The 10%

The Amherst Housing & Sheltering Committee heard an ominous anecdote this morning from one of their own members, Andrea Battle, who resides at Rolling Green at Amherst apartments:  The most recent lease she signed was for only seven months instead of the usual twelve, and ends this August rather than January.

Housing & Sheltering Committee from right:  Andrea Battle, Nancy Gregg, Aaron Blodgett, Greg Stutsman

A September start for leasing is more reminiscent of an apartment complex geared towards students, or what neighbors refer to as  THEM.

In addition, August just happens to coincide with a time frame where Rolling Green owners, a huge Chicago based real estate investment firm, finish paying off a 15 year low-interest state loan,  and can then bring all 204 units up to market rate.

Thus taking them out of affordable housing stock, which instantly drops Amherst to only 8.5% affordable, well below the 10% threshold.

Our little college town is then at the mercy of BIG time developers doing pretty much whatever they want as long as 25% of the units are set aside as affordable.  It's called CH40B and it's use is about as welcome as giant mutant carnivorous ants.

The town has been aware of this August, 2013 deadline for at least five years with little progress towards an equitable solution since then.  And time is running out.

Former Select Board Chair Gerry Weiss appears before Amherst Select Board during unscripted 6:30 PM Public Question period last week to air concerns about Rolling Green going off line

Rescue Me

Jake will sleep better at night

Thanks to the generosity of three of Amherst Firefighter Bill Dunn's  Facebook buddies -- Doug Frederick, "K9 Diezel" of the University of Massachusetts Police Department and a caring Anon animal lover from Northampton -- the Amherst Fire Department now has on order three oxygen mask kits designed to fit man's best friend (as well as felines, birds, and rabbits).

Amherst is home to about 1,400 dogs and most --if not all -- are treated like family.  The only thing worse than losing all your possessions in a major structure fire is losing a member of your family.

This purchase gives our first responders one more tool to help preserve that which is sacred:  life.

Sins Of The Few

The Gazette uses a dramatic pull quote in today's one-sided, front page article about the evil BIG BAD town government making life sooooooo hard for "property managers and renters alike."

Of course they fail to mention the two property managers are also occasional advertisers. 

"But why are you punishing the many for the sins of the few?" asks Pat Kamins of Kamins Real Estate.

Perhaps Commander Spock with his dying declaration had the best answer:   "The needs of the many out weigh the needs of the few."  Especially when the few profit greatly at the expense of the many.

The Gazette quotes a couple of renters criticizing the proposed residential rental property bylaw; but neither of them are college students, a demographic that makes up 59.4% of the town's population, and the ones most preyed upon by slumlords.

The sad saga of the attempted cover up at Hobart Lane by a major player in the Amherst rental industry   should stand as a testament to why the free market sometimes needs government regulation.

Yes, it's a very small percentage of landlords who cause problems for the entire industry.  Just as it's a small percentage of party hardy immature college kids who ruin the image for the vast majority of students who are hard working, law abiding, future titans of America. 

Pat Kamins, center. Amherst Town Manager John Musante, right

Member of Safe & Healthy Neighborhoods speaks

Incremental Improvements

 New LED light Amherst Rt 9/South Pleasant intersection

This spring in an ambitious energy efficiency crusade, Amherst will relamp all streetlights to these more  efficient, longer lasting LED bulbs using a $300,000 state Green Energy grant.

This streetlight at the gateway to town center is already done.  It was decapitated in the Snowmageddon storm last year and replaced with the new and improved LED model, which I'm told are a tad trickier to install properly, but then are pretty much maintenance free.

Speaking of Snowmageddon, work continues on the $85,000 generator at Town Hall which will allow the building to become another Emergency Operations Command.  During the Halloween storm of the century power went out in almost all of Amherst and since the emitters run off the streetlights the WiFi also went down (as did 911 communication).

 New generator behind Town Hall

The generator, which cost $39,000, arrived a couple weeks ago and now needs to be installed -- which will also cost close to an additional $39,000.  Last year Amherst Town Meeting approved $85,000 in capital expenditures for the project.

 Fiber Arts Building, downtown Amherst

Amherst College, our #1 property owner, is in a full court press for construction.  Here working on the old Fiber Arts Building in the downtown, which will be used for office space.

Calm Before The Storm

 

AFD logo

The enormous impact UMass/Amherst usually has on our emergency response system shows up rather dramatically when the students are away for spring break.  A decrease by 90% in runs to our #1 customer.

But this coming weekend, with UMass back in session and possible springlike weather, all bets for a quiet weekend like the last one are off.  Way off.

   AFD Runs, Spring Break

However, town officials have a plan:  Up to six AFD ambulances could be operational during peak party weekends throughout the month of April, the highest number in history.

AFD is putting a new ambulance into service this week as part of a normal rotation in the current fleet of five.

Plans are to keep in service the ambulance about to be decommissioned (as long as they can find all the equipment to stock it).

According to Assistant Chief Lindsay Stromgren: "The town has committed to funding overtime to staff from the current seven up to nine minimum on Thursday, Friday and Saturday nights from now through April 27th (five weekends). On top of that, Umass will be funding one additional ambulance (two firefighters) this coming weekend (three nights) and two additional ambulances (four firefighters) on the four weekends in April."

So with thirteen firefighters on-duty, AFD can staff six ambulances.

Let's hope these best laid schemes do not go astray:  Like having a major structure fire when all six ambulances are engaged.

DUI Dishonor Roll

Whether UMass/Amherst is in session or not doesn't seem to make a h-u-g-e difference with Driving Under the Influence arrests in our little college town, as APD bagged three drivers over the weekend -- about the average number -- with none of them students, although two-out-of-three appear to be UMass employees.

But that's not too surprising, considering UMass is Amherst's largest employer.  Safe bet they were not out celebrating the students return from spring break.

What They Make

Amherst Town Hall shrouded in fog

Unlike the website of our little All American Sister City to the west, Amherst's award winning municipal website -- you know, the one that trumpets "Open Government To The Max" -- does not provide a data base of all town employes and their current salaries.

Neither of course does Amherst Regional Public Schools website.

   Amherst Town Employees 2012 Salaries by Larry Kelley

I guess when you're the town's chief administrator, making $62,100 more than the Mayor of Northampton, maybe you don't want to remind people of that $142,100 salary or, like the Mayor of Hamp, that you are not the highest paid municipal employee.

Only in Northampton, however,  a bevy of people make more than the Mayor.  In Amherst only the Superintendent of Schools, Maria Geryk @ $147,000, costs taxpayers more than the Town Manager.

Although if you compare the other higher paying department head positions in Amherst town government they are further apart as a percentage from the Town Manager's top dog salary.

That is also the case, even more so, in the Amherst school budget.  Far more glaring is the total number of school employees in the $85K and up club.

   Amherst Schools Staff Salaries 2012

And yes, basic ARPS teachers make a tad more than average:  $66,484 vs state average $63,000.  And our one teacher to ten student ratio is lower than state average of 13-1.  But these two factors alone do not add up to our exceedingly high $17,116 average cost per child to educate vs state average of $13,361, or Northampton's $12,596. 

According to the Mass Department Of Education website, Amherst "administration" costs are at $735 vs state average of $447, or 60% higher than state average.  And pesky critics have been pointing that out for years.

Amherst Town Salaries Redacted

Masslive reports on Northampton's transparency