Petition to Call a Special Town Meeting: Town of Westwood v Westwood Land Trust

To the Editor,

I recently submitted a letter to this space outlining my understanding of the Town of Westwood’s lawsuit against the Westwood Land Trust regarding the conservation of Clapboardtree Meadow, and explaining my personal opposition to it.

I am grateful that the Westwood Minute published my letter, because an open and unbiased forum for public comment and debate is badly needed in Westwood at the moment.

Other news outlets, including The Boston Globe, Hometown Weekly, and Fox25 News, have recently published very one-sided features about this dispute, which in my view are not adding anything constructive to the public discussion it deserves.

The Select Board, under Chairman Gotti’s leadership, seems determined to pursue what I believe is a highly unpopular, hostile, expensive, and divisive course of action despite the valid and well founded objections of many residents and an offer by the Donors to re-purchase the Meadow, which, if accepted, would end this controversy altogether.

The question we are all asking is why? The potential benefits to the private farm are obvious, but what are the benefits to the rest of us? And do these public benefits outweigh the costs, financial and otherwise, of attaining them?

These should not be hard questions for Chairman Gotti and his colleagues to answer. Many residents are troubled by the fact that our Select Board cannot - or will not - explain its decision-making process or articulate a public interest motivation behind its actions. We are frustrated by our Select Board’s lack of transparency and stubborn refusal to entertain public comments, answer legitimate questions, or engage in any meaningful discourse, either publicly or in private.

Following a particularly unsatisfying (virtual) Select Board meeting last Monday night, December 8th (which was recorded and is available for viewing on YouTube), a large group of Westwood residents decided to organize ourselves for the purpose of taking further action.

None of us are affiliated with the Westwood Land Trust.   We are acting independently.

We have decided to Petition the Select Board to Call a Special Town Meeting pursuant to MGL c. 39, s 10.

According to this law, a Select Board must call a Special Town Meeting upon request in writing of 200 registered voters, not later than 45 days after the receipt of such request, and “shall insert in the warrant therefor all subjects the insertion of which shall be requested by said petition.”

We hope that a Special - and single issue - Town Meeting will provide a forum for Westwood  residents to speak and be heard, to have our questions answered, and, perhaps most importantly, to weigh in with respect to how our Select Board decides to move forward.

Our petition includes the following warrant articles, which propose to see if the Town will vote to:

• recommend that the Town immediately discontinue its lawsuit against the Westwood Land Trust;

• prohibit the expenditure of any Town funds in furtherance of said lawsuit;

• require a full public accounting of all Town funds spent to date in furtherance of said lawsuit; and

• recommend that the Town engage in no further action related to this matter without first holding an open, in-person public meeting.

It also asks Town Counsel to review the petition and warrant articles so that if there is a problem or deficiency, the petition or the article can be corrected.

The purpose of this exercise is to provide all Westwood residents a public forum where proponents of both sides can speak and be heard.

I do not know how residents will vote, but I do believe we are entitled to meaningful public conversation about this controversy, whose cost and outcome will affect all of us.

If you are a registered Westwood voter who would like to sign our petition, we will have copies available in the Main Branch of the Public Library this Thursday, December 18th from 6-7:30 pm and again this Saturday, December 20th, from 2-4 pm.  

Erin Sibley 

NOTE: Since writing this, I’ve learned that the Select Board has canceled its next regular meeting, which had been scheduled to be held via Zoom on Monday, December 22nd @ 6 pm.   Some of us had formally requested to add specific questions related to the lawsuit to the agenda for that meeting.