Tick, tick, tick: Public Documents bonanza

So I've set my blogger controls to automatically publish at 2:30 this afternoon my most recent investigative article based on a somewhat wide ranging public documents request made the end of February.

The town naturally took well beyond the 10 day response period to comply (after their attorney advised them they had to) and gave me the legal documents concerning 13 former employees.

Some of them were routine retirement settlements; and some of them were far from it.

ARA sets dates

At this evening's cordial meeting the Amherst Redevelopment Authority confirmed the upcoming public outreach orchestrated by American Communities Partnership designed to bring in opinions from ALL the stakeholders--not just those with backyards abutting ground zero.

Planning Director Jonathan Tucker declared anyone who shows interest in the Gateway Project is a stakeholder and will eventually be heard. If they can't make the intimate small group (up to ten people) meetings on April 12, 13 and 14, they can send "public comments" via mail or email to the planning department who will then forward to the consultant.

But ARA grande dame Peggy Roberts pointed out, they should be thinking of what would be overtly acceptable not just for now, but for the next fifty years.

While those initial three days of stakeholder interviews are by invite only and are not open, public meetings, the information gleamed will help set the agenda for the three-day charrette at the end of the month: April 28, 29 and 30th.

These meetings are wide open with the first one an all day affair--the design visioning workshop. On day two the consultants and town staff try to synthesize the input from day one and start to draft a vision, and on day three try to sharpen the vision focus.

At a joint meeting of the ARA and Planning Board sometime in mid-June the final draft from the consultants will be unveiled and in the last two weeks of their contract the consultants will be available for any final tweaks.

With the visioning process completed and a "desired outcome" targeted, the next vital phase consists of the action steps required to actually get us there. And in Amherst, the hardest part is overcoming the usual response: "you can't get there from here."

Dark clouds on the Solar Farm horizon?

DEP requires Amherst to regrade undulations at old landfill

Dave Keenan, a long-time thorn in town officials side, although once a town official himself, is baaaaaack.

Now he's lobbing a stink bomb into the middle of Amherst public officials picnic over turning our old abandoned landfill into a cash cow solar array farm that will produce enough renewable energy to supply all municipal needs, saving the town almost $1 million per year in electricity costs, and pay up to a couple hundred thousand dollars annually in property taxes.

Government tax incentives have stimulated these sunny public/private partnerships springing up nationwide like weeds after a summer rain. And it's not as though old landfills are good for much else.

Mr Keenan blew the whistle to his old acquaintances at the Department of Environmental Protection claiming three retired DPW workers told him about 20-30 barrels of hazardous wastes--allegedly lead based paint from UMass-- they were ordered to bury back in the 1980s.

While I cannot corroborate that particular story, I can verify first hand that hazardous materials were indeed tossed into the smelly pit. Yes, I admit it; 50 years ago my dad and I threw old paint, solvents, dirty motor oil, leftover cleaning products, insecticides, fertilizers, outdated medicines, etc. As did most of the citizens of bucolic Amherst.

To say there are hazardous wastes buried in the old landfill is like declaring there's bear dung in the woods of Maine. That's why the town spent a considerable amount to cap the site with an impermeable protective cover: to keep water from mixing with the dangerous contents and forming a hazardous cocktail that could could migrate downstream. Monitoring sites were also installed to test for that scenario and a system to handle methane gas.

But after 20 Years of fermentation the contents down under have settled causing the cap to sag in spots, allowing pools of water to form on the surface. The DEP ordered the town to fill in the depressions and regrade the site to its original aircraft carrier flatness--all without disturbing the cap of course. As you can imagine, that is a tad expensive.

Fortunately the town is in the middle of a road construction boom. The Atkins corner project, with two roundabouts coming soon, has already generated massive amounts of dirt. Only one slight problem: 6,000 tons of it is contaminated with lead arsenate, a common insecticide used on apples orchards between 1892 and the early 1970s when it was banned by the EPA.



