BELLOWS FALLS — The proposed merger of Bellows Falls and the town of Rockingham soon comes to a vote.
At Bellows Falls' first merger hearing, a lone booster for the proposal suggested that the town of Rockingham could be likened to God.
I was relieved to learn Scripture doesn't support that notion.
We don't need a merger. The local government isn't broken. The town and the village are not adversaries.
The current governing boards do a good job overseeing the community's interests from understandably different perspectives.
Approving the proposed merger would be like volunteering to get cancer. The merger proposal exhibits many traits of a cancer: it is unwanted, divisive, and spendthrift, and to aggravate future expenditures it constantly threatens to further mutate.
A merger's immediate increase of the town tax rate by 37 cents opens a door to more increases as early as the next budget cycle.
Please vote no on the merger at the Special Meeting on Tuesday, May 17 from 9 a.m. to 7 p.m. at the Masonic Temple on Westminster Street.