There was no misrepresentation

Editor, The Citizen August 20^th, 2008

I just read the "draft" minutes of the August 14th 2008 Moultonboro selectmen's meeting. To my surprise I saw my name mentioned in the minutes (I was not in attendance) in essence accusing me of misrepresenting myself in my communications with Time Warner Cable. This was in reference to my attempts to find out the procedure to broadcast video of public Moultonboro meetings on TWC public access.
I have no way of knowing what TWC actually told Karel Crawford, but in my conversations and emails with two gentlemen at TWC over more than three months, I never once said I represented the town in any way shape or form nor was I asked if I represented the town. I find it hard to believe that the TWC representative would suggest that I did, but yet, there it is in the minutes for all to see.
All I did was ask how to get public meeting videos on a public access channel as a private citizen. If I had known the procedure or who actually controlled the public access channel, the process would have been different. TWC never told me how this works until after they were contacted by the town. So now the selectmen are offended by this perceived "discourtesy".
Believe me, there has been enough discourtesy from the selectmen (even at the last meeting) to more than make up for it. That's not what really bothers me about this though. What prompted this letter is the continued lack of leadership, fairness and foresight from some of our selectmen. What they seem to bring to the table though is a good measure of vindictiveness to those they perceive are against them. Think about it, a totally free service, at no expense to taxpayers that would allow greater access by the citizens of Moultonboro to the unedited workings of its government has been convoluted by the selectmen into a "discourtesy". Never mind that only a handful of people attend the meetings and the minutes would at best garner a D- in business school. Is it any wonder then that the selectmen themselves can't figure out what's going on or remember the decisions made? Oh yes, there is a long document being proposed and reviewed at a "work session" to discuss public access. No mention of when and where in the minutes by the way, but wait I'll look it up on the new town website ... but I can't as it is still not live! So in the meantime it will be business as usual and Moultonboro will remain behind the times. How disappointing. But let's look on the bright side. At the prior selectmen's meeting (which I did attend) a question I asked was in the minutes as a "member of the audience asked ..." No mention of my name. So to find my name in the minutes of a meeting I didn't attend (and it's even spelled correctly) is very encouraging. Keep up the good work!


Paul Punturieri
Moultonborough

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