Amendment; but is this perspective prudent. Should we not be cautious and prudent simply because we don’t have to be on a $35,000,000.00 plus project? Or, for once, should we give a tip of the hat to our parents and mentors and measure twice; cut once in an effort to avoid wasted time, money and energy by rushing headlong toward what could be success or an abyss – but for the moment, at least a quantifiable unknown?

I am not implying that those who sat silent are bad people or that they assured a bad outcome. For all I know, they could be proven correct. But, could is a shakey word in my vocabulary. However, for the record, these are the members of the Parker Elementary School Building Committee. Remember that Mr. Casey was the only voice advocating caution and due diligence. All of the others – every single one of them – see no need to take a good look beyond what has been presented so far. Everyone of them sees no validity, legitimacy or need for the experienced members of the Planning Board to take one last look before jumping off with the hope that the parachute is in good working order. This list will be here should the town encounter more than it bargained for should you decide to come back and rediscover who to go to to ask, why?

When the power plant exploded in Connecticut, do you suppose the workers were being prudent, or were they, perhaps, being pushed so quickly that with each measurement or each cut, their futures were given equal measure?

Then again, we wouldn’t have this debate if the Dover Amendment had not been included into MGL 40A. The only way to get around it in the future is to have the Amendment removed by the state legislature.