To the editor:

I have lived in town for over 31 years and for most of that time had a favorable impression of the BUVC, the Barrington United Veterans Council, and I knew that the group had organized our town’s Memorial Day parade for decades. However, during the last few years, the BUVC, the Barrington United Veterans Coalition has had significant presence in our public square. Their representatives have spoken at town council meetings, and they have written numerous letters to this newspaper. The group is markedly partisan. The initials are the same so I assumed that the at the Council had changed their name to Coalition.

In March of this year, the town council voted to have the town manager organize this year’s Memorial Day events. The BUVC, the Barrington United Veterans Council, protested. Now I was confused; were there actually two different organizations?

So I googled the Barrington United Veterans Council. I found a few recent news stories that mentioned the Council, but there was no independent site for it. Instead, the google search for the Council awarded the top ranking to the Barrington United Veterans Coalition which has its own webpage, buvc.org. The site solicits donations, and lists the email address as info@buvc.org. It holds monthly meetings. I then did a Facebook search for both the Council and the Coalition. The Council’s FB page states that it has updated its website address, but didn’t list it, and I couldn’t find it anywhere. There is not a specific contact person, but the email address is listed as uvc@barrington.ri.gov. Apparently, the Council is under the auspices of the town government.

The FB page for the Coalition, on the other hand, is quite active and is replete with partisan comments. It is a 501(c)4 organization, and as such has the constitutional right to free speech and to engage in partisan political activities.

The first question, then, is whether there truly are two distinct organizations. Has the BUVC, the Barrington United Veterans Council, been subsumed by the BUVC, the Barrington United Veterans Coalition, a partisan organization. Has the BUVC, the Council become, in appearance if not in fact, the BUVC, the Coalition. Both groups are led by the same person. Both groups are known as the BUVC. Indeed, the use of identical initials for the two groups is disingenuous and obfuscatory. How can we distinguish the BUVC from the BUVC? Frankly, I don’t think that I am the only one who finds it very difficult to tell the difference. The BUVC and the BUVC appear to me to be in essence one and the same, and to be decidedly partisan.

In conclusion, I strongly support the decision of the town council to place responsibility for our Memorial Day commemoration and celebration with our town manager. The committee that he has formed has been reaching out to civic groups, members of faith communities, individual veterans, as well as to the BUVC to help create, and participate in, an inclusive, non-partisan commemoration of all those who gave their lives to secure our freedoms.

As the daughter of two US Navy veterans of World War II, on Memorial Day I will display the United States flag that covered my mother’s casket. I will also enthusiastically attend this year’s town events. I close with a phrase from the Navy hymn: I “bid the angry, tumult cease; and give, for wild confusion, peace.”

Trinki Brueckner 

Barrington