I like turtles!

I have had a few questions about the poll answer. It's in reference to this internet video clip.



Those two clips, the I like turtles and the dramatic gopher, are famous in the internet.
Click here to read on!

The nuttiest representative?

Representative Michelle Bachmann (R-Minn) has my vote as the craziest US Congress rep. She opposes filling out the US Census and urges us all not to do so. Why? The government will come after you with the information!
Hey, wait a minute, Congresswoman, we ARE the government. Remember the first three words of the preamble or Article I, Section 2 of the Constitution of the United States



Sounds like her children will be some of the first in the camps.
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Archaeological open house at Akin House

The Dartmouth Heritage Preservation Trust is pleased to announce
an Open House to share with the public the results of the third season of the Akin
House Archaeology Project on Saturday, July 4, 2009 from 11:00 A.M. – 3:00
P.M. Dr. Christina Hodge will present the findings of her students and
volunteers
Full press release can be found by clicking here

Learn about archaeological techniques and what was found during the dig!
Click here to read on!

Dylan on Friday

Take what you have gathered from coincidence!
Click here to read on!

Board of Health and the Alternative Energy Committee

The Board of Health has sent a letter to the Alternative Energy Committee and Select Board. This letter was read and discussed at the last Select Board meeting.
I have posted the Board of Health letter to the web and you can read it here. As is typical with the town, I received the letter on paper and do not have an electronic file copy (Yes, that is meant as a criticism of how the town operates). I scanned the document using OCR and that is the reason for the odd format.
Dr. Dipippo, chair of the Alternative Energy Committee, has responded to the Board of Health and I posted his letter here. Dr. Dipippo did send his as an electronic file and I have converted it to an HMTL document.
Ms. Henderson raises concerns about noise and shadow/flicker and Dr. DiPippo answers that those are considered during the permitting process in accordance with the bylaw.
On a related note, Dr DiPippo has sent me ...


...the following email about the permit preparation process.

Subject: Balloon Photo-Simulation Tests

Hi folks,

Atlantic Design Engineers is hoping to conduct their balloon tests for the photosimulations next week on either Tuesday, Wednesday or Thursday (June 30, July 1,2). They need some sunshine (a rare commodity recently) and little wind. Early morning seems to be the best time from their experience.
Simon Thomas will send an e-mail alert the day or evening before the day of the test using this e-mailing list. He wants to have a conference call with Dave Hickox, Mike O'Reilly and me prior to the test to make all necessary arrangements for site access.
They will float two balloons, one at each site to the full 100 m plus blade height, and calculate where the 80 m plus blade height would be. We have designated about a dozen vantage points surrounding the sites.
In keeping with our full disclosure policy, I would like to notify the residents about the test via our new web site (Mike Courville), as soon as we know when they will be conducted. It might be short notice, but it will the same as we all will have.
So let's hope for sun and no wind at least one of those days next week.
Regarding the shadow/flicker simulations, the computer work is on-going and should be ready next week.
BTW, the National Geographic Channel ran a very interesting program last Thursday (18th) at 9 PM on the World's Toughest Fixes. They showed the process of putting up the Portsmouth HS turbine. Unbelievable footage in HD! Worth tracking it down with On Demand. (my note watch it at the Portsmouth webite, BT)

Regards,

Ron

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Dartmouth state aid estimate released

The Commonwealth's Division of Local Services has published the estimated state aid amounts for FY2010. The link to the Dartmouth information can be found here. The good news is that the Budget Director and Finance Committee came very close to correctly forecasting what the aid amount would be. The bad news is that the amounts are reduced nearly across the board. Chapter 70 school aid is down from $9.69 million to $9.49 million. General government aid is down from $3.58 million to $2.96 million.
Since the forecast used to prepare the budget was conservative and accurate, the town remains ...

... within striking distance of a balanced budget for FY2010. That statement contains several caveats, the first being that no wage or salary increases were budgeted, the second is that the Governor will not make mid year reductions in aid as was done in FY2009.
Areas of state aid that were significantly cut were Police Career Incentive reimbursement that was reduced from $197K to $34K, library aid from $43K to $28K, and unrestricted general government aid from $3.1 million to $2.2 million.
Click here to read on!

