The Preservation Association of Beaver Island has been working to organize a public forum on the question of township consolidation. An important part of PABI’s mission is facilitating open and fair discussions of public issues at the Community Center. The board has organized such meetings itself and made the Community Center available without charge for such meetings organized by others. In all cases, the board seeks to facilitate a fair open discussion. Unfortunately, we have concluded that we will be unable to arrange such a public forum on the consolidation question.

The PABI board remains committed to getting fair and balanced information on this subject out to our community. We had planned to broadcast the forum along with interviews with key players on WVBI, PABI’s public radio station. While we will not be able to conduct the forum, we have asked WVBI to proceed with interviews of supporters on both sides of the question after providing an opportunity for members of the Community to send in any questions they would like addressed (more on how below).

Our goal for these programs on WVBI is a fair presentation of both sides of the question in a way that helps our community make a thoughtful, informed decision on this important question. The programs will be broadcast on the station and made available as podcasts on the station website. For information on these broadcasts, you can check either the BIC Center (biccenter.org) or WVBI (www.wvbi.net) websites. Or, you can follow WVBI on Facebook or Twitter. Or you can simply call the Community Center during our opening hours (9 to 5 Monday to Friday and 9 to 9 on Saturday) at 231-448-2022.

You can send questions for the guests on these shows by mail to Consolidation Questions, PABI, P.O. Box 494. Beaver Island, Michigan, by email to consolidationquestions@wvbi.net, or by dropping them by the BIC Center. We expect to record our interviews as early as April 16, so please get your questions to us as far in advance of that date as possible.

On a final note, please know that while the PABI board includes some members who hold strong views one way or the other on the consolidation question — the board is united in its view that open and fair discussions of these and other issues need to happen and is committed to facilitating them in a fair and impartial manner.