Last year in Northwood, the tax-cutters took power. Many of you have been following the story here, a story that is repeated at all levels of government these days: they can get elected but they can’t govern. Late last fall a group of about 25 Northwood citizens decided they needed to at least try to do something about the divisive mess that had been created.

We called ourselves the Northwood Caucus. Using what some of us had learned from past campaigns, this non-partisan group of young people, elders of the community, even some town employees (sssh!, brave folk), and members of boards and committees who work so hard for the town raised funds, bought signs, designed flyers, wrote letters to the editor, and talked to their neighbors. Our goal was to elect two good selectmen for our three person board (we had a resignation mid-year), elect two good people to the most important board in town, the planning board, and defeat SB2 for both school and town.

There were definitely challenges. One was three-way races for both selectmen’s seats. Another was not being sure how well-organized the Harriet Cady group was. I call it that because one of the defining features of the race was that there was a candidate for each seat who supported Ms. Cady, former right-wing state representative from Deerfield, as town administrator. For those who did not follow the story, the selectmen elected last year fired our previous town administrator (who had an excellent evaluation the previous year) for insubordination and hired Ms. Cady, who had no experience with town administration, budgeting or supervising people. What her involvement in the elections for the past two years is and was, we don’t know.

There was also a campaign of lies against the planning board, claiming that the board did not support business coming to town, and was thus responsible for the increases in the tax rate. Since the planning board denied exactly one business application in the four years I was involved with the board, and that because the applicant did not comply with the time-line required by our ordinances and the law, this was decidedly a lie. There were other rumors as well.

On our side was experience in campaigning, a network of concerned citizens, and our new resource, The Forum, our citizen journalism newspaper. They are regularly on-line, but publish a print edition that goes free to all households in the four towns of the Pawtuckaway region several times each year, including election times. They had candidate profiles, letters to the editor, and articles about the election issues.

We elected our candidates to the board of selectmen and the planning board yesterday. We also defeated SB2 for the town and the school. We will have our traditional town meeting on Saturday and again next year! We have given democracy in Northwood a big boost. But the fight is not over, and we need to remain vigilant. We have a very precious resource to defend.