Please help support local access TV (DCTV)

The state legislature is considering a bill that would reduce the support that cable providers must give to local access channels such as our own DCTV Channel 18. Blue Mass Group has a blog post about the cable bill here. The service that local access channels provide is vital to keep an informed electorate. Call or write to your state representative and senator ...

...and ask them to maintain support for local access TV and oppose these bills, Senate Bill 1531/House Bill 3765.
Rep. Quinn contact info here:http://www.repquinn.com/
Sen, Montigny contact info here:http://www.magnet.state.ma.us/legis/member/mcm0.htm
Just a few letters, emails, or phone calls can make the difference. Please support our cable channel and contact our representatives. Thanks.
Click here to read on!

Proposed revision to Lincoln Park district bylaw

The town has filed with the state Department of Housing and Community Development(DHCD) asking for a revision to the Lincoln Park Smart Growth Overlay District to include a parcel on Reed Road. Part of the filing was a proposed revision to the existing bylaw. The proposed bylaw revision can be found here in MS Word format. Please note, these are proposed changes. They have not been adopted by Town Meeting and are not even submitted for the warrant yet. I am providing them so that those who are interested can have access ...

... to the information. If you have specific questions about the filing with the DHCD, please let me know in comments and I will try to answer them.
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Wind turbine information now posted to town website

There was some discussion at this evening's Select Board meeting regarding information on wind turbine bylaws and the steps taken so far to site wind turbines on town land. The information has been posted to the town website here. The link is on the home page of the town website under the title, Alternative Energy Information.

Hat tip to Mike Courville for getting it posted.
Click here to read on!

What Digby said!

Read this post by Digby at Hullabaloo. I completely agree with this,

Other countries have systems that prioritize health care treatment on the basis of need --- a triage system. We prioritize health care on the basis of who can pay. And in the most perverse form of rationing there is, we make the sickest people have the most difficult time getting access to health care. (The sickest, after all, can't hold down a job, so the employer based system doesn't really work for them, at least not in the long term.)

The idea that the US doesn't ration health care is absurd. We certainly do. We just make people do it to themselves out of economic hardship. I guess that's supposed to be a tribute to our sense of individualism and personal freedom.

Hey, nobody's going to tell you you can't be treated --- you made that decision all by yourself when you opted not to have a lot of money. That's what freedom's all about. (Unless you're sick and you want to die, of course, in which case the state won't let you.)

Digby's post is in reference ...

...to this article in the Boston Globe
Click here to read on!

Democrats hold food drive for COA

This was in comments and I thought I would bring it up to a post

The Dartmouth Democratic Town Committee is sponsoring a Summer Food Drive that will benefit the COA food Pantry. Drop-offs are the VFW post on Cross Rd , Burgo Basketball complex on Slocum and of course the COA...the food drive is going to start July 1st and finish up July 31st....the summer months is when pantries need the most help...please drop by one of the locations and help us reach our goal of 1,000 canned goods. thank you---Ray Medeiros Jr.

Help if you can
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State budget passes

The Great and General Court of the Commonwealth passed the budget last night. See this post for details. The Standard Times had this article and the Boston Globe had this one
One correction from yesterday's post, ...

...the local option meals tax is .75%, not 75 cents.
Click here to read on!

The free market at work

Watch this You Tube video of Representative Stupak asking insurance company executives about their policies on rescinding coverage of people who get sick. This is apparently done automatically by computer in one case!


At the 4:47 mark, Mr. Stupak asks each executive if they will stop the practice and they decline to do so.
On related note, please contact Senator Kerry, ...


...who is on the Senate Finance Committee, and tell him you want a public option included in the health care reform bill.
Senator John Kerry
Phone: 202-224-2742
Email him here
This is the message I sent

Dear Senator Kerry
Please vote for a real public option such as Mr. Markey's Medicare for All or President Obama's plan. These plans will have the ability to drive down costs by negotiating with providers. The so called co-op plan dilutes that ability and will not be effective in providing cost relief. I will be following the vote closely and hope that you will help bring real change and real reform to your constituents.
William Trimble

Click here to read on!

