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Date Posted: 14:03:27 04/11/01 Wed
Author: Naturally
Subject: Town Fathers court Big Brother

Well, he may be some 17 years late in arriving, but Big Brother will soon be making his debut in the Town of Dracut. At last night's Selectmen's meeting a system called GIS was demonstrated to the collective awe of most of our Town Fathers. I say almost all because I think Dougie was a bit mystified. He's of the generation that still looks at their cordless phones with satisfied and benused smiles and they say, "those people at Ma Bell do a helluva job and all the luck in the world to them!" Dougie's a few standard deviations below the curve in terms of technological savvy, but a nice guy anyway.

The final decision to buy this thing, which can be aptly described as a municipal Palm Pilot, hasn't been made yet, I don't think. But it's a lock, a done deal and I'll tell you why. First, the Board of Selectmen is currently made up of all, well, men. Physiologically, it is impossible for us to resist anything electronic. Make no mistake, this thing is slick! I don't know how useful it will be but in terms of the slick index, it's an icy road treated with WD40!!

Secondly, the guy making the pitch was smart enough to mention several times that Derry NH already has one installed. Now there's the clincher. The thought of those family-friendly simpletons to the north being ahead of the game in terms of technological wizardry was just the right ego tickle to close the deal.

Then, following the true male MO, came the logical rationale. It would save money on the sewer surveys. The cost of the system (initially $250K)would be shared among each department that uses the thing. Dennis Williams kept saying, "HARD DOLLARS"

It was oddly reminiscent of the time I tried to convince my wife that an outlay of $2500.00 for a home theater system would more than pay for itself with the money we saved by not going to the movies. In desperation, I even think I went so far as to add, "especially if you figure in the cost of popcorn!" I sincerely believe had I used a term such as "HARD DOLLARS" I might have prevailed. Damn!

In terms of desperation though, I have some kindered spirits among those at last night's meeting. Someone suggested this thing could help determine which streets had not yet been plowed. A system already exsists for that. The residents of the un-plowed streets! Also, the idea was advanced that this system could be interfaced with the E-911 system and could provide our firefighters with the quickest route to the fire. C'mon guys! This isn't Boston or Tokyo. This is Dracut. I think the firefighters are already equipped with that knowledge. Plus, that kind of thing can become similar to Spell Check Syndrome. You get so over-reliant on it and then one day you get one of those "This program has performed an illegal operation!" messages and some poor bastard loses his house.

The Town Manager suggested it could aid in the plotting of school bus routes. This is pretty transparent. How long have we been routing the buses in this town? But yeah, it's a good way to put the arm on the school budget for its portion of the "cost-sharing" tribute. I think in the mob they call that Wetting our beaks.

The system does have some practical applications such as information storage and retrieval. It can map out the sewer and water system so if there was a spill of hazardous material, it could be tracked as to where it would flow. It can map out all the water pumping stations and how the water flows from source to end user. If only this had been available a few years ago, maybe Nick would be out and about more these days.

The pitch guy almost lost it though. He mentioned that the system could depict on a map those properties where registered gun owners resided. Shaw stopped sipping his coffee long enough to raise an eyebrow to that. The Sales guy must of thought he was pitching Cambridge or Brookline.

Either way, it's coming, there's absolutely no doubt about that. Four men, a new toy and hey... They got it in Derry! And no Mr Willett. It's a windows based program, not a program to install new windows!

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