Holla... I mean, Challah!

February 25, 2010 by Sadie in Sadie & Greg

I have a dear friend who often invites me over for shabbat. Because she keeps semi-kosher, I can't contribute to the meal. But after a year and a half, I've convinced her to let me make challah. The most I can reasonably do to kosher-up my kitchen is burn it down, so I poured boiling water over everything and put the over on self-clean. Unfortunately, heating the oven made the kitchen smell more like roasting bacon. For someone who considers herself fastidious, having someone ask you to wrap your kitchen utensils in three layers of tinfoil is quite humbling. But the bread looks pretty, and we got to have challah french toast smothered in brandy-soaked apples with the extra loaf this morning. The perfect Purim!

Grafton Civic Life Series No. 2

February 18, 2010 by Sadie in Sadie & Greg

The Reciprocity of Public Servants and Private Citizens in Pay As You Throw

After decades of organizing slums in Chicago, Kansas City, and Rochester, community organizer Saul Alinsky wanted to take on a new organizing project- the middle class. He explained that America’s suburban “Silent Majority” was neither conservative nor liberal, but “alienated, depersonalized, without any feeling of participation in the political process.” Many scholars and activists have echoed the sentiment that America is steeped in alienation, that our civic life is in a four-decade freefall. The League of Women Voters have given way to professional advocacy organizations. Suburban sprawl demobilizes neighborhood associations. As Robert Putnam argued in his work on the weakening of our social connections with each other, more of us are bowling alone.

As a newcomer to Grafton and student of democratic participation, I was ready to join the ranks of suburban commuters nostalgic for the Grange. Boy, was I wrong. In my eight months here, I’ve seen residents seize Aulinsky’s challenge, advancing towards a genuinely participatory community. Private citizens found farmer’s markets, preserve land, and grow thousands of pounds of organic produce for the Worcester County Food Bank. In addition to private action, and often behind the scenes, our public servants are also investing in citizen voice.

Municipalities need residents to help evaluate and promote policy changes in times of lean. When the town faced a $450,000 budget shortfall, the town administrator and board of selectmen relied on a group of volunteers to half the Town’s second largest budget line- garbage collection. The recycling committee proposed Pay-As-You-Throw, a program that reduced the town’s trash collection from 400 to 200 tons a month in the first six months.

In June 2009, Doreen DeFazio stepped down from her position on the recycling committee to coordinate Grafton’s new Pay-As-You-Throw program. Of the public and private work to advance recycling, DeFazio says, “it takes efforts from many different angles. I take small steps forward, and the recycling committee takes small steps forward, and you look back and say, ‘this is really working.’” Consequently, Grafton has increased the number of households recycling from 12 to 44 percent in the last year and a half. “I look at Groton, and they have a 66 percent recycling rate. That’s where I want Grafton to be.”

Saul Aulisky would call this public-private arrangement cooptation. But DeFazio believes that commitment to civic life is stronger than ever. “I grew up in Grafton as a farm town of 8,500 and when I came back, it was totally different. But often feel its more of a community now.” The difference between Aulinsky’s vision of social change and the social change that is happening right now in Grafton is a commitment to partnership, even in the midst of conflict. “Last week I witnessed 1,500 people patiently cast their vote for a new school,” says DeFazio. “I’m proud to be part of this community. I think people realize that it’s a gem, and they want to be here and be active.”

Grafton Civic Life Series No. 1

February 18, 2010 by Sadie in Sadie & Greg

The Civic Ecology of Land Preservation

Last Saturday, we saw how citizen engagement in local issues can alter the future of Grafton. The special town meeting is proof that our local governing structure demands local solutions and citizen approval, although policy itself is not made at town meeting. So who really gets things done in town? Do most policy changes come from citizens on boards and ad-hoc town committees, or through voluntary associations? As a new resident and member of the planning board, I became interested in public problem-solving within the context of development. This series is an attempt to understand civic life in a town in transition, where looping subdivisions rub against the pastoral landscape.

Like many towns shifting from rural mill villages to residential subdivisions, Grafton residents have complex and often conflicting values and visions for the future of the town. According to the 2001 Comprehensive Plan, forty percent of Grafton residents surveyed said they were attracted to the Town because of its small-town character. And with the extension of the commuter rail and route 146, commuters can have more bucolic for half the price, and still get to work by nine. That simple cost-benefit analysis got me here in the first place.

But someone’s got to keep an eye on the bucolic while I’m busy with my commute. Anyway, bucolic is the most cost-efficient use of local taxes. Unlike residential developments, open land doesn’t make a family or call the fire department, and uses thirty-seven cents in services for every dollar a town collects from property taxes. For every dollar of revenue a town raises on a residential property, that property uses one dollar and nineteen cents in town services.

Unfortunately, like residential development, land preservation takes a pile of money and a sophisticated understanding of state land use policies. It also requires the technical expertise of town planners to support the Community Preservation Committee and ensure that Land Trust acquisitions are not hindered by subdivision defaults. And tax policies incentivize generous donations from landowners to protect open land.

Because of the interdependence of stakeholders, land preservation is a lesson in civic ecology. Public incentive structures and technical support bolster the work of independent organizations like the Grafton Land Trust. In May 2004, the town and Land Trust worked in partnership to protect the Hassanamesit Woods from development. As Ed Hazzard of the Grafton Land Trust explained, the property captured Grafton residents’ sense of history. Archeologists unearthed cultural artifacts and a cultural identity for a town that is as defined by highways as by its town common. The less visible story of Hassanamesit is the persistence of local residents to preserve citizen engagement and Grafton’s civic identity.

Making Robots for Valentines Day

February 14, 2010 by Sadie in Sadie & Greg

I am sitting with Greg as he surrounds himself with bolts and flat metal peices and communicates with his fellow robot geeks online. Apparently, many geeks spend Valentines day making sweet robots, not sweet romance. Although my geek make me dutch babies with brandied stone fruit this morning. I'm a lucky lady.

Sorry for my bloggin absence. I'm writing on civic life for the Grafton Times, so my thoughts on exurb life have to be channeled productively and include actual facts and interviews with real people.