By Don Simonini
The mask, no-mask discussion has caused me to reflect on our near 50 years here in The Valley as a visitor, second-home owner and permanent resident. I have been a visitor during the later stages of the Mascara Mountain era; watching multiple ownership changes at Sugarbush; Mad River Glen becoming a co-op; observing the decline of dairy farming particularly after financial incentives were provided for farms to sell their herds; seeing the fortunate ownership of Sugarbush by Win Smith for 18 years; and observing the economic ups and downs over these years. The economic conditions ebb and flow; restaurants come and go, and The Valley moved forward.
We have seen the Warren and Fayston Select Boards adjust to these evolving circumstances with forward-looking decisions while preserving historical and cultural positives. The Waitsfield Select Board has struggled during these same decades to adjust to contemporary times. Their decisions have often been based on a nostalgic view of the present rather than reacting to contemporary needs. The no-mask decision by the Waitsfield Select Board is just another moment in time when the Waitsfield Select Board could not make the right decision.
The no-mask communism non-decision; no support for providing trash cans for our visitors to use (we want visitors, we need visitors, we enjoy the money they spend here!) where a Waitsfield board member said: “We don’t need trash cans, let people take their trash home with them.” Well, other tourist areas in our country provide things like trash cans for visitors to use because they have learned that this is what you do if you are a tourist destination, which we are!
As many people understand The Valley’s average age is the oldest in Vermont (48 years); Vermont is the second (or third) oldest state in the nation, and as a result we are fast becoming a retirement community (by default) without the younger next generation being able to live here because our housing costs are way beyond reach. We will need future select board members to consider how do our towns support affordable housing initiatives; what active (and financial) contributions do towns make to advance affordable housing; what zoning changes are needed; and how do the towns advance future senior support initiatives? These new, emerging, contemporary needs will require board members to honor our past while accepting that the way it was done 50 years ago may not be the way we do it today to meet today’s needs. We need to be able to attract a younger generation here to make The Valley their home and their children to populate our Valley schools.
We can adapt our Valley perspective to contemporary needs, while retaining our positive historical and cultural history. To achieve this, we need to elect people to municipal positions, like the select board, who are willing to accept that circumstances are changing and have the courage and will to make decisions that reflect contemporary needs.
We will have an opportunity to exercise our most inalienable right, the right to vote. Please vote in November. And please vote in March at Town Meeting for select board and other municipal positions individuals who can honor our past and who can participate in decisions that accept contemporary problems and challenges that need a contemporary view and judgments in their decision making.
Don Simonini lives in Fayston.
