Party House runner up

The Enchanted Forest: 83 Morgan Circle

Nestled in a fairly solid, not-yet-overtaken-by-students residential neighborhood, 83 Morgan Circle made the police report this past weekend for the first time since last March . That may not sound like something to celebrate, but last year this address was party central, earning my "Party House of the Semester Award" for their repeated shenanigans.

Police responded early Sunday morning (1:45 AM) to a call complaining about a "loud party". When police arrived resident Ryan Good promised his remaining guests would "keep the noise down." Fair enough. APD issued a written warning.

Ryan Good's name did not show up last March when residents at 83 Morgan Circe were sited for the fifth separate occasion. So maybe we have had a turnover this fall with all new housemates who are not quite as outrageous as the Bad Boys who lived there all last year, but not exactly Mother Teresa types either.

Which makes you wonder what kind of background check the property owner does before turning over the keys to the front door?

Interestingly the house at 83 Morgan Circle is co-owned by Stephan Gharabegian who also owns almost half (4 of 9) the, errrr, dwellings on Phillips Street, arguable the worst slum in town. Which is why I dubbed him "King of the decadent street." One of the four he owns includes 33 Phillips Street, where white, pretty boy rapper Paul Markham proudly resides.

Mr. Markham's anthem "Welcome to The Zoo" perpetuates the party atmosphere that feeds the machine built around alcohol. Perhaps Markham will change his tune when some kid dies due to alcohol poisoning.

Former Amherst College Pres Tony Marx busted for DUI (driving a company car)

Town Meeting supports development measure

The canary in the coal mine briefly quivered, but survived, as Amherst Town Meeting passed article #5 by a 90 to 67 vote, providing $40,000 for a "housing market study" of the entire town, but mainly used to promote the ailing Gateway Corridor Project, a joint development effort Amherst started last year with UMass and the Amherst Redevelopment Authority but now pretty much a town project.

Fortunately, tonight's marketing study article required only a majority vote. Article #17, Form Based Zoning, also a pro development measure somewhat connected to the Gateway Project, will require a two-thirds vote.

And none of the No voters from this evening are going away.

Unfortunately.

Free at last

Spring Street Parking Lot noon today

Pssst, don't tell anyone but the spiffy new Spring Street Parking Lot in town center is FREE until the DPW paints numbers in the parking spots and the fancy new ticket machine is fully installed, sometime later this week.

Meanwhile about 50 yards away, state authorities (MEMA, DOT) park wherever they darn well please.

No" commercial loading or unloading" taking place; and they were still there a half hour later

Party House of the Weekend

655 Main Street, Amherst (anybody know a good house painter?)

With power and transportation restored to most of Amherst, and the weather back to whatever is considered normal for early November, and pent up demand bubbling over from last weekends devastating storm, The Usual Suspects returned to party mode. Besides, it was "Homecoming Weekend" for UMass, our largest provider of Party House patrons.

655 Main Street is not exactly a repeat offender, although I did award them a "Party House In The Making" last Spring. Welcome boys, you have now made the Big Time.

And they must have done something to tick off responding officers as all the inhabitants received both noise and nuisance house citations ($300 each ticket $600 total per perp).

1:10 AM (early Sunday morning)

Noise Complaint 655 Main St

Arrested for noise and nuisance house:
Christopher Osepowicz, 58 Greenleaf Drive, Northampton, MA, age 21
Peter Grazul, 50 Saddleback Road, Mashpee, MA, age 21
Michael James Farrell, 5 Hope Ave, Foxborough, MA, age 21
John Daniel Donovan, 77 Forest St, Middleton, MA, age 21

Arrested for Open Container Alcohol and Underage Drinking:
Shawn Michael O'Donnell, 456 Homestead Ave, Holyoke, MA, age 20

Owner Card for 655 Main St

Top of the morning!

McMurphy's Uptown Tavern 11/5/11 9:45 AM

Over 50 patrons were already lined up alongside McMurphy's Uptown Tavern entrance at 9:45 AM this morning awaiting a 10:00 AM opening. Yes folks, McMurphy's is a bar.

And even though the owner and manager described to our illustrious Select Board (acting as Liquor Commissioners) two weeks ago the customers they expected at this event to be "a little bit of an older crowd" they look, umm, kind of young to me.

Spring ahead

Spring Street parking lot, one of the most convenient for tourists or shoppers in the downtown has, after many months of construction, finally reopened. The Amherst Farmers Market is still displaced, but the extra parking will come in handy--especially since this is "Homecoming Weekend" for UMass, the town's largest employer.

Amherst Farmers Market 11/5/11 7:45 AM

Treemageddon!

East Hadley Road 10/30/11

Trying to get Amherst citizens to think positively about trees right about now is kind of like a perfume company trying to market the scent made by a dying skunk, but the Public Shade Tree Committee will do their best to remind citizens of all the positive things trees bring to the table even though Chair Hope Crolius admitted, "Animosity is going to be high; it is trees that did the damage."

This morning's meeting, with the agenda headline "Tree Calamity," was requested by member Nonny Burack who wants the committee to "make noise," as she has had what she described as "otherwise thoughtful people" disclose their plan to clear cut all the trees from their property. Yikes!

The brutal storm affected thousands of trees, hundreds came down, hundreds more will still have to come down because of significant damage received. But if the damaged tree is in the public way (even if near a private home) homeowners cannot trim or drop the tree without permission of tree warden Alan Snow. And based on how often his cell phone chimed or vibrated during the course of the one-hour meeting, he may not be all that available over the next few days.

Committee Chair Hope Crolius, Tree Warden Alan Snow

Snow told the committee that as of this morning 3,000 cubic yards of debris had been picked up off the public roads by town crews and will be turned into biomass, mulch, or animal bedding. The town has a contract with Wagner Wood to haul it away.

I asked if the 75% FEMA reimbursement for cleaning up municipal debris would be jeopardized if private material made its way into the waste stream, and it appears that the Feds would not reimburse for private debris but would still cover the municipal waste. In other words, it is not an all-or-nothing deal.

The town could schedule alternating odd/even days to distinguish between municipal and private debris, making accounting easier.

Presumably Wagner Wood, since they are home based in Amherst, is giving the town a decent disposal rate, so why not leverage that to benefit private homeowners burdened by the unprecedented fallout?