As a 30 year resident of Belmont, and a proponent of the last override, I wanted to express my dismay at the recent yard waste letter from the Citizens for a Fiscally Responsible Belmont (CFRB).
The CFRB has strongly opposed the last override, and had spent advertising dollars pushing for it to be defeated. I can not reconcile the same organization who scolded the town’s leadership for “going back to the well” and adding to taxpayers costs now advocating for a financial carveout for a specific policy they favor.
As an experienced Town Meeting member, I know how nearly double digits yearly healthcare inflation costs for our most valuable town employees: firefighters, police, and EMS (among many others) have found insufficient funding due to state-mandated limitations on raising revenues more than 2½ percent. And that is to say nothing of the dramatic increases in gas and food prices, for both the town and residents in the last two years. We need to ask ourselves tough questions about how we overcome these fiscal challenges, and we need to be honest and transparent about our stances, past and future.
Michael McNamara, Marlboro Street