At West Boylston’s April 15th Select Board meeting, the Town Administrator outlined the process and results for a recently conducted analysis to assess the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats to our community. During a five hour session with 17 volunteer residents, the Beaman Library surfaced as one of the top 3 community strengths. 
Ironically, the only residents to learn of these findings were the six library advocates in attendance to present a petition signed by hundreds of residents in support of the library, which remains zero-funded for FY2010.
The dissociation between funding and values also plays out at a national level. Last month the Washington Post reported that the audience for National Public Radio (NPR) is growing while audience share for commercial news and radio outlets is in decline. According to NPR CEO Vivian Schiller, the audience for its weekend show, Wait wait… don’t tell me! is twice as large as The Daily Show and The Colbert Report combined. Nevertheless, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting budget has come under legislative assault for years, despite the obvious value Americans place on public broadcasting.
How can we remedy this disconnect? For starters, we need more focus, organization, information and participation. Read full article.
