LONELY AT THE TOP.....Somewhere there is a DVD and some kind of a record of Jeff Bennett stating that if people were looking for someone to blame for the 500K shortfall in the Town's budget, then blame me, as the sitting chairman of the board of selectmen, I accept the blame. As is the case in the military and in business, education, politics and just about every where, if you are in charge, you get the blame and must accept it. Authority can be delegated but not responsibility. So yeah, Bud Chase gets the blame from me for things at the highway dept. It is not a personal thing, but if a highway worker gets hurt or a citizen passer by gets hurt, the questions come, were safety practices in play? were the workers properly trained? Was the equipment in use in good working order? Did the truck get a pre-trip inspection before going out on the job? Did the driver properly inspect his truck before leaving the shop? When the chemical splashed in the employees eyes, was he wearing proper safety gear as in glasses and or face shield? Was he properly licensed? was the eye wash station working properly and was it in the best location/ Had the fire extinguishers been inspected in the proper time frame? All these and more are or should be the responsibility of the person in charge. It is part of the job and responsibility of being in charge. Are there post trip inspections done on all highway equipment when it returns at the end of the day. If you have a commercial drivers license, you should know the requirements and if you do not, you can look them up and ask those same questions. These things take time (approximately 15 minutes for each pre-trip and post trip) and yeah it may mean a 6 hours of work out of an 8 hour day but it is safety and in some cases, the law.
When the trucks are serviced, are they inspected as well? Yes, I know the mechanic at the highway dept. and his capabilities and yes, I visited Bud and spoke to him about the painting of the dump bodies back when I was on the BOS and yes I was shown the used frame and parts, new and used that were used to rebuild the Hendrickson suspension on that old ten wheeler. I took the time to visit, to talk and to look! So when it was said that the loader (s) had loose bucket attachments, and I believe it was at a BOS meeting held in the gym of the Baldwinville school where this was pointed out or brought to the BOS and I recall it was more than once. There are pins and bushings that are used to attach the bucket of the loader to the "arms" that have hydraulic cylinders to lift and lower the bucket. Those can be replaced, at your location if need be, and the cost is about 3 grand. Talking with a CAT mechanic, the usual reason for their failure is lack of grease. So yes, I have taken the time to look, listen and speak.
The blame or fault has to land somewhere and it is usually placed right at the feet of the one in charge, right or wrong, the responsibility has to lie somewhere! And perhaps the get r done attitude and the thought process of we can get this old worn equipment to go one more year is part of the problem. If it is simply worn out, then it should be parked and then if you do not have any trucks to work with, then, well, people it is up to you, vote some money or the work you want or think should get done will not happen. Dave Smart included in one comment on here that instead of bashing or complaining, that perhaps some ideas or suggestions would be better, so I have produced multiple ideas, suggestions and information and I asked a question; why do so many communities use a snow blower rather than a snow plow to clear city / town sidewalks now since at one time, snow plows were used by most communities. My hypothesis was that at some point, somewhere, someone decided to try a different method and that method was a snow blower vs. a snow plow and as it has been pointed out, a sidewalk snow blower is not exactly cheap. Someone was first and I am inclined to think that it worked so well for many reasons, that many communities followed suit! That justified the increase in spending.
So I hope to make it clear that all the things I have posted on snow & ice and road repair are not the result of things Jeff wants, but were posted in answer to a request or suggestion to put forth said ideas, suggestions and information but it seems no one is interested in even exploring them because sometimes change is very hard. What I do hope for and one thing I would like to see is for the town to explore the surplus system and get in the game to get what is out there and available to the town and it is not just army trucks. Dave, perhaps while you are gathering information on 10 year grader costs, you can obtain and post here a cost of the refurbish of that 10 wheeler.
Lastly, you can point at the school and the light dept. all day, everyday, but that is not going to get you money, you are going to have to try what we did on the BOS, hold meetings, show and tell, open house, free coffee, whatever, but you are going to have to convince the people why it is in their interest to finance highway equipment or road repair. I can almost guarantee you will get one question; why did we use road repair money to buy a loader? Now head banging time is over, time to start looking at the school and town budget, as the horse was led to water, but he don't want to drink!
Jeff Bennett
Paul working for you.
Speaking of "lonely at the top."
ReplyDeleteFrom what I can gather Mr. Robinson made the statement “what is the end game” concerning the investigation voted on at previous town meeting. Here are my thoughts as to why this investigation needs to be pursued.
I have run across this paragraph from Chapter 10 of the book Creating the Perfect Mind Control Slave. “ What is often attacked in individuals and nations in order to control them? It is their sense of identity as a spiritual moral being. The individual and the nation must be brought to think of themselves as animals. Another primary tactic or tool is to traumatize the victim who is to be controlled, and then provide relief when a demonic lie is accepted. Rejection is an important trauma, because it creates a desire for performance and retaliation, and gets people trapped in a bondage loop. Lies put people into bondage. Images are a type of lie, that lead to bondage.
