OPINION: Why Is There a Lack of Candidates for Westwood Town Election?

Thank you to Mr. Moore for raising a very critical question. It is similar to a statement/challenge made by another resident who administers a local facebook page.

On the day after my resignation (Feb. 4th), I saw a post on said Facebook group. A person going by the name Kevin Haskins replied to the administrator’s comment with the following:

I think you’re wrong that there aren’t enough people who want to do it. This is still a popularity contest not an issues election. There’s no real form of campaigning that can really allow competing candidates to debate. There’s no real platform to talk about the issues at hand. It’s come down to who has the most friends and who has the loudest voice on the internet. A candidate should have to caucus. But it’s not paid position and its volunteer base doesn’t want to spend thousands of dollars on an ad campaign. I’m surprised what people are willing to spend to get elected to a volunteer position though. (Mr. Haskins went on to tag Mandy St. Clair in a question asking if she’d consider running.)

Not knowing whether or not Kevin Haskins was a real person, much less a fellow Westwood resident, I debated whether or not to respond. However, I saw this complaint about the system as an opening to more fully explore his hypothesis and responded as follows (note I have updated the references to candidates as of today, March 5th):

Hi Kevin, I hope you are right on the willingness of people to serve. Our form of government is dependent on it.

When I ran for the Select Board, I was one of three candidates in 2020…which we all will remember as a strange time due to the outbreak of a global pandemic.

The League of Women voters held a virtual debate.

The late, great Skip Wells similarly organized a virtual debate for the residents of Fox Hill Village which had a great turnout and we were asked very thoughtful questions.

I held neighborhood walk/talks to help get people out of their homes and to talk about issues concerning them all while keeping the required social distancing and getting some steps in.

I recall one of my opponents, Dave Atkins, going door to door all over town to do similar.

It was exactly what you seem to desire…as you should.

Marianne and I each ran unopposed for our second term.

Joe remains unopposed as of this post. (and still does as of March 5th.)

There are two open seats on Planning Board that each have but one potential candidate (both incumbents).

The School Committee openings have one potential contested seat with 3 candidates vying for two of the three year seats, assuming the third candidate does return signed nomination papers by Tuesday's deadline.

I personally would even encourage longer form debates to allow answers to demonstrate depth of thought and intellectual agility.

Unfortunately, most debates are dumbed down to answering in 2 minutes with 60 seconds allowed for rebuttal.

Most issues are far more nuanced than that and require intellectual curiosity to ask the right questions; intellectual agility to understand and get to the core of; and creativity to explore the art of the possible for solutions. Then it requires clear, concise, communication skills.

But to Nancy James earlier point (an earlier comment on the FB thread), it requires residents to care, to make time to understand and to think critically on options.

There are those who will say “the Town” needs to adapt and put out more communications in short form like Reels other “digestible” social media content to fit people’s lives today.

I offer a counter to that notion as doing so only serves to dumb down the discussion to sound bites and social media engagement such as 👍🏻.

Mandy St. Clair is right, she, much like 99.5% of other residents lead very busy lives and just don’t have the time to dedicate to serve.

Therein lies a part of the problem, that I don’t blame anyone for. I get it….we’re all busy enough, why take on the stress and time commitment?

Why?

If we don’t have thoughtful, selfless people willing to give of their time, talent and thought…this beautifully imperfect, work-in-progress, called Democracy doesn’t work.

As for the costs of campaigning, I raised money $25, $50, $100 at a time by talking with residents one-on-one and in small groups. Campaigning is part of the process. Few people I’ve met who hold or has held office enjoys that part of the process. It is itself time consuming and exhausting. But without awareness, it’s hard to get to the consideration stage of the purchase funnel of decision making for casting a vote.

So, I return to…Hope. I hope you are right. I hope there are caring, thoughtful people who are willing to make the sacrifice required of the responsibilities of elected volunteer office in service of our community.

We need them.