The Barnstable County Commission Race
May Be The Most Vital to Cape Residents

CAPE COD, MA – Perhaps not surprisingly, this year’s Cape-wide election for Barnstable County Commissioner is one of the most hotly contested races on the November 5^th ballot.

Acting Commissioner Roland J. Dupont of Sagamore Beach in Bourne is trying to retain the seat he’s held since being appointed after Robert O’Leary was elected state Senator, and he is being strongly challenged by J. Gregory Milne of Hyannis, who is a member of the Barnstable Town Council, and William Doherty, of Harwich, a former business executive who is conducting his third campaign for a seat on the three member County Commission.

It’s not that the position of County Commissioner carries a great salary – the County pays $14,000 a year to the Commissioners during their four year terms – yet increasingly it is the County Commission that is involved in decisions and actions that affect all 15 Cape towns that comprise Barnstable County.

This year, however, the importance of the Commission is perhaps reflected in the competition for the open seat, and each of the three candidates for the Commission bring different goals, ideals and background experience before the voters, some of which are reflected in the following profiles.

"I think it’s alarming, when (in active campaigning) you meet with hundreds of people from all parts of the Cape, and almost universally people have no idea what the county government is," declares Greg Milne, adding: "I find it interesting and perplexing how a particular layer of government can for so many years exist and yet the general population, the year-round residents, don’t have any idea of what it’s all about."

This realization has apparently dovetailed with some of the thoughts and goals that brought him into the County Commissioner race in the first place.

In terms of how the Barnstable County Commission engages people, Milne says he doesn’t "think it is adequate at all." People throughout the Cape, he asserts, should know what County government is, and what it does for them. "People may know about the Cape Cod Commission," he says, but "they get the impression that is the County, yet it’s only an agency of the County, set up by a Special Act" of the state legislature.

Milne, 34, is a Barnstable High graduate who holds a BA degree in Human Ecology from the College of the Atlantic in Maine. He is a native of the Cape who owns and operates a seasonal, vacation rental business. Milne is currently an elected member of the Barnstable Town Council, and will retain that position if he becomes a County Commissioner. In that regard, he is quick to point out that the Town Council members are in effect the elected legislative representatives of the Town of Barnstable, which now operates on a city form of government. In effect, he notes, the Council members are the same as elected members of a representative town meeting, such as the Falmouth Town Meeting, and in all respects have the same responsibilities as town meeting voters anywhere.

But it has been his recent experience running what seems to clearly be the most active campaign that has focused his attention on communication. "I (now) feel that a particular element of government has gone astray," he says, explaining that "there has been far too little effort by the leaders, the County Commissioners," to make sure "that the affairs (of the County) are well known to the general public."

"I think the Commissioners need to go out in the communities and meet with people, including making presentations at town meetings," he states, "and I think it’s incredible that local towns have been using (cable) television for their selectmen’s meetings for 10 years and the County hasn’t…I’m sure there is surplus money (for this) and we have several public access channels." It is vitally important, he states, for the County Commissioners to reveal the processes of the County government, since "then we can build a perception that we are the leaders…to show the public, the electorate, the Assembly (of Delegates), and the (state) legislature where we need to go to solve Cape-wide problems, such as wastewater treatment. We have to be facilitators for change."

"When Mary LeClair, (a current member of the County Commissioners who is not up for reelection this year), says the County has been here for 350 years and you can’t change it, that is completely inappropriate," Milne declares, noting that "the public owns the government – the current public – and we owe the next generation the best decisions that (can be made) that will leave a legacy of county government and services that are in better shape than we found them."

He also notes that "trying to stuff a new facility on that hill (behind the old courthouse in Barnstable Village), which is totally overloaded, just doesn’t make sense to me." Commissioner LeClair’s comment, he observes, seems to overlook the fact the County has already changed, and now encompasses the Assembly of Delegates and the Cape Cod Commission, plus there is a bill pending in the state Legislature to convert the County government to a regional government.

Among the issues that originally interested him in seeking the Commission role, Milne explains, is his interest in fiscal responsibility. "I’m a fiscally conservative guy," he states, "and I’ve been privileged and fortunate to work in (the current) Barnstable (town government), which has such good fiscal management."

The Cape Cod Commission, he notes, "needs to live within" its means, but he points out that it has done some extraordinary work, including its handling of the regional comprehensive plan. "The Cape Cod Commission," Milne recalls, "took the regional policy concept on the road to a vast number of meetings regarding the regional policy plan, the overarching umbrella for the regional comprehensive plan, and as a result, the public’s fingerprints are all over it…" This, he emphasizes, is a good model, and the County Commissioners themselves, who oversee the Cape Cod Commission and its budget, should follow it.

But the experiences he has had in a very active campaign clearly have made an impression, and he points frequently to the lessons he’s learned.

"If one runs for a particular job and they aren’t actively campaigning, they are missing a critical part of our democracy," he states, concluding that "in my view it should be mandatory that the person (seeking an elected position) get out there and talk to the voters; if someone doesn’t do that, they’re fundamentally flawed in their approach, and the voters should question it."

"I’m interested in how we preserve what we have, this precious and vulnerable environment," Bill Doherty explains in indicating why he is once again seeking one of the three seats on the Barnstable County Commissioners.

Doherty, of Harwich, underscores his environmental concerns by elaborating on the importance of water. "I think it’s all about the water," he says. "We’re standing on our (drinking) water and we use the (salt) water around us (for every type of income, ranging from shell and commercial fishing to recreational boating and the allure of beaches and swimming for tourists). He notes that members of his family who live in Bourne make a living by shell fishing, and this has increased his understanding of the issues involved in protecting the water.