The contractor can either spend a fortune hauling the contaminated soil to a special handling facility or bring it to the old landfill to use as fill for DEP required site remediation. Everybody saves a ton of money. The DEP approved the idea, but will require a three foot layer of non-polluted soil to cover the contaminated soil and numerous other safety precautions.

But every cloud does indeed have a silver lining. If a project--like the Bluewave Captital Solar panel farm on the old landfill--is "part of a site remediation or restoration under a Mass/DEP enforcement action/order" it is eligible for "fast track status" when negotiating the local permitting process.

And while the long-term contract with Bluewave will have to be approved by town meeting it will only require a simple majority vote, unlike a zoning change that requires two thirds.

Who says money doesn't fall from the sky? Now it will--whenever the sun is shining.



Christmas '07: After the town took Dave Keenan's humble abode for $50,000 in back taxes he camped out in his former front yard. DEP fines for ten years procrastination cleaning up an oil spill also amounted to $30,000. Mr. Keenan eventually repaid Amherst over $63,000 in back taxes and legal fees.

Business West profiles the Amherst Solar farm

Jones Library has a new trustee

Amherst College professor Austin Sarat won the vote 8-1 in a combined meeting of the Jones Library Trustees and Amherst Select Board and will serve out the remaining one year term left on Kathy Wang's seat, who resigned due to time constraints brought on from her day job--principal at the ever expanding Pioneer Valley Chinese Immersion Charter school in Hadley.

Party house of the weekend: Busted!

51 Pine Grove (stand alone condominium)

These bad boys are vying for "Party House of the Semester"! Four occupants, each arrested on charges of violating three bylaws: Unlawful noise, Nuisance House, Unlawful Possession of a Keg. Normally, had they simply been issued $300 tickets, a stinging $900 each ($3,600 total for the incident).

But, instead of the that lucrative option, the responding officers arrested all four charging each with 3 violations and one, Ted Bates Miller, with the additional charge of "resisting arrest". Which shows that the town crackdown on rowdy students is not about raising money--it is about changing their bad behavior.

According to Police narrative: "Ongoing problem with listed apartment, approximately 20-plus people cleared out, keg confiscated, four residents arrested."

Dashnilov Emeri Yoyo, age 22
Matthew Kubinski, age 21
Mark Chancy, age 27
Ted Bates Miller, age 21

About a month ago I almost gave them "party house of the weekend" award for the noise tickets issued, but they were trumped by a party house of five girls gone wild. This past weekend they tried a little harder; and will now pay the price.

Interestingly the condo at 51 Pine Grove is owned by Jonathan Goldin and according to the assessor it is "owner occupied." Apparently Mr. Goldin was not home the night of the party.

Of course, of course

Spring Spectacular Horse Show 4/3/11

Amherst Robocop

Amherst Police Department scored yet another major grant , $18,945, for a cruiser mounted high-tech gizmo that automatically scans 1,000 license plates per hour flagging unregistered or stolen vehicles, AMBER alert targets in flight or cars registered to drivers with revoked licenses, a common penalty for drunk drivers.

The computerized camera/internet system, known as ALPR (Automated License Plate Recognition), combines the power of optical character recognition and face recognition common on digital cameras but geared toward high speed capture and analysis of license plates.

Thus an officer can automatically do real time plate processing, effortlessly, in high-volume with a highly accurate system that never discriminates against race, creed, color, gender or religion.

And unlike the current controversy in South Carolina, where a small town uses radar cameras to issue a plethora of expensive speeding tickets, the results produced by ALPR involve potentially more serious infractions.

APD was only the second police department to receive state accreditation 12 years ago and has been recertified every 3 years since. This achievement weighs in their favor when applying for government grants. Recently they have snagged an Underage Alcohol Grant, You Drink you Drive you Lose Grant, Car seat Grant, a very large Domestic Violence Grant ($175,000 shared with UMass PD), and now this ALPR grant.

Conspiracy theorists may whine about "Big Brother," but it will always be a flesh-and-blood, highly trained officer who interacts with drivers stopped because something was amiss, possibly preventing harm to innocent citizens--as well as the responding officers.

The system will be operational in July.

Long Beach PD demos the system