Below are some of my thoughts regarding the responses of the Board of Selectmen candidates to Mr. Parenti’s survey questionnaire:

The two men who responded (Selectman Accomando did not) speak about a lack of money in a depressed economy. All admit that the town fathers have spent the past 10 years raising our property taxes while promising to do the opposite. The net result is a 70% or more increase in those taxes, and I think one could easily argue that with that 70% increased cost came lesser and lower quality services.

Granted, the town has kept our fees down, allegedly to help keep down taxpayer’s overall costs, but at what expense? At the time of the discussion on retroactive fee hikes for sewer primarily, but water as well, our leadership had the town in a position of losing half a million dollars a year because we were severely undercharging for services provided. Additionally, because funding our water and sewer services through some form of an enterprise fund was rejected early on and rarely if ever discussed afterward, we’ve run up a 5.5 million dollar deficit that we aren’t addressing even with the newly imposed retroactive hikes.

With that kind of debt, the prudent thing to do, from my perspective, is to fund the budget at last year’s level with no further increases for the budget under review or any other in the foreseeable future. If cuts have to be made that include layoffs, then, so be it. Because of collective bargaining rights and generous packages agreed to by the town, there is no way to recoup money by forcing cuts to wages or benefits.

The difference between any town and any other business is that business has to run on profits earned, while towns, for the most part, view the taxpayers as a bottomless trough to feed from. It’s past time to stop feeding the pig. Instead, we should be whacking it on the snout at every turn and forcing it on a diet.

I hear people whine about how taxes kept going up during the “boom times”. And while that is true, we were still not covering all of our expenses. If you have a rainy day fund of 3 million dollars and a sewer and water debt of 5.5 million dollars; in practice, you don’t have a rainy day fund. Saying you do may help you get votes and keep you in power, but it doesn’t make the facts of mismanagement go away…it just hides them. Using fee offsets to justify expanding property taxes is the coward’s way of governing through deceit and indifference about the consequences that will surely appear one day. It temporarily enables avoiding the hard choices that come with leadership and masks the overall incompetence by town management.

Consider for a moment that had an enterprise fund for water, sewer and Waste Water Treatment plant services and infrastructure been established early on, we’d be level funded or better and not in a debtor position. Our water/sewer rates might actually be lower. However, because we are in a debtor position in this one enterprise, where are we to get the funds to pay for a major water main break should one occur similar to the one that occured in Boston last year? Perhaps, our main pipes aren’t as large as the one in Boston is, and maybe we wouldn’t lose as much water or suffer the inconveniences suffered by those depending on that line for service, but we would suffer costs in several areas that we can’t afford either as a town or as a community.

Here is another reality. In addition to the 5.5 million we are in debt just for the water and sewer services provided, it has been estimated that another $6 million dollars are needed to replace meters that are 5 years beyond their expected life cycle and that could begin failing en masse at any moment in time. That means, just to make the system solvent and self-sustaining and to get readings that are accurate on a real-time basis through the use of working and reliable meters, we are in actuality, $11.5 million dollars in debt in providing water and sewer services and climbing.

How many CEOs do you suppose would survive such a record in business? Why are Selectmen and Town Managers given a pass for such poor performance records? Why is finger pointing allowed as acceptable behavior when it comes time to hold individuals and boards to account? We don’t accept that from our children; yet, it is a commonplace reaction from our political leaders and seems to draw no real consequence imposed by many of us who vote. Perhaps the answer rests in the quality of the candidates we accept. But, then again, some in Billerica believe that a “blow-in” could never truly grasp the town’s problems in context with its glorious, historical past.

This overall water/sewer associated bill will not pay itself, but before any other “investments” in the town can be calculated in, this is a vital area that must be considered and addressed. All of this trouble is directly attributable to a failure of leadership to properly consider and budget for the town’s real cost of operating in terms of dollars collected for services provided, including salaries and benefits as well as a myriad of other costs. All of this trouble is directly attributable to politicians preferring to rob Peter to pay Paul to make it appear that they are doing a good job and to convince Billerica residents that they are getting a great deal by continuing to live in a low cost town.

Just think…I haven’t even brought up the School Department and how they manage to hide or disguise their fiscal mismanagement. The truth is that until we figure out exactly where we stand in terms of real debt, we’ll be hard pressed to address any improvements to the town simply because we have no understanding of the town’s true financial picture. I cannot urge citizens enough to force this town into submitting to a full and comprehensive forensic audit going back a decade or more.

In the meantime, we need to take advantage of every tool in our toolkit to draw in businesses of all sizes and to encourage them to stay by building a partnership and convincing them that Billerica understands its problems. Billerica understands how we got into these problems. And, finally, that Billerica is committed to solving its problems and building in safeguards to prevent them from reoccurring.

It costs nothing to approve a mixed use overlay. Developers cannot set up a mixed use project without meeting the additional standards that are above and beyond current zoning. But when those projects that do meet or exceed the overlay requirements come along, there is a very good chance that we could come up with something special.

I’ve heard people complain about a mixed use overlay as it was applied in North Billerica. Most of the negative comments have appeared on the Billerica Watcher’s Group website, and most specifically, from the BWG site originator, Ed Camplese. What I have not heard is whether the plan that was used there has been compared to the plan under review and an objective opinion on how the two are alike or different. Zoning weaknesses can be strengthened and areas that are too restrictive to be practical can be loosened to accommodate new trends by frequent reviews and updates. If we can afford to run $11.5 million in potential debt and $5.5 million in actual debt on our water/sewer system alone, then I think we can find a way to fund a comprehensive zoning/traffic study that could substantially benefit the town in terms of walkability, traffic flow, an improved business climate and quality of life initiatives as well as an improvement in general aesthetics.

All in all, I found little new from this questionnaire. It is my belief that none of the candidates have truly given the issues covered much critical thought or honestly appraised how the town currently operates and what steps need to be taken or what course should be followed to gain significant improvement. Again, there is not much new in comparing this attitude with the attitude of candidates in previous elections. It would be nice, however, if the candidates would address the issues above candidly and completely to demonstrate that they aren’t about to continue making the same mistakes and that there is at least an ounce of courage in their makeup that can be relied upon to do the right things to get the down back to fiscal solvency and moral sanity.