A Capital Idea

 

APD Chief Scott Livingstone right

It's that time of the budget year when department heads appear before the Joint Capital Planning Committee with tin cups in hand looking to fund equipment above and beyond their "operation budget."

The Joint Capital Planning Committee is comprised of two members each from Select Board, School Committee, Finance Committee and Library Trustees.

The target expenditure goal for capital is 7% of the $45 million projected tax levy, or $3,130,466.  However two-thirds of that -- $2,008,575 -- is already spoken for to service debt on previously authorized projects, leaving available $1,044,588.

Plus $180,000 in Community Preservation Funds (the Community Preservation Act Committee is in charge of those funds) and another $255,000 in ambulance funds bringing the grand total to bankroll new capital purchases to $1,480,000.

But the problem is requests to the JCPC are always w-a-y over that limit, with requests this year totally $3,881,311-- so cuts have to be made.

The Amherst Police Department was first up last week and their modest request consisted of 3 new vehicles, total of $105,000, and a $15,000 fingerprint scanner,

The front line police patrol cars are used 24/7 and rack up more miles than a NASA orbiter.  Both of the cruisers are Ford Interceptors -- one an SUV and the other a sedan -- and the third car, for administration, will be a politically correct Ford hybrid Escape.

Ford Interceptor SUV (Crown Vics are no longer manufactured)

Everybody APD arrests has to be fingerprinted.  The current eight year old scanning unit is outdated and breaks down frequently.  The new unit will automatically link to Massachusetts State Police data base for instant background checks.

Of course like Amherst Fire Department one serious problem faced by APD is a lack of people power.  The Town Manager has put the hiring of one new officer ($62,908) for downtown patrol on his "prioritized list of budget restorations" if the Regional Dispatch Center should miraculously happen and saves the town $62,908.  Kind of a Public Safety robbing-Peter-to-pay-Paul scenario.

This morning the JCPC heard pitches from the Jones Library ($39,000), Planning Department ($52,000), and Conservation Department ($10,000).

The Library is looking for $4,000 for a new snowblower.  Finance Director and JCPC staff liason Sandy Pooler pointed out the committee has a minimum threshold of $5,000 per item and half jokingly suggested, "Why don't you order a bigger snowblower?"

The North Amherst Library is in need of new carpet so no problems making the $5,000 minimum there, since a lot of equipment needs to be removed and stored before going back in on the new carpet.  A company that specializes in libraries will do it all for $10,000.

The request that will stir the most controversy, but was described by Library Director Sharon Sharry as their #1 priority is for $25,000, representing a one-third contribution to apply for a $50,000 State Planning and Design Grant (25 out of 35 libraries will win be awarded grants).

If the Jones does not win the $50,000 grant the town's $25,000 will be returned.

The $75,000 will go towards hiring a project manager and architect to start the process of a major renovation that could double the size of the Jones Library.  The state would cover half the cost of the renovation/expansion, but on a $10 million project that's still $5 million of town tax dollars.

JCPC Chair Kay Moran called it a "very exciting project, but we have these other very large needs" as she rattled off major renovations coming up -- two elementary schools, a new DPW building and
the forever talked about new Fire Station.

Planning Director Jonathan Tucker presented a request for $52,000 to complete a project already underway:  remapping the 100 year flood plains.  Town Meeting approved $100,000 in 2012 and $15,000 of that was used to hire a consultant.

The consultant concluded the cost to integrate new information into new maps would be $137,000 total or another $52,000 on top of the remaining $85,000 from 2012.  Tucker described the current set of maps (dating back to 1972) as a "Very accurate representation of old information."

David Ziomek took off his Assistant Town Manager hat and put on his Director of Conservation and Development hat to request $5,000 for a new brush hog mower and another $5,000 for a trailer to cart it safely and efficiently around Amherst.

The Conservation Department oversees 2,000 acres, including 40 open fields where mowing is a big part of that upkeep.  The current brush hog is five years old and tends to break down.  But if the new one is purchased the old one would be kept as a back up.

Sandy Pooler gingerly asked (his boss when he's wearing his Assistant Town Manager hat) if he could borrow a DPW mower.  Ziomek replied the DPW is busy with theirs at the same time so it's hard to schedule, although items like a chipper, which is not used as frequently, can be borrowed. 

The JCPC will be meeting with town department heads every Thursday until mid March, and in April will issue a final report to Town Meeting with their Golden Ticket recommendations. 

