Troubles and transparency

So the venerable Daily Hampshire Gazette had an interesting way of demonstrating dire financial conditions--besides the anemic page count--on today's Front Page, with an article about Northampton's First Night finding another sugar daddy to replace the $5,000 cash donation nixed by a "major sponsor" after 25 years of support.

Of course they were smart enough to hold off until paragraph three before admitting that major sponsor was none other than the Daily Hampshire Gazette. Although they will continue to promote the New Year's Eve celebration event on their pages (like they did today) and publish a First Night supplement and the event's program, but a sizable chunk of cash is no more.

As a former longtime small business owner I appreciate how tough it is to accommodate all the hand outs requested by worthy agencies (I would get roughly three per week); and product is a lot easier to donate than cash.

To pitch their product to Valley businesses, a generation of Gazette ad reps chanted the mantra "advertising doesn't cost, it pays." Now the shoe is on the other foot, looking withered and worn.

Subcommittee continues to draw fire

Left to right: Whistleblower Chris Hoffmann, Library Director Bonnie Isman, Carol Gray (hanging her head in shame) Pat Holland (Chair) Sarah McKee

UPDATE: Saturday 1:00 PM

So the evaluation subcommittee met yet again this late morning/early afternoon and continued to justify their existence. This time they had some very tepid support from fellow lefties Frank and Ellie Gatti--but not much.

Pat Holland in response to fellow Trustee Chris Hoffmann said she would love to issue a separate, sanitized for public consumption report about the evaluation and goals for the paid, professional Library Director but at that point cutthroat Carol (Gray) immediately went into hyper twitch mode about that, so it's not a safe bet at this point.

Although Ms. Gray is jetting off to Egypt soon for an E-X-T-E-N-D-E-D period so all sorts of good things could return to the Jones Library operations. Happy days are here again.
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ORIGINAL POST: Friday 6:45 PM
Friday the 13th proved less than lucky for the Jones Library Evaluation subcommittee as the entire Public Comment period this afternoon before the full board was taken up by pointed criticism aimed in their direction, including a "vote of no confidence" by unionized workers at the library for the yet to be released evaluation report.

Statement from union employees of the Jones Library


Tina Swift reads union statement to the Jones Library Trustees

Moving forward with Umass partnership

Mixed use block (retail on ground, housing above) owned by Dartmouth College in Hanover NH town center

While most--if not all--of the immediate neighbors may view it as "Sherman's March to the Sea" the Amherst Redevelopment Authority met again last night to continue plowing forward with the Gateway Project, a spiffy economic joint undertaking connecting the north end of Amherst town center with the heart of our flagship's campus. Yeah, that would be UMass/Amherst.

Interestingly, outspoken critic and of course next door neighbor John Fox wondered if Umass was really "invested" in the project. Well... they are giving away property that cost them $2.5 million only four years ago. I would call that invested.

And it would certainly not be unreasonable of them to, you know, make a condition or two regarding terms for the exchange--as in more housing for students, who are coming. With or without the Gateway Project.

But with this project they can avoid living in slums that have sprouted like weeds in neighborhoods all around town over the past 40 years to prey on those incoming nubies.

And with this project the town has tremendous control over the look and feel of the entire development. For the first time in my aged memory Umass wants to partner with the town (via the Amherst Redevelopment Authority) on an equal basis. They are the proverbial 1000 pound gorilla and they could do whatever they damn well please with the former Frat Row.

Our recent road trip to Hanover NH, where Dartmouth College stepped up as an Angel Investor in the downtown proves it can work. And it only takes one white crow to disprove the theory all crows are black.

Before and after photos of how it worked in Hanover NH

ARA and Select Board member Aaron Hayden reports

Request for proposals on Gateway Project, about to go out to the private sector

Jones Library Eval Comm: Terminator unleashed

So this subcommittee simply refuses to die!

Although the venerable Amherst Bulletin did stop the presses to extend the deadline for the subcommittee's long-winded OpEd column response to Trustee Chris Hoffmann's initial SOS that sparked a spotlight on their nefarious activities attempting to fire/retire the current Library Director who is about the celebrate 30 years of service.

And just to demonstrate how dedicated these drones are to their pernicious program, the subcommittee has met 44 times between January 4 and July 16 for a grand total of 112 hours. This does not include July 29th, August 4, August 7 and this morning's August 11 meeting, or the next one they have scheduled for this coming Saturday morning.

The August 4 meeting was supposed to be their final one.

The Subcommittee's whinny letter/column to the Amherst Bulletin

Monster misstep in DA race

So I've gone out and collected signatures over the past 25 years with more petitions and campaign forms than I care to remember. And yes, on occasion somebody simply refused to sign, saying they did not support the idea--sometimes even saying they hated the idea.

My response was always something to the effect that by signing this preliminary form you are not voting to support it, only getting it (or me) on the ballot for the electorate to decide; and isn't that what grass roots democracy is all about?

And of course one of the sacred rights in America is the secrecy of your voting ballot. Although the state decided long ago that campaign petitions to get things on the ballot are public documents. So beware what you sign, because most folks will consider that a sign of support.

Michael A. Cahillane is doing major backpedaling at the moment--today's Daily Hampshire Gazette front page article and a live appearance on the Cantara show, my favorite WRNX radio program this morning, trying to explain why he signed the referendum petition to ban gay marriage back in 2005.

Ironically he worked as a prosecutor in the DA's office--a position he now seeks--and one of their responsibilities at the time was to enforce the Open Meeting and Public Documents Law. So you would think he would have known better, although his boss Betsy Scheibel was pretty well ensconced as DA--and most insiders would not have predicted her retirement only five years later.

