North Kingstown

Attend meetings before criticizing

Much has been written in this newspaper and elsewhere about the North Kingstown Audit Committee meeting Sept. 18. The fifth item on the agenda, involving an inquiry regarding the Boosters Club and a possible conflict of interest with the School Department’s athletic director Keith Kenyon, has drawn the most interest and commentary.

In a lengthy letter last week School Committee member Doug Roth expressed concern that the Audit Committee was asked by the town manager to focus on a person which Mr. Roth regards as being outside the committee’s scope. The item was awkwardly worded on the agenda and a reading of Town Manager Michael Embery’s memo shows that the matter resulted from an anonymous phone call and is not a request from the town manager.

Unfortunately Mr. Roth was not present when the agenda item in question was discussed. Had he been or had he taken the time to view the video transcript of the meeting, he would have heard me suggest that the committee chairman rule the matter out of order essentially for the reasons cited by Mr. Roth. In addition, I pointed out that the Audit Committee is not an ethics panel.

The town manager’s memo states that “This issue was addressed by Bacon & Edge (auditors) approximately 10 years ago.” He went on to “recommend that the Audit Committee review the Bacon & Edge comments.” This prompted one of my colleagues on the Audit Committee to ask that one of our members review the audit report in question and report back to the committee. Accordingly, I made a motion that was unanimously approved to move the agenda item to our next meeting to allow time to do just that.

I think most people would agree that it is within the purview of an audit committee to review and discuss comments made in a report by independent auditors and to determine whether the conditions that prompted those comments continue to exist today.

In a sidebar comment Mr. Roth wonders why the Audit Committee is not “asking the manager why the Workers Comp Self-Insurance Fund “disappeared” from the town’s books in 2005 while the Town Council continued to spend from it.” Footnote number 15 to the town’s annual financial report for the year ended June 30, 2005 deals with “Self-Insurance Activities” which are classified as Internal Service Funds on the balance sheet. Schedule C-1 displays those funds. There are similar footnotes to the financial statements for the fiscal years ended in 2006 and 2007. I submit, therefore, that the worker’s compensation self-insurance fund did not “disappear” as Mr. Roth alleges.

Mr. Roth is well aware that he, acting as a private citizen while he was chairman of the School Committee, asked me as a member of the Audit Committee to look into the matter of the self insurance fund. He is also well aware that I issued two memoranda to the School Committee, Town Council and town and school chief administrators and reported to the School Committee at one of its recent meetings on his request. Unfortunately, my conclusions do not support Mr. Roth’s opinion.

It should be noted that Mr. Roth was not present when this agenda item (number 6) was discussed at the Audit Committee meeting.

Likewise, Joanne Naumann, who wrote a letter denouncing Mr. Roth’s photographing people at the Audit Committee, was not present at the meeting. I suggest it should be incumbent on people who write such letters to the editor to at least be present at meetings or “go to the videotape” and not respond to hearsay.

Richard J. August

North Kingstown

The writer is a member of the North Kingstown Audit Committee. These comments are his alone and do not reflect the opinion or conclusions of the committee as a whole.

Richmond

Help is sought finding manuscript

I am trying to find a certain manuscript written over 100 years ago by the wife of a black preacher from Rhode Island. This is a short story of how I learned about it and why I am longing for it so desperately.

One fall day, I think it was in 2004, I was given a tour of our neighbor’s farm. And it was during this walk that I saw for the first time a small cemetery at the border of the farm. The cemetery was fenced and well tended.

In the middle of it, among small, unmarked stones, stood a round, granite monument engraved with the shortest biography of the Browning family:

In memory of

Harry Browning &wife Jane Rodman

Rev. William Bundy & wife Esther Browning

Lydia A. Almira E. Martha C. & W M. H Bundy

Harry Browning. Brought from Africa

A slave, gained freedom. Bought this farm

1805. Held by the family until the death

Of Elder Davis & wife 1904

Rev. Daniel Davis

Born 1834

A southern slave

Died 1904

In honored minister

Of the gospel

His wife

Almira E. Bundy

Born 1832

Died 1904

A worthy Christian

Erected by friends 1906

The phrase below sparked my imagination:

Harry Browning. Brought from Africa

A slave, gained freedom. Bought this farm

1805. Held by the family until the death

Of Elder Davis & wife 1904.

My journey through libraries, town halls, archives of historical societies, etc. started. I bothered people who maybe knew something or knew somebody who knew something. The first “discovery” was a book, Driftways Into the Past. In its second edition, in the chapter written by Ms. Gladys Segar, on page 32 one can read:

“A few days before his death, he (Rev. Daniel Davis) expressed a desire that after he was gone, someone who knew the circumstances, place them before the public. He pressed into hands of a friend, a manuscript which Mrs. Davis had prepared.”

I believe that this manuscript will add a lot of the firsthand and extremely important information to my research.

And this is the manuscript I am looking for and the reason for my cry for help.

Thank you for your kindness and willingness in helping me to find a certain manuscript written over 100 years ago by the wife of a black preacher from Rhode Island. If you have information, please call me at (401) 364-0481.

Krystyna W. Kasman

Wood River Junction

North Kingstown

Veterans have friend in Kenneth Carter

There are about 100,000 veterans in Rhode Island, of which I am one.

Ten percent of our state’s population has served in some capacity in the military, many of them during wartime. Many are productive members of society, homeowners and parents. Many others have fallen on bad times, forced to live on the street. A recent national survey indicated that a large number of the nation’s homeless are veterans.

There is a wide range of services that needs to be provided to those individuals — social, residential, medical, rehabilitation — and to the next wave of veterans who will be returning from the conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq. Most importantly, these veterans must not be forgotten.

There is one individual that I know for whom the welfare of our state’s veterans will always be the number one priority, and that is Rep. Kenneth Carter. During his years as a member of the House of Representatives and as chairman of the House Veterans’ Affairs Committee, Ken has worked tirelessly to ensure and improve the health and welfare of our state’s veterans.

Ken’s efforts in this regard range from small to large. He has sponsored bills to provide for new veterans’ and gold star parents’ license plates, and to allow communities to provide property-tax relief (exemptions) for veteran homeowners. He fought, and won, the battle a few years ago to ensure that a live bugler would be provided at military funerals instead of a tape recording. Ken just fought, and won, the battle to ensure a rifle salute at the funeral of all veterans when the government attempted to restrict such a tribute to only a few military funerals.

He has also fought, and will continue to do so, for the creation of a new Department of Veterans’ Affairs within state government. Rhode Island currently tries to attend to the needs of veterans through a small division within the mega-Department of Human Services. Ken believes, as I do, that a small division of state government is not adequate to address the issues that are specific to veterans, and that veterans deserve more attention, through a full-fledged, autonomous department of state government.

There are many people in the General Assembly who speak for many different segments of our society. The one individual with the constant, clear, strong voice for veterans is Ken Carter, and we need to return him to his seat in the House of Representatives to continue to speak for, and fight for, all veterans in our state.

Sgt. Donald M. Brown, U.S. Marine Corps (1954-57)

North Kingstown