What Fate for the Trash Fee

The more I think about it, the more I think tonight is going be verrrrrrry interesting as the trash fee gets a public hearing.

From looking at the comments here, reading Fitchburg Hometown, and hearing feedback from other spots, there seems to be very few folks out there supporting this -- at least publicly. And there are a lot of people who are flat-out against it.

Tonight is going to be interesting not because people are going to come out to complain -- the room won't be full of green-lovers under any circumstance -- but it will be interesting to see how many people come out and how many people get fired up, and how deep and broad the voices are against this. I don't think there's a middle ground tonight. I think the place is either empty and pretty quiet, or I think it's a big, fired-up crowd. I've leaning toward fired-up crowd right now.

Obviously Wong supports the idea, but I think the council is a different story. I think are there might be some conflicted folks among the 11 who are watching what's going on with the budget and desperately want to throw it a lifeline, but who are also fundamentally aware of the "higher water, sewer, gas, Unitil, so on" argument. A "yes" vote might seriously tick off a pretty vocal minority (not, mind you, a majority of residents, because that's probably a given. Concentrate on the vocal minority). But in the political math, would that vocal minority remember 18 months from now? Who knows?

It will be interesting to see how this is played tonight. Wong spent the last two weeks talking "go green" and linking the fee to recycling and making money. But last night's conversation that tied to the fee to cop jobs and other cuts -- while a realistic assessment of the situation -- now adds an air of political hijinx (justified or not).

There's a feeling in the city that people feel taxed out. Tonight, we're going to find out just how deep-rooted that feeling is, and what residents are willing to do about it. A big crowd tonight might make up some of the 11 minds that are paying close attention to this.