State budget moves out of committee

The 2010 state budget that has emerged from conference committee has deep cuts and some tax increases. The Boston Globe article about the budget can be found here. As is always the case, the devil in the details of where these cuts ...

... will fall and how that will affect our town budget. It is safe to say that it won't be a positive change to our situation.
The Massachusetts Budget and Policy Center has a preliminary analysis at this link.
UPDATE the local option meals tax is .75%, not 75 cents.
One helpful item for Dartmouth is the ability to assess a 75 cent tax on meals. That will help to generate some local revenue for the town if adopted by Town Meeting. The tax would be effective October 1.
Education aid via chapter 70 will be cut by 2% across the board. For Dartmouth, that works out to about $190K (Chapter 70 aid ~$9.6 million last year). Also cut will be funds for the so-called "circuit breaker" that limits the portion of special education cost that the town must pay for some students
The Quinn bill funding which rewards police officers who get college degrees was cut 4/5 from last year's level to $10 million.
Click here to read on!

Positively 4th Street- Bob Dylan

I wish that for just one time
You could stand inside my shoes
And just for that one moment
I could be you
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Akin House archaeological dig underway

The Standard Times has an article today about the archaeological dig taking place at the Akin House on Dartmouth Street. My oldest son does this kind of work (he lives in Georgia)and I think it pretty cool to have some of it going on right here in town.
The Akin House is one of the oldest structures in the area dating to Revolutionary War times.
Those of you ...

... who like your history to come alive may be interested in the Civil Wart re-enactment at Fort Taber this weekend. Here is the Standard Times piece about that event.
Click here to read on!

Takeover of sheriffs may be delayed

The Fall River Herald News reports that other pressing legislation has delayed the bill which would have put the county sheriffs under state budget control. The article is here. The move may be delayed...

... until January or the beginning of Fiscal Year 2011 in July 2010.
Click here to read on!

Noodle factory burns to my dismay

One of my favorites, Hoo Mee chow mein noodles are made in Fall River. Their factory was gutted by fire this morning. They are going to try to reopen but are not certain that they can. No deliveries are being made to stores. Sad news to chow mein fans.
The only thing I can think of that would be worse ...

... is if Sam's Bakery burned and I couldn't get meat and spinach pies.
Click here to read on!

Wind turbine information

Martha Keating has a letter in today's Standard Times about the proposal for two wind turbines for the town. I have posted the wind turbine bylaw and information about the process here or on the town website here. Ms. Keating states that the funds appropriated by Town Meeting were for a study. The actual use of the funds is to prepare the permit for the turbine in accordance with the bylaw. The Alternative Energy Committee (AEC) had commissioned a wind speed study to determine if the wind regime ...

... in town was suitable for a wind turbine. That study was positive and the AEC reported their findings at a public meeting of the Select Board. The second study was commissioned to investigate the type and location of the turbines and the associated costs and revenues of each type. An engineering company, Atlantic Design Partners, was hired to do this wind turbine feasibility analysis. They reported their findings at public meetings of the Select Board and Finance Committee. The minutes of the February 9th Select Board meeting can be found here.
Both the wind speed survey and the wind turbine feasibility study are dozens of pages and are available at Town Hall. I will try to get them posted to the town website.
Click here to read on!

Rhode Island slot parlor near bankruptcy

Those who see slot machines or casino gambling as an answer to theCommonwealth's revenue problems, this blog post from Blue Mass Group is sobering news. A Rhode Island slot parlor operator may declare bankruptcy at the end of the month and the state will lose the revenue at a time when it can sorely afford it.
Let's hope our legislators are ...

... paying attention to what is happening next door and don't buy into increased gambling as a solution for added revenue.
The state Democratic Party adopted a no predatory gambling plank in their platform last month.
I don't like gambling as a way to raise revenue. Personally I wish the state would close the lottery too. What are your thoughts about casinos, slots and lotteries?
Click here to read on!

US Health care costs

Matt Yglesias points out in this post that US health care spending is much higher and the outcomes are poorer than countries with government run systems. So much for the efficiencies of the marketplace.
Yet for some reason, the debate in this country starts with the assumption that a government run system would be more costly. This assumption is demonstrably false ...