"The water we’re sitting on defines how many people can live here and the (Barnstable) County Commission is one of the (principal) agencies that can have an effect on water…" As a Commissioner, Doherty explains, he would have a role in planning how the water is protected and used. "The County Commissioners control a lot of the water projects," he says, "and they are looking at how to do alternative sewage treatment, (but) it’s not only the water we drink, but how we manage the water we drink."

"When I’ve examined the studies that have been put out by the various agencies," he says, "(it’s clear) we aren’t managing phosphorous loading very well, but we do pretty well with nitrogen loading…"

Doherty, 65, who holds a Masters Degree in Business Administration from Babson College in Boston, grew up as a summer resident of Whitehorse Beach in Plymouth. But after a career that encompassed the responsibilities of a military officer, through executive positions in the utility industry, mostly in the Greater Boston area, he and his family decided to move permanently to Harwich in the early 1980’s, when his daughter was enrolled at Cape Cod Community College and his son was still in high school. In recent years, he has been a regular substitute teacher in Harwich High, the Barnstable Middle School, and in the Cape Cod Regional Technical High School, also located in Harwich. The tech school students, he notes, can often be the most interesting to teach, because often the subject matter directly relates to their interests and "you can see them light up, you can see the kids turning on the switch to pay attention; that’s really exciting…"

Teaching, however, only seems to enhance Doherty’s interest in the Barnstable County government. "We talk about the roads," he says, "and all the traffic that comes down through the Cape…and the question is, how can we develop good public transportation?" He underscores this issue by noting that it isn’t just a question of off-Cape, tourist traffic, but the need for everyone who lives here to have a car available.

Often Cape Cod employers, he observes, "demand that employees have some sort of personal transportation," and although he sees such criteria as inappropriate, if not obnoxious, it is hard to argue against it because the current municipal transport on the Cape only functions until the early evening. "We can get someone to a job, but we can’t get them home," he says, clearly referring to the many Cape jobs that are involved in the restaurant and hospitality industry and therefore end late at night.

He feels the County Commissioners could play a role in solving these problems, and that his background, which encompasses "education, science and the arts," would be an advantage on the Commission. "On Cape Cod you’ve got a complex and diverse group of people," he says, "an aging population, but at the same time there has to be diversity; if there’s not room for everybody, there’s not room for anybody."

Doherty stresses that if solid planning isn’t accomplished, the Cape may be faced with trying to accommodate base salaries in the $50,000 to $60,000 range for police and teachers and other middle-income professionals. "If you take a look at it, the question of affordable housing is critical," he says, but at the same time, "You don’t want to be taxed off your land."

The Cape Cod Commission, he notes, was supposed to be the organizer and the catalyst that helped the County’s 15 towns develop comprehensive plans for local development. But he thinks what is happening is that many towns are pushing whatever local development plans that are controversial forward to the Cape Cod Commission, and that concomitantly the CC Commission seems to want to continually lower the standards by which issues can be brought forward, while at the same time complaining that the work load is too heavy and more funding is needed.

"I think the Cape Cod Commission should act as some sort of filter," he explains, "and instead of complaining why the work load is increasing, answer the question of why the towns are not doing their share (of the regulatory work load) and not just (agreeing with the process of ) kicking issues up to the commission."

In the end, while not negating his other points, Doherty feels that the greatest role the County Commissioners could achieve would be that of lobbyists for the entire Cape. "The local (state) representatives don’t have a regional focus," he explains, "but the County Commissioners can show up in Boston and talk to the (legislative) Committee on Counties, or other committees, and show what is needed for the (Cape) region." Such support, he feels, would help coordinate the efforts of the Cape’s legislative representatives, and effectively help to unify them.

 "The fact that you can look to see what’s going in the region and have a direct effect on it," declares Roland Dupont, "is what interests me the most (about returning to the County Commission." He adds that it is the challenge of "trying to create a resolution, to make things happen," that makes the position very attractive to him.

Dupont, 52, who lives in Sagamore Beach in Bourne, has been a member of the Barnstable County Commissioners since 2000, when he was appointed to fill the seat of Robert O’Leary, who was elected to the Massachusetts Senate. He is a graduate of UMass, Dartmouth, and owns and operates a relatively new construction related corporation in Bourne, his adopted hometown.

In terms of the County Commission, Dupont explains that he particularly enjoys the ability to "go out in the field…and tackle issues that are caused by growth…and to try to find ways to provide affordable housing, clean water and clean air…" He notes that helping to select how surplus county funds are used is important and exciting, an example of which could be "using money (resulting) from growth to tackle issues caused by that growth."

Dupont, who describes himself as "a self-employed consultant," says that since his appointment to fill the O’Leary vacancy, he has had an opportunity to work directly with the Cape & Islands Investment Board, which is the agency responsible for the work force training funds coming into Barnstable County, and he is also on the advisory board of JTek and Americorp Cape Cod.

"I’m also on the executive committee of the Cape Light Compact," he notes, "and I’m also the representative of the County Commissioners to the Cape Cod Economic Development Council."

When asked what he feels he’s contributed to or accomplished since his appointment, Dupont notes the Commissioners have begun reviewing all county departments, and are currently developing a strategic plan, "so that County government will begin working as a unit instead of (independent) pieces." He underscores this point by noting that the Cape Cod Commission is a department of Barnstable County government, and its areas of concern and expertise, when combined with the County departments that work with health and environmental issues, should produce a much stronger overall effort.

"You start putting all of those links together and you have a far more effective organization," he says.

He is particularly interested in being elected to a regular County Commission seat because "I was in the original (Barnstable) Assembly of Delegates that voted on the plans and goals (of the Cape Cod Commission)" and many of those plans and goals have remained unfulfilled 10 years later. "Let’s get the work done," he concludes.