Let The Scrutiny Begin

List of 113 candidates for Amherst Town Meeting's 80 three-year seats divided over ten precincts, eight per precinct. (Click on a name for background link.) UPDATED Thursday afternoon to include one and two year seats.

In an ideal world there are only 3 year seats available (Town Meeting is made up of 240 three year seats, so that's why 80 are up every year.)  But when a person wins a three year seat, serves one year and then leaves town, the two year balance of their term then becomes a two year seat opening, or one year opening if they served two years of the three.

 

Amherst Town Meeting Precinct 1 candidates for 3 year seat (8 available)

Nonny Burak, Melissa Perot, Sarah Swartz, Christian Rodrick, Jonathan Lieber, Michael Martin, David Webber, Terry Franklin, Paola DiStefano, Meg Gage, Ryan Teixeira, Philip Gosselin, Stephen King, Steven Brewer Savannah Van-Leuvan-Smith, Matthew E Cunningham-Cook.
Precinct 1 seat for two years (1 open 4 candidates:  Muthoni Magua, Lawrence Francis Quigley 3rd, Nicholas K Bromell, Richard N Calderone

 

Amherst Town Meeting Precinct 2 candidates for 3 year seat (8 available) 

 Nolar Anaya, Meg Rosa, Edith MacMullen, Michael Birtwistle, William Mullin, Robert Biagi, Jean Schwartz, Ira Addes, Richard Gold, Michael Turner, Cyrus Cox, Adrienne Levine, Matthew Charity
Precinct 2 for One Year seat (one seat open):  Kenneth L Hargreaves

 Amherst Town Meeting Precinct 3 candidates for 3 year seat

 

Robert Kusner, Marcy Sala, Kathleen Carroll
Precinct 3 for Two Years (3 seats open):  Pietro Tarone, Fletcher Clark, Ethan Clotfelter

Amherst Town Meeting Precinct 4 candidates for 3 year seat

Derrick Andrews, Walter Fernandez-Pereira, Patricia Blauner, Stephen George, Michael Giles, Caroline Murray, Trevor Pilkington, Christopher Stahl, Thomas Vulaj, Finn McCook, Peter R. Blies, Michael Rosson
Precinct 4 two year seat (2 open):  Katherine Troast, William M. Kendall
Precinct 4 one year seat (1 open):  Margot S O'Connor, Patrick D Sadlon

Amherst Town Meeting Precinct 5 candidates for 3 year seat

Amber KaCey, Mary Wentworth, Mandi Jo Hanneke, Marylees Turner, Tong Shen, Walter Wolnik, Emahum Campbell, Russell Vernon-Jones

Precinct 5 two years seats (2 open):  Andrew P. Grant-Thomas, Melissa E. Giraud
Precinct 5 one year seat (1 open): Jacqueline L Maidana, Willis W. Chen, Nina Wishengrad

Amherst Town Meeting Precinct 6 candidates for 3 year seat 

Tracelee Boutilier, Ruth Smith, Richard Cairn, Michael Burkart, James Smith, Joan Logan, Paul Drummond, Mari Castaneda, Joseph Krupczynski, Renee Moss, Stephen Jefferson, Bernard Brennan, Lisa Kleinholz
Precinct 6 one year seat (1 open):  James Brissette, Andrew Melnechuk

 Amherst Town Meeting Precinct 7 candidates for 3 year seat

Richard Morse,Viraphanh Douangmany, John Boothroyd, Albert Chevan, Jim Brassord, Isabelle Callahan, Chris Hoffman, Gertrude Como, Kevin Vanderleeden, Robert Wellman, Carol Gray
Precinct 7 one year seat (1 open):  John A Hornik

Amherst Town Meeting Precinct 8 candidates for 3 year seat

Nelson Acosta, Janice Ratner, David Mullins, James Boice, Issac BenEzra, Frank Gatti, Bernard Kubiak, Julia Marcus, Geoffrey Sullivan

 Amherst Town Meeting Precinct 9 candidates for 3 year seat

Richard Roznoy, Nancy Higgins, Julia Rueschemeyer, Sarah Lacour, Stephen Schriber, Mathew Lebowitz, Pamela Rooney, Steven Randall, Felicity Callahan, Gary Michael Tartakov, Rona Thompson, Jonathan O'Keeffe, Shavahn Best, Richard McGinn Jr.

