Nora,
Their clear disregard for the truth will come back to haunt them. If you toss in their lack of accountability, then you realize they have no respect for the citizens of this fine town. We must continue to highlight each and every misstep they make. More and more citizens are now aware of the complete dysfuntion that starts with the Selectmen and permeates throughout our administrative staff. It's time for a change and it will happen.

Thank you for bringing the truth out to combat the baseless and shallow claims against the trustees and WFL.

I agree with you Larry. I just don't understand why more people are not outraged at the cost of the senseless library litigation for legal fees that are paid for on the backs of the taxpayers who would rather have their roads repaired, or the snow plowed this winter, or more staffing in the town's departments, or....well I could name plenty of things that money could have been used for instead of litigation.

Many of you looked at the video clip of the dismissal of the trustees (on the video blog thread). Recall that Priscilla Porter said several times in that video (before she was dismissed) that the trustees had no problem allowing the BoS to appoint the library trustees.

The Friends fortunately had indemnity insurance so our fees were all covered except for the $2500 deductible we had to pay (that could have been used for the library instead!!!). But I do get to see the bills that were sent by the Friends lawyer to the insurance company and I have seen all of the Trustee's and Foundation's bills from Phil Beauragard.

Consequently, I have to figure it cost the town at least $100,000 for the litigation. (I believe Fin Com would have the exact figures but only if the "town" will give Fin Com the numbers they have been asking for since they took office!!)

So let's see what the results of the litigation were again:

1. The BoS gets to appoint trustees. Since this was agreed to before litigation as evidenced by the video, big whoop. I still don't get why they are dragging their feet appointing new trustees when they spent nearly $100,000 for this privilege!!!

2. The town's insurance pays Phil Beauragard $40,000. The town's insurance only covers members of the town's boards and not private corporations. So, because the trustees were legally appointed by a recognized appointing authority for the town, and each swore an oath to the town clerk to act as public trustees, it looks like the decision was in the favor of the former trustees. (Recall that the trust was held by a private non-profit, hence the public/private issue.)

3. The Friends get to keep the $75,000 that was a gift from the former trustees for the Spinney library project. (Good thing we had insurance or it would have cost us that $75,000 just in legal fees to prove we were right all along!)

4.  The private corporation that was in existence in Wareham and incorporated since 1891, known as the Wareham Free Library, Inc. must dissolve. This is being done now with the help of a local lawyer.

5. The money that was transferred from the trustees to the private foundation, Wareham Library Foundation, Inc. was legally transferred and the money (except for #6 below) stays with the Foundation.

6.  The former trustees/ library foundation, agreed to donate $50,000 to the new library trustee trust fund in the care of the town. (Since we owed Phil Beauragard $40,000 and would have had to pay his bill, we can now take that amount off the accounts payable category since the insurance company picked up that tab. $50,000 is in the lawyer's escrow account waiting to go to the new trust fund. Total realized loss to trustees/foundation from this deal? $10,000.)

People should be outraged at this totally unnecessary litigation that caused the spending of tax dollars which could have and should have been used on the real needs of this town. The only way to stop this irresponsible behavior is in the voting booth in April. I've had enough. Have you?

If the Hypocrite Elite would take the time they spend on manufacturing lies to destract from their screw-ups and actually dedicated that effort into doing something crazy like, not screwing up in the first place, this town would be alot better off.

April can't come soon enough.  Throw these lying scumbags out the door.

Thanks to all of you for your kind words.  It sure makes me feel better in light of the recent nastiness, and now that I can speak freely (since the litigation has been completely dismissed from the courts), I want to get the truth out there. Thanks for your patience as I know I am wordy at times.

Bornofwareham brings up a good point. The book Images of America, Wareham (which you can still buy at the library or at the Company Store, Paper Store, or Borders) is in that sepia-toned series of books that provide a historical snapshot of a town.

Lynda Byrne Ames and Susan Pizzolato collated the old photos of Wareham and composed the text describing the photos etc.  The books sold at the library (purchased by the Friends for resale) return a profit for the sale. Books sold outside of the library return royalties to the authors.  These two women have donated every penny of the sale profits and the royalties to the Friends' archival bank account and those funds are restricted to historical preservation of records and documents, supplies for preservation etc.

For example, last month we purchased several acid free archival boxes for storing some recently attained documents and also paid to have a CD created out of some old photo slides of certain areas of Wareham. Because of the money in the archival account, the library is better able to care for our history. Several years back the Friends were able to purchase a very old record book that had the names of Wareham soldiers from (if memory serves) the Civil War. Our Wareham history is so interesting and important.

By the way, the historical documents, old town records etc. are kept in the special room of the library called the Stone Research Room. The money for the building of that room came from the Stone (Converse sneakers) family. (You can also thank the Stone family for the loan of and donation of some of the art work in the library.) Through a grant prepared by Mary Jane and Susan, we were able to have a professional archivist help with the archiving of historical materials and train the staff to continue with proper archiving techniques.

We have so many generous and wonderful people in this town who have supported our library and made it a better place.  It's times like these when we are thinking of giving thanks, that all we need to do is look around us and see so many good-hearted people working for the betterment of the town we live in. I truly believe Wareham can be saved!!

As long as our community continues to care, it will overcome this debacle of the BOS, its mouthpiece and all the mistrust which was used to bring this miscarriage about.

Many of our citizens haven't experienced all the good our library, our police, and town employees contribute each day outside the news. Whether they read it or not really doesn't matter, its whats in their hearts and minds that does.  It's hard in today's world to decipher what really takes place behind the scenes.

During the holidays I especially like sharing Charles Shulltz's Philosophy:

http://thewayofpeace.org/shultz_philosophy.html

This reminds me of many of the good things in life and what thinking about this town can become again.