Mary Kasper vs Three City Councilors

My name is Mary Kasper, 106 High St. in Florence. I'm here to talk about the Feb. 22nd meeting of the Committee on Social Services and Veterans Affairs.

For those who have not seen the video of this meeting, please check out NORTHAMPTONMEDIA.COM.

I was a City Department Head for 9 years and a member of the Northampton High School Building Committee for 7 years, over 5 of them as the Vice-Chair. I’ve attended well over two hundred city meetings, and I have never seen one like this one. It was conducted with no regard for public meeting rules. It's hard to know who's chairing the meeting. A member of the audience acts like a Committee member, speaking at will. Had I not seen the name first I would have thought it was some sort of Committee on Public Morals.

Matters Councilors LaBarge, Plassmann, and Tacy discuss are: raising the fines for marijuana use; having drug-sniffing dogs in the schools; trying to gate and control access to the Meadows; changing open container laws. At the suggestion of an unidentified member of the audience, they decide it’s appropriate to look at sex ads in the Valley Advocate and add this to their future agenda.

City Code, Chapter 22-6 Subsection A2, defines the charge of this committee. None of these matters are under its purview.

Particularly troubling is Councilor Plassmann’s pushing of her personal agenda to change marijuana laws by May, in total disregard for the will of the voters.

Where is there any sign of good process? Where is public input? Where are best practices?Nowhere to be found in this discussion.

In 2008, 12,527 Northampton voters voted YES on Question 2, the marijuana referendum; 3,403 voted NO. That’s 77% in support. 3,000 more votes were cast in favor of the referendum than were cast in last year’s mayoral election. And, 11,951 more votes than were cast for Councilor Plassmann. In fact, Ward 3 voted 80% in support of Question 2; and Wards 6 & 7 each voted over 70%. We voters were not misled, as Councilor Plassmann asserts: we studied the issue; we knew what we were voting for, and I resent her assumption that she knows better than 12,000 plus Northampton voters - without ANY research whatsoever to back up her claims.

On the issue of drug-sniffing dogs in the schools: We members of the High School Building Committee spent countless hours trying to build the very best school we could to foster learning, intellectual curiosity, creativity, good citizenship, a sense of community. The fabric of trust that has been built in our schools would be ripped apart by drug-sniffing dogs making random searches up and down the hallways. I can't think of anything that would alienate the students more. Please leave this in the hands of those competent to deal with these issues.

I hope the City Council, as well as my fellow citizens, will review the video of the entire meeting; it’s available online.