Bear with me now as I try to explain how it is my belief, Kopelman and Paige need to be exposed for their lies, for as above “Lies put people into bondage.”
All lawyers belong to the bar. The bar has been around for a long time. Big corporations have been around for a long time. Big corporations employ lots of lawyers. Lawyers don’t have to tell the truth in the court room’s of Massachusetts. Templeton employed K&P for legal services. It is my opinion K&P told lots of lies. Lies put people into bondage.
Big corporations seem to run the world and it appears that the bar works for these big corporations or corporation. Woodrow Wilson had this to say, Since I entered politics, I have chiefly had men's views confided to me privately. Some of the biggest men in the United States, in the field of commerce and manufacture, are afraid of something. They know that there is a power somewhere so organized, so subtle, so watchful, so interlocked, so complete, so pervasive, that they better not speak above their breath when they speak in condemnation of it.”
Trying to expose a lie appears to be a step in the right direction for the many reasons expressed in paragraph two. It is hoped anyone who values their freedom will agree and have the courage to continue to pursue the truth in this matter and back this investigation should it come before us as a citizen’s petition, at annual town meeting.
So Jeff the big question you avoid is where the money will come from for your ideas to save the cold patch costs. We can then invest that amount in the roads and or equipment needed long ago. You only pointed out what failed at town meeting and not that the reason was due to the rates going up. Many towns have a yearly 2 1/2 over ride for roads repair above and beyond the usual funding source chapter 90,TIP and other means.princeton has a 250k extra to do road repairs every year and they know the cost to do all the work needed is even more. They have the ideas to try to catch up and get the roads to a point of condition that will be the quality they would like. Looking at the votes you posted tells me the people in town want what they have and don't want to pay for the equipment with a tax increase. Thinking back when the votes were had I think the TRUST factor for the BOS and how the money was being handled and accounted for was less than the town expected. When we have been told all is on track now and find out an audit is not possible till 750-1000 hours of work are done. We can only try to work through what we have to work through it with. As with the equipment needed here other towns often use chapter 90 monies to do purchases even when over rides don't get put in front of voters. The people said no to an over ride of the tax rate. No I don't want my taxes to go up. When the need for equipment comes it usually doesn't tell us when it quits we find out when it does. Evaluation happens and the educated decision happens. That is a team approach of how what we need to do happens. Spending the tax payers money is never taken lightly and never for granted. The loader has logged in 600+ hours this winter; to say we could have done the job as good without it would be a lie. No one can or could look over the other loaders and expect them to pull the load we needed from loaders to get the job done this winter or any other. As far as the district pool of equipment thought WOW what that would be like to keep anything running.
ReplyDeleteThings sound so good if the people who write it have an imagination of a perfect world. Just the sweeper equipment for one we all need it at the same time. Who will get to look at the dirty roads the longer. Our crew is done spring sweeping way before the rest of the towns because of the way we do it. The equipment we use and the leadership with the knowledge of the ways it has been done in the past and has improved the outcome now. I think the thing about the equipment is more about the trust and ability of the leadership of the town to govern. With the change in the way the town has gone to a administrator type may have been a good change and will keep a open central way of dealing with the town operations.
ReplyDeleteBob Markel has had his hands full and knows how to handle things the way they should. The town may need to take another step and set up a charter and have control of the whole town and stop the department push and pull as we see now. A DPW setup has long been needed and could be a way to save Templeton great amounts of money and stop the duplication of management like we see now. As with the light department cost of a lawyer to find out the governance of Templeton showed Driscoll we can change the town for the better and without doing so could keep us from ever getting in a position to properly fund all parts of the town. There is a reason Driscoll did not want to share the answer to the 11,000.00 question and said the department would do anything it had to to protect things for them. For them and not the town. We see this now as the money for PILOT has ended and the rates have gone up and will continue to go up.
gee, where would I get money to do road repair??? I know I know!!1 chapter 90 money cause I would not use it to buy a loader! You use the money you already get and use it in a different way. And we gonna do a Town charter??? I hope you are running for light and water commission so you can change that around too.
ReplyDeleteAs you very well know jeff the minority gets nothing done they would like to do. Thats been the issue here for some time. The point of the loader being purchased with the chapter 90 money is it was a last resort. The amount of road repair that money would have produced would be 0 the money would be eaten up on engineering costs first. A drop in the bucket so to speek!
ReplyDeleteYou know the big bucket Gery Skleleton talked about at the campaign night. I think the different way would be to Grind the roads in the worst shape and pave as we save on the patching costs. Again see about the over ride and raise of tax rates to help quicken the roads repairing time and get them back to the state we want. If the voters want the roads that way they will support this and have what they want with what they have to want it. Wheres the money going to come from?
200k will get 101 to the car wash maybe 1 coat. what was done on 101 cost 50k + paid for from pot hole repair fund for emergancy the special from state program.