Well, this week we are hearing from some old “Friends” who are getting around to responding to the spate of opposition in recent editions.

Becky Swaffield takes Allen Kasiewicz to task concerning his letter last week.  She lands a couple of solid punches when she points out that the Turner Engineer Property Condition Assessment was ordered and prepared after the citizen petition warrant to direct the Selectmen to purchase the Building.  I believe she is also correct in her assertion that the Selectmen did not recommend that action.  All I can say is good for the Selectmen at the time who knew it was a pig in a poke without an engineer to tell them.  Maybe they thought bringing a breach of trust action to compel the trustees to at least expend whatever funds they had to repair the building would have been a better move.

Richard O’Donnell is back to his old habits of misinformation.  He knows that with the parking lot acquired three years ago and still unused, a town office on Lehner street would have tons of parking.  I know the downtown merchants think they own it but the fact is they didn’t pay for it.  Contrary to their claim that they could have used it immediately for employee parking, they haven’t used it at all in three years.

The community bank building on Varney Road is not built on wetlands.  That is against the law and the claim is just plain false.  I’m sure the dentist that bought it right after the town turned it down would agree.

I know Marge Webster had someone design a $4 million Taj-Mahal for Lehner Street with ten bathrooms, but that doesn’t mean a reasonable office would cost that much.  TOCAG priced it out at about $2.5 million for 10,000 sq ft which included the cost of the lot that we now own. And it’s not hard to make the case that Lehner Street is in the village core.

Mr. O’Donnell just can’t seem to make a factual argument.  Maybe he gets that now and that’s why he doesn’t mention his famous  “That’s a cap!”, $3 million complete renovation plan, or his “Fix Town Hall” for $500,000. How’s that going anyway?

I get that as a retired Architecture Professor he is dazzled by the potential splendor of a fully restored Brewster Hall, and I think a lot of people share his passion for it.  These lame arguments really just detract from his obvious and sincere love of the building.