By tradition, every Representative Town Meeting session opens with an invocation.
The invited speaker — sometimes a clergyperson, more often not — makes a few remarks about the RTM, democracy, the town, whatever.
They fall somewhere on the scale from uplifting to innocuous. An invocation to a group like the RTM traditionally takes “the form of a prayer, a recitation of an inspirational message or a quiet time of guided contemplation,” a web search says.
Tuesday night’s invocation was hardly innocuous.
Ramin Ganeshram — executive director of the Westport Museum for History & Culture — began the Zoom meeting by noting that her building, Town Hall and the entire town sit on tribal lands of the Paugussett people.
Recognizing that this RTM meeting would discuss funding for a new Long Lots Elementary School, she expressed pride that Westport dedicates resources to a “world-class school system.”
Screenshot of Ramin Ganeshram, from Tuesday’s RTM meeting.
Citing the need for collaboration and “truth in history,” Ganeshram described attacks by “conservatives and liberals” on local committees and institutions during the recent school debate, whether “based on facts or not.”
The Westport Museum for History & Culture is also “no stranger to civil discourse,” she said.
Seven years ago, Ganeshram explained, the board decided to “evolve from aggrandizing the genteel past of Westport’s founding fathers,” to “exhibits and programs that uplift erased narratives.”
However, Ganeshram said, those efforts were “fruitless,” because the museum is a private institution.
“We are not vulnerable to the tools of the anti-equity playbook: persistent FOIA requests, interruptions of public meetings, or a right to be disruptive on premises,” she said.
The Museum will remain “trustworthy” specifically because it is not beholden to public money. “We can objectively act where town institutions cannot.”
While “parents try to shut down BIPOC (Black, indigenous, and other people of color) social studies classes, or lobby to remove LGBTQ books,” the director said that museum exhibits highlight events like past unfair housing practices.
“A feel-good-only approach to history is not accurate history,” Ganeshram said. “It is not the job of people in the present to seek absolution for deeds of the past.”
“We must be able to act without fear of scapegoating or attack,” she concluded, and urged RTM members to view the Westport Museum as “flag bearers for truth in history.”
“You can’t just ‘like’ the idea of the museum. You have to support it.”
Jimmy Izzo was one of several RTM members taken aback by Ganeshram’s comments.
Yesterday morning, the District 3 representative told “06880”: “I went to bed last night a bit confused by Ramin’s invocation. At first I was a bit angry, that one would use the forum, not inspire but to bash our community.
“I woke up this morning feeling a bit sorry for her. My family on both sides came to the United States with nothing. Like many immigrants, they worked for everything they have.
“My grandfather on my father’s side worked 2 jobs, raised 13 kids. At 14 when he landed in the United States, he worked the railroad for $1 a day. No unions. No vacation pay. Ten hours a day, 6 days a week.
“To him, this was all about ‘opportunity.’ Last night’s invocation could have been about ‘opportunity’ for Ramin and her privately funded museum.
Jimmy Izzo
“History is not always pretty. But it is not all bad either. We can take both the ‘positive’ and ‘negative’ and grow from it. History in a lot of ways is like our democracy: a constant work in progress.
“The founding families of Westport provided my immigrant family the opportunity to provide for their families. The Leeses, Nashes, Gaults, Sherwoods, Bedfords and others all employed Irish, Polish, Italian and other immigrants.
“To bypass the history of our founding families, donors, and people who care deeply about our community and charity, in my opinion is not a good path to take when ‘adding’ a deeper dive of Westport history.
“I love the First Amendment right of free speech. Last night, with a big RTM audience, a great opportunity to utilize ‘free speech’ to include community was missed.
“There is room for all history in our community: the good, the bad, and the ugly. We should embrace all sides, learn, and grow as a community.
“Being positive at the podium with an open mind of filling up the glass is never a bad thing.”
I asked Ganeshram for a comment, and to explain why she thought it was important to say what she did.
Westport Museum board chair Greg Porretta responded: “On behalf of the board and staff at Westport Museum, thank you for bringing to light the inquiries from our public officials about the RTM invocation delivered by our Executive Director on February 13. We believe it reaffirms the need for our mission to reveal facts of history and encourage inclusion of all those who have gone before — particularly marginalized communities and especially in public forums where they have been historically barred.”
(Click here to view Ramin Ganeshram’s RTM invocation. It begins at 2:16.)