Action Takes Time

Yesterday brought an e-mail from a Middletown businessman who told me, “We need rapid and effective collaboration between the three [island communities] now. Most of all, how do we keep this from being politicized? Attack this problem from a business perspective and it gets solved very quickly. Politicize it, and we are doomed to talk and gridlock.”

I certainly hope he is wrong. The one thing that I would not like to see is a bunch of people making consolidation a political football. The keywords in one of my earlier posts were “honestly and honorably.”

He was absolutely right about one thing though. Government doesn’t work as fast as the business world. A business develops an idea, designs it, produces it, and markets it pretty quickly. If it works, great. If not, there is readjustment or redirection. Pretty simple.

Government is not that easy. Major decisions are made by a group of divergent thinkers. It takes time to reach consensus or even a majority willing to take action. Then there is the need for public input and due reconsideration. Often it takes time to weigh the interests of a few in light of the potential result for the whole. More time passes before there is decisive action.

How does this time problem relate to sharing municipal services and school regionalization? As much as it would be nice for those who have long advocated for such consolidation, the process of reaching consensus for school regionalization by voter approval will take time.

It can’t be rushed. It can’t be arbitrarily decreed. It must be explored in each community by all concerned to determine the advantages and disadvantages for each. Then, if each community decides to proceed and, if a regional board is authorized by each individual town, the concept will have to be discussed and negotiated until a clear delineation of a common goal is agreed to by all the parties.

All this has to happen before it can even begin to be marketed to the voters. How can you market something that isn’t clearly identified so that everyone visualizes exactly the same thing? The voters are the ones who will have to support it – after they know what they are voting for.

Unfortunately, government action can’t be rushed – even when fiscal issues and the future of our children are on the line.

However, with a serious commitment by all the island government bodies, it can move forward deliberately and expeditiously to provide relief for taxpayers and a better education for their children.