...but our media never seems to get around to mentioning that. It is not even true for the huge government run system already in place in the US, Medicare, which provides better care at lower cost than private insurers.
Why do you think that the discussion in this country continues to begin from this false premise?
Click here to read on!

Today's Select Board meeting

The Select Board meeting shown for today on the weekly meeting schedule is to approve and sign bond notes. That is the only agenda item.

And here is the rest.
Click here to read on!

Globe getaways

The Boston Globe recommends two relatively local getaways for its readers. The first is the Coastal Wine Trail which includes our own Running Brook Winery as well as Westport Winery. You can visit any of the wineries and pick up a passport for the tour. Get it stamped at all the wineries and you can enter a prize drawing. Good wine and nice scenery all along the route.
The second ...

... is more urban, Waterfire in Providence. The river is aflame and wired an eclectic assortment of music during these events. Nice place to people watch or stroll on a hot summer evening. My favorite are the living statues.
Click here to read on!

County sheriffs may be absorbed by the Commonwealth

The Fall River Herald News reports that the county sheriff system may be absorbed by the state if the House decides to follow the Senate's lead in the legislation. One unresolved issue is who will pay for the pensions of existing retired workers. That obligation currently carries a $1 million price tag.
The Herald News quotes Westport representative Rodriques,

“This is universally supported because the county sheriffs already receive 83 percent of its funding from the state, and when the two are joined it will allow for more accountability for the taxpayers and voters and more control where we can adequately monitor the spending,”

Sheriff Hodgson is quoted ...

... in the article as supporting the move but also notes that the county system provides opportunities for regional co-operation. What do you think about the elimination of the county sheriffs?
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Jokerman- Bob Dylan

A friend to the martyr
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Pension reform bill passed

The Boston Globe has a story here about the pension reform bill which passed the General Court yesterday. The bill does tackle what I would call pension abuses but cannot in my opinion be called reform. What the state and municipalities need is the ability to go to defined contribution plans, rather than defined benefit plans. That is the direction that private companies have taken over the past few decades. Currently pension provisions are mandated ...

... by Massachusetts General Law, MGL Chapter 32
Allowing municipalities to negotiate the level of pension compensation would be another step that would be welcome as real pension reform.
Click here to read on!

Wind farm on the Cape

The Massachusetts Military Reservation is considering the instalation of a wind turbine farm on their base. The Boston Globe article is here The press release from ...

... the Massachusetts National Guard can be found here. The proposal appears to have widespread support from elected officials. The 17 proposed turbines would have sufficient capacity to power the base.
Click here to read on!

Wind turbine bylaw and town wind turbines

I thought that the wind turbine bylaw was posted to the town website but I could not find it. I have uploaded it and made it available here.
The Town Meeting approved funding for preparation of a wind turbine permit and I have had a few questions about the process. An engineering company will prepare the permit application for two wind turbines on town land in the Paskamansett Valley in accordance with this bylaw and submit it to the Technical Research Group (TRG) for review. The permit and the recommendation of the TRG then goes to the Select Board ...

...which is the Special Permit Granting Authority for a hearing on the permit application. These hearings would be open for public comment. The permit application must address many issues and I will leave it to those with interest to read the bylaw. If approved for a permit, the project can then be built.
I feel that our current bylaw is too restrictive when it comes to the siting of commercial wind turbines. For instance, the approval by the TRG and Select Board require super majorities of the body (4 out of 5 members) to approve the permit. Additionally the setback and open space requirements are such that huge areas are needed in order to site a single turbine. There are commercial size wind turbines in close proximity to structures all around our area. The wind turbines in Hull and Portsmouth are adjacent to school buildings, as is the turbine at the Massachusetts Maritime Academy. A commercial sized, albeit relatively small, turbine sits next to I93 going into Boston. None of these installations would be allowed under our bylaw. There are many areas of our town that are ideally suited for wind power generation and therefore, the potential for significant tax revenue from those turbines.
On the positive side, the existence of the bylaw gives potential wind power developers a clear set of criteria to meet when presenting a project for permitting approval.
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Latest financial file from Finance Committee

The latest MOB file from Mr. Lynam of the Finance Committee can be found at this link. This file reflects the changes made at Town Meeting. Of note are the items which were not funded due to lack of revenue. Among them are police cars, road maintenance and school technology which total more than $450,000. Also not included is any pay increase for town employees.
The future year projections continue to show deficits and the projections are probably optimistic in that they have state aid continuing at current levels which seems unlikely and no increase for town employee wages in future years. Another area of concern is ...

