Making a difference.

One of the privileges of living in a small town like Rehoboth is the opportunity to participate in our town meetings. Town meetings are the purest form of democracy in our nation because EVERY vote counts, and everyone can create change. Collectively, each voter can affect all the major decisions made in the town. We can determine who will be on the BOS, how the schools are funded, how expenses are prioritized, and determine the future direction of the town.

Unfortunately, the vast majority of Rehoboth voters have abdicated their civic responsibility and have chosen to simply not vote! We have over ten thousand registered voters, and many town meetings have no more that 175-250 people in attendance. That’s only approximately 2-2.5 percent of the voters!! Even the Presidential election has no more than 15% of the voters participate.

Does that affect Rehoboth? Tremendously! To affect any given vote, all that's needed is to have a few dozen people come to the meeting and swing the vote. 95% of the town may want the opposite outcome, but it doesn't matter if nobody shows up. Whether it be a town official, a developer, a power company, a union, or any other special interest group, all that’s needed is to get some supporters to show up to vote, and they will get the outcome they want!

Those who are upset about the decisions on the budget, about school issues, about development, about water, about the environment, etc. will then bitch and moan, complaining about what happened and just who was responsible. But let’s just look in the mirror! “What happened” was simply real democracy in action, and those who advocated for their own causes, and won (by default) are not to blame. The voters that did not show up are the real culprits.

Thanks!

Dave LeComte