Submitted by David Wold, Greenwich
Letter to the editor,
Reading the Greenwich Sentinel on February 9th titled “Camillo, Rabin Speak candidly on the record, Deepening Rifts: A Battle Over Leadership of the RTC Greenwich Sentinel), I am likely as surprised by some of the statements the First Selectman and second Selectwoman Lauren Rabin issued as anybody else.
We know that they go back a long time and there is no surprise that they have the same view on almost everything, even how the way Republican Town Committee is run, should be run, and who is best to run it etc.. but some of the statements seem ‘odd’ and I feel need to be questioned.
Both are Board of Selectmen members and as such serve the interest of all of Greenwich, and as such elected by the citizens, it be Republican, Democrats, independents and the large percentage here in town who cannot vote (but pays property taxes etc). So why ‘blame’ RTC for their support or lack of support in elections?
RTC is a ‘caucus’ of the Republican voters and maybe they should listen to them, if they are critical to how the Republican members on Board of Selectmen run this town, instead of trying to managed them.
As Lauren Rabin expressed when she stepped down from the RTC and had been elected first time as Selectman – ‘basically she could not service the RTC while she was elected official for the Town’, so what has changed that makes her believe it is ‘necessary’ to ‘lend her expertise to candidate selection’.
We can only guess that is same argument Fred Camillo would give, if he was asked to be on the board of RTC or the Democratic Town Committee, but at the same time he seems to want to have a stronger hand in who they support.
Understand they want to ‘help’ the RTC, but not by taking away a seat that represents the grassroots volunteers who have secured their seat on the Board of Selectmen. They seemingly are always welcome at their meetings to ‘lend (their) expertise to candidate selection’.
Fred expressed that that his own and Lauren’s election result should be credited to their own success and I checked the voting numbers, it seems they both have now in 3 election cycles managed to keep the Republican votes, but gained very few extra votes from Democrats or independent due to their success. Democrats have been ‘shuffling’ around and presented new alternatives, but it does not change the numbers. RTC has not run any alternative candidates to take their place.
The ‘star power’ of a current sitting 1st and 2nd Selectman seemingly does not change much over the years, as Republican’s stay loyal to their sitting members and Democrats cannot present a better alternative, but they seemingly have not changed party affiliation but are not happy with their candidates either.
It seems like Fred and Lauren feel they are ‘entitled’ to more support from voters and blame the Republic election machine (RTC), and they can fix that if only Lauren comes back on the board.
But we do not see any other elected official Republican, like town clerk, tax collector, etc., who feel the same or maybe they feel the same as Lauren did 6 years ago, as elected Town officials they are not going to use their official title to influence either political party ‘caucus’ system between election periods.
It seems like these two town officials want the ‘grassroot’/’caucus’ system to follow their recommendations and do not like it when volunteers enter the caucus system and want to serve.
Think the town Republicans have to decide now in March whether they want keep the caucus system or have the RTC run by elected officials at Town Hall.
David Chr. Wold