Precinct 9 One Year seat (1 open):  Susan Roznoy, Diana Alsabe

Amherst Town Meeting Precinct 10 candidates for 3 year seat 

Gretchen Fox, Steven Bloom, Nancy Gordon, Paige Wilder, Stephen Brawn, Scott Keating, James Turner, Brett Butler, Kristaq Stefani, Perry Moorstein, Byron Georgellis, Christine Kline, Gabor Lukacs, Marc Boyd

Election "Contest"

At least the upcoming March 25 Amherst local election is, unlike last year, a contested one.  Sort of.  But in the (sort of) all important Select Board race, where four candidates will vie for two open seats, the two insider candidates -- Andy Steinberg and Connie Kruger -- are virtually unbeatable.

The quirk in an election with two open seats is that each voter gets to vote for two candidates.  Two like minded candidates then combine forces and easily double their vote tally, making outside loners like Helen Berg and John Boothroyd marginal candidates.

Potentially the most interesting Select Board candidate, Umass Grad Student Matthew E. Cunningham-Cook, failed to return his Select Board nomination papers with 50 required signatures, but he did sign up for Town Meeting.

He said he became too busy working on calling a Special Town Meeting to try to enact a Home Rule Amendment for Amherst to increase the minimum wage to $15/hour.  Not sure how well that will go over with local businesses in our service economy that rely on a, um, cheap labor.

But hey, I'm sure he could talk Senator Elizabeth Warren to come speak in its behalf.

Thus the only interesting race is going to be for School Committee where incumbent Katherine Appy will take on newcomer Viraphanh Douangmany.  With the current disarray in the schools it's probably a positive not to be an incumbent.

Town Meeting interest picked up dramatically in the final stretch and there are now contests in all but one Precinct out of ten for the (sort of) all important three-year seats.

Even though the Amherst Redevelopment Authority has not met in over a year two candidates -- Paige Wilder and Pamela Rooney -- will be vying for one seat with a five-year term.  And the Amherst Housing Authority also has two candidates for one five-year term, Peter Jessop (also an "insider") and activist Tracylee Boutilier.

Last year with no town wide seats contested, voter turnout was a pathetic 6.6%.  With all these "contests" this election should see a whopping 15% turnout.

Lockdown!

 

Fort River School historic East Amherst Village

Amherst Fort River Elementary School went into "lock down" this morning at 10:15 a.m. "to address a concern," but for only five minutes.

According to Principal Diane Chamberlain they had an "internal issue that needed uninterrupted attention and this was our best way to address the issue."

Parents were "informed" in an email sent out well after school closed for the day, as once again school officials are being vague about a troubling incident.  

Box Alarm Amherst College

 College Street in front of Valentine Hall (midnight)

The call went out clear as bell a minute before midnight last night, and the public safety response was the usual coordinated cacophony of personnel and heavy equipment descending on the scene.

Within minutes AFD Engines 1, 2 and 3 (Student Force) lined up in front of Valentine Hall along with an ambulance, two assistant Chiefs, AFD Chief Nelson, and a bevy of Amherst town and Amherst College police.

Box Alarm Valentine Hall Amherst College smell of smoke in kitchen.
— Larry Kelley (@amherstac) February 4, 2014

The fire started in clean folded linen stored in a hamper, but it was quickly extinguished, so additional off duty personnel were waived off (although three did show up.)

 

Many AFD personnel responded to Valentine Hall fire

The smoke alarms rang loud and clear, and in the pitch black cold winter night the warning strobe lights were also hard to miss.  Valentine Hall also has a sprinkler system, but the fire never got hot enough to activate them.

On the rear side of the building a bevy of students gathered after evacuating the building.  

 

Back side of Valentine Hall (midnight)

Amherst College "gifts" to the town anywhere from $90,000 to $120,000 per year to offset AFD responses like last night.  Although I'm told by the Town Manager this year it will be the lower figure.

Either way, they get more than their money's worth. 

College Street side Valentine Hall

   AFD runs end January

Show Us The Money!

 Pothole, College Street (cue the Jaws theme)

So for those of you who have had to replace a tire or needed a front end alignment after hitting a stealth pothole take note:  The State is holding a Public Hearing tonight (who the Hell knew?) at the Bangs Community Center at 6:00 PM to take comment about the outgoing Governor releasing an extra $100 million in Chapter 90 road funds, up from the current $200 million scheduled to be released.

This would make a $382,000 difference on the plus side to Amherst, going from the scheduled $818,000 all the way up to $1,200.000.