...that the state target for Dartmouth's reimbursement under Chapter 70 aid is 17.5%. The reimbursement percentage is being slowly decreased until we reach that level.
The town has made some progress toward fiscal health but there are still difficult choices ahead. I hope that we can adequately plan to met these challenges. Over the past few years, the taxpayers have added over $4 million dollars to the town's budget if you include fees and override tax increases. Town employees are going to take wage freezes or have reduced numbers. We need to move aggressively to reduce costs through increased use of technology, regional agreements, consolidation of departments and outsourcing to continue to deliver services.
Click here to read on!

June 13th is Paul Cuffe Day!

The Herald News has an article that the Westport historical society will honor of the 250th birthday of the African American abolitionist, businessman, and hero.
The article continues,

On June 13, the Westport and New Bedford historical societies are sponsoring the anniversary of Cuffe’s birth by rededicating his monument at the Westport Friends Meeting House at 930 Main Road in Central Village. ...
Brock Cordeiro of the Dartmouth Historical Commission, who wrote a 215-page graduate thesis on Cuffe in 2004, wrote to local, state and federal officials ... to get recognition for Cuffe

The ceremony will be at 3PM.
Mr. Cordeiro is an expert ...

... on the life and times of Mr. Cuffe and has a real passion for fostering greater tribute to this early advocate for equal treatment for persons of color.
Providence has a maritime charter school named in his honor.
Click here to read on!

Plymouth Rock Studios infrastructure spending in doubt

The Fall River Herald News has two articles today about the proposed Plymouth Rock movie studio. In this one, state Senate leader Murray casts doubt on the funding for infrastructure improvements. The Governor's office disputes her statement and says the funding will be available. Another article, see here, details the potential for 2000 jobs ...

... if the project is built.
Even during tough financial times such as the current ones, this is the type of government spending that should be done. By providing a modest investment now the state and its residents can realize earnings in the long run. Let's hope that the Governor and legislature can get together on this project and bring it to fruition.
Click here to read on!

Analysis of the federal deficit and stimulus funds

Matt Yglesias has a blog post on the sources of the current federal deficit. The answer may surprise you. I am not opposed to deficit spending by the federal government during periods of economic downturn. My hope is that the spending will be focused on things that will pay long lasting dividends in future years. One such use of stimulus money might be ...

... alternative energy production. Dartmouth is hoping to install two wind turbines to generate power for town uses (see here as well). If stimulus money were to be used to help fund that, jobs would be created to build and erect the turbine, the town would realize energy cost savings for a couple decades, and our reliance on foreign energy sources would be reduced.
To that end Dr. DiPippo and several Select Board members are planning to meet briefly with our Congressman, Mr. Frank, when he visits New Bedford to inquire if our project might be able to get some of the stimulus funds.
Click here to read on!

Towns near regional animal control agreement. Big savings

The Herald News reports in this article that a regional or inter municipal agreement between Somerset and Swansea will save both towns over $30,000 and increase service in Somerset.
The agreement has been approved by Somerset and awaits the approval of the Swansea Select Board. This is the kind of co-operation ...

... that is needed across the board in our towns to avoid drastic reductions in services.
Click here to read on!

Moderator names two to Finance Committee

Curt Brown has a blog post this evening that Town Meeting Moderator, Steve Sharek, has appointed M.L. Nunes and Jason Wentworth to the Finance Committee. They will begin serving on July 1 and are appointed to seats ...

... that were formerly held by Melissa Haskell and Fran Pettengill, who asked not to be reappointed.
Click here to read on!