Of course this major misstep would never have seen the light of print/bandwidth over the past 12 hours if two citizens did not take the time to write a 'Letter to the Editor' of the venerable Gazette.

The main mistake Mr. Cahillane made was to ignore their legitimate concerns--probably hoping the issue would never get out of the closet--rather then addressing it head on many months back, when apparently one of the letter writers first brought it to his attention.

A template of possibilities

clockwise: Peg Roberts, Larry Shaffer, Aaron Hayden, John Coull, Jonathan Tucker

The Amherst Redevelopment Authority along with Town Manager Larry Shaffer and head planner Jonathan Tucker took a roadtrip on Friday as a fact finding mission for the proposed Gateway Project in partnership with Umass to develop the former "frat row" into a mixed use commercial development with high-end student housing, thus seamlessly connecting our downtown with the main campus.

Like Amherst MA, Hanover NH is dominated by one major higher educational institution: Dartmouth College. Although compared to Umass, their total student population of only 6,000 seems dowright intimate.

Interestingly Wikipedia describes Hanover as a "rural town." I found their downtown to be larger and more vibrant than Amherst town center. and I also noted a distinct lack of vacant storefronts and a lot of construction underway.

Hanover Town Hall cloaked under cover of ivy

But their Town Room was spacious and well cooled. Town Manager Julia Griffin far left.

Perhaps because of the involvement by Dartmouth College, who owns a large stockpile of commercial property and housing for students and staff--all of it on the taxrolls.

Yes, downtown Hanover even has a hardware store, situated in a building owned by the college (actually the entire block) where the rents are below market rate because they understand that a lively downtown requires a good mix of offerings.

Mixed use block (retail on ground, housing above) owned by Dartmouth College in town center
And they even have a hardware store!

And all of the soon to be proposed Gateway Project would be on the taxrolls.

The ARA meets this coming Wednesday night and we will discuss in open session what we learned on our one-day summer vacation.

The sad saga continues and continues...

So I could not cover the "final meeting" last night of the Library Director Evaluation Committee's supposed final meeting, but fortunately Jones Library Trustee Chris Hoffmann (who is not on the subcommittee--and they hate it when he shows up) is a glutton for punishment and attended, even writing an overview that he sent out to a private listserve of 24 concerned citizens. One of them forwarded to me and he gave me permission to publish.

I think before this Jones Library Trustees snafu has ended somebody should award trustee Chris Hoffmann a Silver Star for going above and beyond the call of duty. Or maybe a Purple Heart. Considering his field dispatch I'm kind of glad I could not make the Evaluation Subcommittee meeting last night at 7:30, supposedly their final one. But, apparently not.
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Jones Library Trustee Chris Hoffmann reports:

Thank you Pat, Sarah, and most especially Carol, for wasting three hours of my life. We got out at 10:35pm.

I never knew a meeting could be excruciatingly boring in content while simultaneously being infuriating in tone.

They spent three hours crafting a letter to the editor/column for the Gazette. Some of my notes:

"Should this be a comma or a semicolon?" "Capital M or lowercase m?"
Pat: can't we each draft our own letters in the comfort of our homes and meet later to merge them?" Carol: "C'mon just give me 10 minutes. I can do it."
Pat: "I don't know if that's important. Hey, Chris is here. Perhaps he could tell us what he thinks the most important parts of his memo were." Me: "No, I think I'll leave that for you folks to figure out."
blah blah blah
"Wordcount?!
I think they are just trying to bore us to death
Pat: "Carol, couldn't you just write the draft yourself? Here in the Police Station if your house is a mess. Then let the rest of us go home?" Carol: "But then we may not make the deadline for the Bulletin"
"Wordcount?!"
Sarah: "Carol, only lawyers would use the word 'jurisdiction'"
Carol: "A certain other trustee has disagreed with our report". Me: "Carol, I don't mind if you use my name". Carol: "No, we're taking the high road."
Carol: "I really think we should say something about X", Sarah: "Let's see... wordcount is 649. NO!! That's it! No more!!!"

Basic summation -- I have never seen three people who so completely miss the point. They thought my report was entirely about a formal process, and their column is almost entirely about how they followed a process to the letter of the law: how they interviewed people, what they said to them before the interview, what an executive session is, with an extended quotation from the lawyer's letter proving they needed to go into executive session, and so on. Even if the Bulletin prints it, I can't imagine anyone actually reading past the first paragraph!

Pat jumped ship around 8:30pm. Carol begged her to stay, and told her she could just go home, get her hearing aids, and come right back. "That's NOT the problem, Carol!", Pat snapped back.

One thing I found grimly amusing. Since they are the only Evaluation Committee in Bonnie's tenure to insist on creating a confidential document as their evaluation, they are now forced to tie themselves in knots to find ways to talk about out in a public way! As ye sow, so shall ye reap, or similar aphorism comes to mind. Pat had a mini-meltdown while trying to convince Carol there must be a legal way to tell people what the Director's goals are, at least. God bless her, Tina even suggested they create a separate generic summary of the goals as a public document, but Carol would have none of it.

Believe or not, they are going to meet at 8am on Wednesday so Pat can read it and then all of them will formally approve it. They said they're going to contact the Bulletin right away and ask for space for a column if the paper will wait until Wednesday morning to see it!

For what it's worth, it's all on video. As is the public comment section of our Trustee meeting. The part covering Carol's remote participation didn't come out. Once I figure out how to get the video off the camera, I may post bits to YouTube.


Tiredly,
Chris