WRRB/Telegram District City Council Forum 10/18
-
This forum is for all district council candidates; all candidates are here
today. Format: 14 total questions, 4 questions across districts (for all
candida...
6 months ago
14 comments:
I wonder if Worcester has filed a grant application with the Massachusetts Opportunity Relocation and Expansion Jobs Capital Program (mentioned in the story)
- CF
Does anyone question how we got $15,000 for the memoprial at Salter School when we just asked the YMCA and Bancroft school to run the Shore Park Beach because we have no money!!! If I was from either of those organizations, I would question those who said we had no money. I am sure their individual contributions were about that amount. Politics at its worst!!!! Give me what I need, and I'll give you a good evaluation!!!
i READ THAT ARTICLE THis MORNING and also had somewhat similar thoughts. Another park to care for and we cannot maintain the ones we have now. Maybe the neighbors will care for this one?
ORH has huge ramifications for the city, relative to this memorial, and in 8 yrs of massport management we still havent solved the problem up there. Granted the money involved is much more. Can't we just move the memorial to an existing city park (or to the yard of one of the neighbors)? Too bad the City couldnt accomodate Salter the way Salter accomodated everyone in this situation. Afterall, Salter could have just given the Memorial the Spags 19 treatment or fenced it in just for spite. Kudo's to Mr Keefe, the apparent key man at Salters, for doing the right thing even though the city, the neighborhood, and the pols basically ran him right out of town on a rail. I wonder how much in personal property taxes we lost as a result? I'll bet it would pay a lifeguard for the summer.
Kudos to Mr. Keefe as well. He got $20,000 for some land he did not even want and the Taxpayer misses out again. So the winners are Mr. Keefe, Mr. Smith, who gets some political one-upsmanship, and the losers are the taxpayers AGAIN.
To anonymous re the $15k. We'll be paying each city councillor an add'l $14k in annual salary as a result of their vote to increse their annual salary by 84% That's 14K x 11. A cool $154,000. Additionally, the school committe, through no action of their own, picked up another $50,000 in annual salary. How many pool/beaches could we have opened with that total of $204,000 in rasies for elected officials.
And of course my pet peeve....The Hanover Theatre a.k.a. "The Hand It Over Theatre"...(the old EM Loews)...gets a permit fee waiver of $198,000....which waiver was voted by the same council that continues to weep & moan about non profits not paying their fair share. Gimme a break! The fee waiver came after the theatre was given a multi million $$$$ Community Dev'ment Block Grant.
Let's just hope the new Hand It Over Theatre doesnt catch the Downtown Wocester Flu and go the way of Tiannos, Union Station Blues, or the apparently troubled Union Station Restaurant.
If any of us were local colleges with millions and poss. billions in endowmwnts, would you just hand over your money to a city council that spends and mismanges money like a bunch of drunken sailors and is absolutely beholden to the city unions? I sure would not! I'd tell the city to first of all clean up the money called paid sick days. What is it?......9 or 10 paid sick days on average for every city employee. Thats 2 weeks of non productive time paid for by taxpayers who work in private sectore jobs and get no where near that many paid sick days. 4th July on wednesday next week............OMG.........in addtion to the summer nationals , the City Employee Flu will be coming to town too !
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I watched City Council review of City Manager O'Brien last night. Many councilors commended the City Manager on his handling of ORH. Not sure how anyone can be happy with the current 6 month extension?
If anyone reding this can do so and support any of them is beyond me. Everyone is in the tank!
Maybe the extension is being used to make final agreeemnts with Massport and airlines that will be flying from ORH. So when the sale of ORH is final they can make a big announcement of all the new things that will be happening under the new owners.
tim macdonald said...
"So when the sale of ORH is final they can make a big announcement "
Unfortunately, they're not talking about selling. Only a 'new operating agreement' where Massport picks up 100% of the operating budget.
It sounds like the same agreement they penned eight years ago, with the possible exception of the City increasing their share.
I'd like to see the city use Fitchburg as an operating model, and use the income to offset the debt service. That would save the city another half a million a year.
- CF
Tim:
I hope you are right. The last time we heard that a big announcement was coming was when Allegiant pulled out last August. The "big announcement" never came.
Bill
With Chicoppee landing Skybus, what other airlines might we be chasing ?
Anonymous:
We are not going to get any start-ups to ORH under the current mgmt... Losing Allegiant sent a very loud message and now with Skybus at Chicopee we are cooked.
Our only chance for January is that MassPort will take over via a long-term lease or outright sale and divert some of their flights to ORH.
Bill
From the Springfield Republican article:
"Murray said smaller airports will increasingly see a demand from airlines because the larger airports, like Bradley International Airport in Connecticut, will be at capacity in the coming years."
Massport is only agreeing to take it over because they know they will need it down the road. They have no short-term need for it, so I seriously doubt they will do anything to build it up.
If the city would realize that they can surrender the part 139 certificate, and operate ORH like the GA only airport that it is, they wouldn't be in such a hurry to sign on with Massport.
- CF
zlaaunSo what does Murray do for ORH in his new position as Lt Govenor, applaud Chicopee for landing Skybus?
I would not put too much faith in what Murray says as regards the future of air travel in Massachusetts. Take a look at Logans decreasing capacity utilization over the last 10 years and additionally they added a new runway last fall.
So maybe they throw us bone and we get 4 flights to Fla from Oct to May. We need more than this and we cannot wait 10 or 15 or 20 years for Bradlee or Logan to reach capacity. And if Bradlee reaches capacity,isnt there still an sirport in Hartford & Chicopee?
CF, if we go to a GA airport then we would have to lay city employees. What will our former pro labor Mayor have to say about this? Please do not forget that labor is running this town.
Post a Comment