Patrick Long '10

Dear Finance Committee Member,

I am asking you to vote for me for President of the Massachusetts Association of Town Finance Committees for 2010. The officer and Governing Board elections will be held at the ATFC annual meeting on October 24. I believe the ATFC, in concert with the Massachusetts Municipal Association, should be the most effective advocate it can for the needs of local government.

The first step is making the ATFC more accessible to members. I am in my third year of service of the Great Barrington Finance Committee. This year has been my first year of getting involved in the ATFC. It has been a frustrating one. Because I was interested in running for the Governing Board, I decided to attend a meeting to learn more. I told a member of the Board and an ATFC staff member that I was interested. I showed up for the meeting only to learn that it had been moved forward two days. No one told me, and the calendar on the website still had the original date. If even members who are being very proactive can't basic information about when Board meetings are going to be held, how is anyone else supposed to? If your Finance Committee tried the same thing, it would violate the state's open meting laws. The ATFC is an organization comprised of government officials and funded by your tax dollars. The ATFC Governing Board should be held to a standard of openness and transparency similiar to or higher than the one local Finance Committees have to meet, not a lower standard. Even if you do not vote for me for President, please vote for my prothe following good government proposals:

Require that the Governing Board give at least 48 hours' public notice of its meetings.

Require that the bylaws and all documents produced by the ATFC be available to the public upon request unless they contain the sort of information that government agencies could discuss in executive session.

Allow candidates for Governing Board and officer positions to be nominated any time prior to the Governing Board and officer elections.

Additionally, my requests for more details about the MMA's legislative package never received a response. I know my state legislators and am happy to talk to them about any legislation I want them to support. But how do I know what the right position is on a complicated issue if all I have is a little blurb on the MMA website? ATFC Board members serve on the MMA's policy committees, so they can influence what policies the MMA endorses and how well that information is communicated to members. If you've been involved in the ATFC before you've probably seen some of the same issues I have.

Some of these problems are oversights by ATFC staff. But the tone at the top determines how well staff do their jobs. Active communication with members needs to be a top priority for the ATFC Board. Did you know that the ATFC has it's own newsletter, separate from the one MMA sends you? I had no idea until this year. The Board should ask the chair of each town's Finance Committee for the members' email addresses and set up an email list for anyone who is interested to receive the ATFC newsletter and any other pertinent updates, such as when meetings will be held. Staff should be aware that getting back to members is important, and held accountable if they don't do it. As a former political consultant with experience in campaign communications, I know how to get information out to the people who need it, and I will assume this responsibility if the rest of the Board is unable to do so.

 If you have any questions, please feel free to contact me through the website or call me at (413) 841-5595.

Please contact me for more information.