So make sure you make the meeting!  Maybe we can get the Select Board to spring for coffee and donuts (or pizza and beer).

"A Precipitating Event"

A black mother addresses racial issues with all-white panel of Amherst town officials

If you're Irish you can crack jokes about alcohol; if you're a young supposedly hip black youth you can use the N-word among other young supposedly hip black youth.  Sort of.

But over the past few years -- because of the pervasiveness of hip hop music -- a kind of cultural homogenization has occurred where white youth (or in Madonna's case, older white women) have adopted a variation of the N-word (5 letters rather than 6, ending in "a" rather than "er") as a term of endearment.

However, when you transmit either N-word over social media where anybody can see it, you're asking for trouble.  BIG trouble.

This sad story starts ironically enough over Martin Luther King Jr. holiday weekend, after a white youth (I'm going to call him "Justin" but that is not his name) posted a note of congratulations to his close friend, who is black, using the shorter (supposedly hip) version of the N-word.

Other black youth took offense and aggressively let Justin know it.

The original "threat" on the Facebook confessions page was actually submitted that weekend (January 18) but did not see the light of bandwidth until Saturday, January 25 a week later (the confessions page is moderated and a bevy of saved up "confessions" are published simultaneously) and was quickly spotted by School Superintendent Maria Geryk Sunday evening, January 26.

Obviously Justin was trying to send up a warning flare about being bullied.  And the events of the previous week, days after he first tried to post his "confession," demonstrate why:

On Tuesday, January 21 Justin had an altercation with a black youth upset about his Facebook congratulatory post to his friend (who is black).  It was heated enough for Justin's father, who works in the schools, to stop in the next day (Wednesday January 22) and consult with Dean of Students, Mary Custard.

She of course had problems with either version of the N-word.  The father agreed to tell Justin to stop using it (and had in fact done so in the past), even as a term of endearment.  At the meeting Ms. Custard informed the father she had been in contact with the parents of the black youth (his father also works for the schools) involved in the Tuesday confrontation.

Now Justin's father  became "dismayed" that he was not initially consulted for this official attempt at fact finding.  Even though they live in a surrounding city, the schools would certainly have his contact information and he does, after all, work in the building.

And he let Ms. Custard know, "The situation needs to be quelled before it gets out of hand."  On the morning of Friday, January 24th it did get out of hand, as one of the black youths escalated from verbal abuse to getting physical with Justin. 

The father again paid a call on Ms. Custard, but then tried to go over her head to Principal Mark Jackson, who was not in his office.  So he consulted with Vice Principal Michael Thompson, who promised to set up a meeting on Monday between the warring students, Ms. Custard and Principal Jackson.

In the meantime Vice Principal Thompson told Justin to go to lunch and if any problems with the other combative kids should arise, to seek out the nearest adult to act as referee/cop.

After lunch the problem happened yet again.  Justin, angry and hurt, called his father to tell him of the altercation and reported he was signing himself out of school.  The meeting scheduled for Monday never happened because the school suddenly closed due to Justin's Facebook "threat" discovered on Sunday night.

Through the snooping skills of Information Technology guru Kris Pacunas town officials and police discovered Justin was the perpetrator of the Facebook "threat" somewhere between 3:00 and 3:30 early Monday morning.

A few hours later Justin's father received a call from Amherst Police to come in for an interview, where he described how well his guns were stored.  As an ex-marine the father is well versed on the proper handling and respect shown for firearms, starting-and-ending with security.

Around 9:00 a.m. Monday morning local city police showed up and the father willingly turned over all the guns, even though they were legally owned and legally stored.  Police have determined Justin never actually carried a firearm into the schools.

The Mass State PD  bomb squad screamed through Amherst town center around 11:30 a.m. Monday morning heading to the High School to do a complete sweep for guns and bombs, although bombs were never mentioned in the Facebook "threat."

At the "community meeting" on Monday night (Justin and his family did not attend) school officials focused on the Facebook post as the "precipitating event".  A concerned audience member begged to differ, although she portrayed Justin as pretty much a KKK member.

School officials first informed parents and guardians only an hour or so before school normally starts  Monday morning (January 27) that ARHS was closed due to "unforeseen circumstances."

Perhaps if administrators opened their eyes a week earlier, those circumstances would be far from unforeseen.  After all, the first step is to recognize you have a problem.

The Republican reports (front page no less)