Police present at meeting after board gets hostile calls, emails

By Scott Merzbach
Staff Writer

Published on October 30, 2009

A flood of angry phone calls and emails to the Select Board prompted a call for a police presence, following the board's decision last week to support a petition warrant article asking for the safe resettlement of cleared Guantanamo detainees.

Because some of these communications used vulgar, crude and threatening language, Town Manager Larry Shaffer requested that a police officer be present at the board's Monday meeting at Town Hall.

Chairwoman Stephanie O'Keeffe, who cast the lone vote against the warrant article that will be taken up at next month's special Town Meeting, said this was a sensible approach.

"There was some heated and hostile response to last week's discussion of the warrant article about resettling cleared Guantanamo detainees, much of it based on misinformation," O'Keeffe said in an email. "Due to the nature of some of those responses, Larry thought it would be a reasonable precaution to have an officer present at last night's meeting to address any potential security concerns. Fortunately, all was well."

For more than two hours, police Lt. Chris Pronovost was stationed at the back of the Town Room at Town Hall. But no suspicious or unruly activity occurred. In fact, the only members of the public in attendance at the meeting all had business to conduct before the board, including obtaining taxi driver and food cart licenses and presenting details of a trip to Kanegasaki, Amherst's sister city in Japan.

Select Board member Gerry Weiss, who voted in support of the resolution, said he was not surprised nothing happened.

"Many, many, many of the nasty ones are anonymous," Weiss said. "If they can't sign a letter, why would they show up in person?"

It's also likely that many of those expressing outrage don't make their "I think 99 to 100 percent of the vicious stuff has come from out of town," Weiss said.

Weiss said the board has gotten a lot of emotional feedback by phone and email, most of it coming from widespread attention to the resolution in the Boston media, as well as two appearances Weiss made on Boston radio station WTKK, including a prime-time show hosted by Michele McPhee.

Much of the response, Weiss said, is based on misinformation. If granted asylum by the U.S. government, both detainees on whose behalf Amherst is working would be able to settle anywhere in the country. In addition, Amherst would not be spending any town money to house the two men.

Weiss said he is pleased that not all the response has been negative. The board received an email from a group calling itself September 11 Families for Peaceful Tomorrows, whose founding member, Robyn Bernstein, lost her mother in the World Trade Center in the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

"Bravo to the people of Amherst for taking a brave step forward for our nation. Like them, more localities need to come forward to redress wrongs and rebuild our credibility in the eyes of the world." Bernstein wrote in a letter published in the Boston Globe.

Select Board member Diana Stein, who joined Weiss in voting in favor of the warrant article, said she was particularly touched by this letter.

The Pioneer Valley No More Guantanamos group, which is endorsing the article, is working specifically on behalf of two men, Ahmed Belbacha, a native of Algeria, and Ravil Mingazov, a convert to Islam while in the Russian Army.

Weiss is currently speaking to attorneys for both men and should have more information about them for Town Meeting,

Police Chief Scott Livingstone said he received the request for a police officer from Shaffer, observing that it made sense under the circumstances. "We got the request for police presence, and we obliged," Livingstone said.

One police officer is always present as a constable at Town Meeting sessions, though one session at last fall's meeting featured two uniformed officers and an undercover police detective following the receipt of mysterious, anonymous postcards sent to all Town Meeting members urging them to attend.