Full Day Kindergarten for Dartmouth

UPDATE- Wow! That was fast. I got an email from an astute reader who pointed out that I had not subtracted the amount of the current 1/2 day program. I have revised the post and the spreadsheet to reflect the difference. Changes in italics, BT
There has been some discussion between the School Committee, Select Board and Finance Committee about implementing a full day kindergarten program for our schools.This link has a presentation from the school department about full day kindergarten(MS word, .docx file) The discussion has focused on the one-time costs that are incurred when kicking off a program that increases the student population. These one-time costs occur because Chapter 70 school aid lags a growth in student population by one year. Dartmouth’s foundation budget for FY10 is based upon the student census in November of FY09. So a program that increases the number of students is not reimbursed until the following school year. Some have referred to this as the “startup” cost.
I was interested in what that cost was, so I ran a few numbers through a spreadsheet and found that the costs are significant, but not astronomical. Using the FY10 foundation for Dartmouth, the startup cost for a full day kindergarten program would be just less than $250K. The total cost to taxpayers the first year is about $2.06 million ($1.27 million more than the current 1/2 day) and that drops to $1.8 million the following year ($1 million more than the current 1/2 day) when the new kindergarten students are counted in the foundation.
An increase in the school budget of $1.0 million would require an override in my opinion since there is no place to find that amount within the departmental operating budgets. I think that an increase of that magnitude should be put to the voters in any case. If the town decides ...


... that having a full day kindergarten program is worth the added expense, the override will pass. I would support an increase in taxes to provide full day kindergarten. I believe that an investment in early childhood education is the biggest bang that one can get from additional spending.
You can see the figures that I used on the spreadsheet at this link. A word on how I arrived at these figures. I had to make an assumption. The assumption was how many children would attend full day. I chose 320 as that number. The increase in cost is the right hand columns and is the cost of the full day program minus the cost of the current 1/2 day program. I got the foundation budget numbers (per student amounts, no. of students in ½ day) from the Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education website and I have attached them as a separate sheet.
So implementing a full day kindergarten program would require about $250,000 in startup costs for the first year and an override for the program of $1.0 million. What do you think about that? Is this something that the town and schools should pursue? As I said, there is no better dollar spent in education than one spent for early education.
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UMass Dartmouth has scholarships for laid off teachers

The Herald News printed this article about a scholarship program at Umass Dartmouth aimed at helping teachers whop have been laid off. The article has the details and contact information. Click here to read on!

You bet your health!

Play the game here!
This site is sponsored by a nurse's organization. Looks like some health care providers are getting on board. It is a mystery to me ...

... why employers are not lining up to back health care reform since it could help them shed a great deal of cost. I would like to see a public option included in the health care reform bill currently before Congress. Our congressional delegation is leading the charge for that but you can sign the petition so that the Congress knows the public wants to move on health care reform. Maybe we can make it a condition of the bankruptcy of GM and Chrysler that they have to move all their employees to a public plan. What do you think about having a public option?
Click here to read on!

Why is health care so expensive?

This New Yorker magazine article examines why McAllen, Texas has the second highest spending per person on health care in the nation despite having the lowest per capita household income nationally.
Health care is less expensive in Rochester, Minnesota, home of the Mayo Clinic than in McAllen. The care provided is not as good as El Paso according to Medicare analysis.
I think the article is revealing ...

... and can be a basis for discussion of what our health care system needs. The Congress is currently debating a health care bill and the insurance and pharmaceutical companies are lobbying heavily to poison an option for a public provider. Read Robert Reich's take at the preceding link. Our congressional representatives are supportive of the public option and are leading the Congress on health care issues.
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Emailing the government

Mass INC has an article in their Commonwealth magazine (free registration required) detailing the responses received when emailing various government agencies for information. The email addresses were listed on their websites. Email is a ubiquitous method of communication in this day and age, so I'm sure that many users choose ...

... to send an email rather than call or write. What the author found was that many emails went unanswered and many gave incomplete or unsatisfactory answers, some took many weeks to reply. Others responded promptly and even followed up with a phone call. Do you have an experience with emailing a government agency? What was your experience? Do you think that email is a good vehicle for government to serve its constituents.
Click here to read on!

Measures to balance state budgets listed

The National Conference of State Legislatures has compiled a table of actions that states across the country are employing to solve their budget puzzles. The list contains measures on both the revenue and spending side. You can find the table here
I find it interesting that many other states have proposed ...

