Just one look

Obviously Selectman Kusner is disappointed and angry…with his Lordship Select Board Chair Gerry Weiss in particular. Notice that overly pregnant seven or eight second delay before Weiss half hearted says he “raised an objection” (the objection was just as wimpy).

And particularly notice at the very end Mr. Kusner’s little flip of his head and eyebrows diagonally up and to his left, like an evil Klingon.

Stephanie O’Keeffe transcribed on Inamherst.com “Recap of the 11/7 Select board meeting” the innocent and accurate observation “Mr. Kusner appeared displeased.”

So Kusner, first after pressuring O’Keeffe to delete the line, posts the entire NY Times Vs. Sullivan First Amendment case as a form of intimidation (go ahead Rob suit her--or me for that matter--and see how much press that would generate.)

Why he wanted Mr. Weiss to vote NO on this liquor license upgrade for the UMass Faculty Club is anybody’s guess. Probably as a reaction to the flack generated by their $200,000 giveaway of water to Umass at the 9/17 meeting, and not wanting to be seen as simply sycophant servants to the University.

What I found particularly fascinating about this entire brief episode is that Kusner and Brewer both recused themselves from the discussion (actually leaving the room) over their Umass affiliation.

So they can leave the room over a nickel-and-dime liquor license to Umass BUT when it comes to gifting the University $200,000 in free effluent water they lead the charge.

Oops...wrong button.

So we had another one of those amusing, always revealing cyberspace boo boos on a listserve where, longtime Amherst Town Meeting member Hilda Greenbaum, sent a chatty missive to fellow longtime Town Meeting member Mary Wentworth lamenting “nasty” Moderator Harrison Gregg and encouraging a continued fight over upcoming zoning articles; and it accidentally went to over one hundred Town Meeting members.

Although she did send another to the entire group three minutes later with the subject line all in caps: “PLEASE DELETE WITHOUT READING” my previous post. Of course that probably doubled the readership of her mistaken email.

The battle line is drawn around the Zoning Board of Appeals (which Hilda Greenbaum is an Associate Member) giving up some of its veto power to the Planning Board, thus making it a tad easier for development to occur in the People’s Republic.

Fist off, Hilda Greenbaum is a significant Amherst property owner--both commercial and residential. Why is she on a quasi-judicial permitting board where her one vote can kill a proposal to increase competition by adding either commercial or residential property to the tax base?

Her email reveals: “Barbara Ford, Carolyn and I have been working together to avoid the whole issue of posting public meetings for telephone calls, emails and lunches. Jane joined in after the public meeting but again we had to be careful about open meetings and passed all messages through Carolyn.”

Barbara Ford is the ZBA Chair, Carolyn Holstein is a town employee acting as staff liaison, Hilda Greenbaum is an Associate Member and I assume “Jane” who “joined in” AFTER the public meeting is ZBA Associate Member Jane Ashby, thus making three.

According to Rules and Regulations for the ZBA posted on the Town Web cite:
“Three members/associate members shall constitute the panel for all public hearings or meetings. Three members/associate members shall constitute a quorum.”

So in spite of trying to “be careful about open meetings” they obviously were not careful enough. I guess they learned it from the Select board, who appointed them all.

Only in Vermont

My daughter the treehugger. Yeah, a chip off the old block.

Something old, something new.

Old Glory over a new light fixture with St. Brigid's steeple in the background.

Thanks to all the veterans who have served and sacrificed to keep our nation free.

$omething old, $omething new...

So Amherst Town Meeting coughed up $278,000 to bribe the state to release APR property so Mr. Cherewatti could build his new home on 1.7 acres of land just to the rear of the historic brick Kimball house. He originally wanted to tear down the structure and build on its footprint, but Amherst do-gooders liked the view and wished to preserve it (a digital photo would have been a lot cheaper).

Mr. Cherewatti contributed $25,000 cash and $8,000 in APR property to the deal. He still owns the Kimball House, although he can't demolish it (and has done some recent renovations). The Cherewatti’s also sponsor family fund that donates money up to $500 in Challenge Grants to local youths and families in the area.

Their brand new LARGE abode will probably be in the top-ten assessed homes in Amherst, thus paying significant property taxes. And, with no school aged children, will have minimal to no impact on town services.

Expensive Feed for the Great White Elephant

One of the advantages of a Daily paper cranking out four or five editorials per week it they occasionally sink a hole in one. Today’s Gazette for instance.

Yeah, it’s bad enough the free spending state encouraged South Hadley and Amherst into the golf business in the first place with $500,000 Open Space Grant’s--but now to further embolden South Hadley with a $237,000 grant for a Clubhouse throws good money after bad. But hey, it’s state money so who cares?

Perhaps the small business owners (believe it or not golf courses are considered small businesses) who have to unfairly compete with South Hadley’s Great White Elephant.

Private business creates tax dollars while public entities consume them. And when that public business goes into competition with private, tax-paying entities they have an unfair advantage.

The Leisure Services Empire in Amherst (fancy term for Recreation Department) has been salivating for over a decade to construct a mega-million Recreation Building. And Umass is about to break ground (is spite of a historic barn on the site) on a $50 million Recreation Center that will instantly kill two health clubs—one in Amherst and one in Hadley-- who target Umass students (not to mention another one in Hadley about to open).

Amherst College did a $7 million renovation of their Fitness Center a few years back and the Amherst Athletic Club went from signing up an average of twenty Amherst College students per semester down to one or two, or a 90% hit. Ouch!

Of course Amherst College has every right to do whatever it wants to serve its students. Just as Umass—a state agency—has every right to take care of students’ health fitness needs. I do draw the (battle) line with Umass however if they open up subsidized memberships to employees or their spouses.

As an Amherst Finance Committee member mentioned at a recent meeting almost everybody in Town Meeting and the town itself has some connection to Umass. If that Recreation Center were a private enterprise it would pay the town $750,000 in taxes and membership rates to consumers would have to reflect that overhead.

Crime Does Not Pay

OverRiders--some anyway--will be grumpy to hear the State actually coerced the teen-aged culprit to reimburse (Amherst) Taxpayers for Responsible Change for the 75-100 stolen angry bumblebee “No More Overrides” signs snatched from lawns all over the town of Amherst during the dead of night April 22’nd--only a week before the ill-fated $2.5 million May Day Override tanked--where they were ceremoniously displayed like trophies in front of the Amherst Regional High and then callously tossed into the school's dumpster.
http://onlyintherepublicofamherst.blogspot.com/2007_04_01_archive.html