... gasoline tax hikes as did our Governor.
Few states have even proposed raising personal income tax. New York being a notable exception. I would have preferred that option in our Commonwealth.
Layoffs were widespread across all categories of government.
The New York Times has more on which states are hardest hit here
Click here to read on!

Allen's Pond in the news

This opinion piece in the Standard Times chronicles the challenges faced by the ecosystem of Allen's Pond. Residents were swarmed by mosquitoes last year when the pond's outlets silted up and the pond went stagnant. Without seawater coming in and out with the tide,...

... the pond becomes mosquito heaven. The greater question now is what to do about the problem. As the op-ed writer points out this is a natural cycle. What do you think should be done?
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Buckets of Rain - Bob Dylan

From Blood on the Tracks album, one of my favorites!


All you can do, is do what you must,
you do what you must do, and you do it well
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Here's something that would really help!

Charley on the MTA has a post at Blue Mass Group about health care reform that is moving through the US Congress and the State House.
Take a look at this pie chart about where our state dollars are spent. That big yellow piece of the pie is health care spending as well as the deep purple one for employee coverage. If these reforms can drive down what the state and municipalities spend for health care, ...

... it frees up billions of dollars for other uses. It might put a few extra dollars in your pocket too, unless you are an insurance company.
Our own Senator Kennedy has been in the forefront of this effort for many years. You can read his editorial on reform in the Globe here.
Yeah! Go Ted! Go Obama!
Click here to read on!

For those hoping for more state aid!

From the Governor's Online Forums,(Link here) which are being hosted by Chancellor MacCormack of UMass Dartmouth, comes this little tidbit,

If you cut costs by laying off every employee in state government, you’d still have a $1.1 billion deficit. If you eliminate every state human services agency—Mental Health, Public Health, Transitional Assistance, Developmental Disabilities, etc—you would still be short $700 million. Since the state faces a combined budget deficit of approximately $9 billion in the next two fiscal years, the federal stimulus will be part of but not the entire solution. ...How would you raise new revenue? Which services would you cut? Which services would you preserve, and how would you pay for them?

For a pie chart that shows how the state spends our money, click here
The state and local rules for things like vacation, sick time, and pensions are the same or very similar in most cases. These issues are certainly a part of the problem.
But as you can see from the statement above, the bottom has fallen out of the revenue collection. The General Court has not done enough to correct that. I would like to see

... a graduated income tax to go with the sales tax hike that is likely to pass. Although I also think the flat income tax that Pennsylvania uses has a lot of merit. The rate is fairly low but here's the kicker, no deductions on earnings. If you make $20,000, you send in $600, if you make $200,000 send in $6,000. I would also support a tax on gasoline which is dedicated to mass transit and road repair only (not tolls, not more roads).
Even if the state emptied out the Stabilization Fund, they can't keep up the contributions to education and local aid. So much for next year might be better!
Click here to read on!

State House committee on local relief meets in Fall River

The Herald News has this article today about the meeting of the Joint Committee on Municipalities and Regional Government. The committee heard from local leaders yesterday on the measures that they would like to see enacted to help local governments. I like the idea of making it easier for local governments to join the state GIC insurance and hate the idea on funding local aid based on the Chapter 70 formula espoused by Fall River Councilwoman Viveiros. Mayor Lang of New Bedford pitched the idea of state aid for public safety services. I think we have more work to do with regional approaches such as regional dispatch before asking the state to fund our local fire and police.

And here is the rest.
Click here to read on!

Town Meeting results

The annual Town Meeting was held today and adopted the 24 articles that were voted. Two articles were withdrawn. The results can be found at this link. The article to fund the Stabilization fund was withdrawn due to lack of funds. The article to reinstate the funding for the Youth Commission was withdrawn due to the fact that the funding was restored ...

... within the annual budget article, Article 10.
The Finance Committee had recommended against the adoption of Article 6, $350,000 to acquire the former State Police Barracks, funding the Youth Commission, and had reduced the line item for the Grant Department salaries by 15%. Town Meeting members spent considerable time debating these three issues and decided against the Finance Committee recommendations on each.
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