Woodstock CT Café

“‘you scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours’�

The present and future quality of life for the citizens of Woodstock has been in the hands of a select few over the last 15 years. Although we have elections every two years, it seems like nothing changes. The heated issues that exist today are the same issues that existed years ago. Perhaps the biggest single fiasco of the last 15 years was the failure of the Town to purchase the Data General property that is now owned by Hyde School, a non-profit entity that pays no taxes. Then there are the continuing controversies over education, land development and preservation, the Woodstock Academy, and taxation. Party leaders will claim that no one is interested in running for office, but I recall what happened when a group of new republicans tried to take over the party leadership a few years ago – they failed.

Who has led Woodstock over the last 15 years? Ed Neuman was First Selectman for many years before independent newcomer, Ernie Wetzel, unseated him. During Wetzel’s 4-year reign, he was out-numbered on the Board of Selectman by two ‘old guard’ republican foot soldiers, first Roger Gale and Melissa Weinand (Melissa replaced Ed Neuman who wouldn’t play second fiddle), and then Roger Gale and Delpha Very. Gale’s profession is real estate and conveniently Gale’s wife Nancy is the longtime Judge of Probate. Delpha Very ran Stoggy Hollow with Ed Neuman’s wife before she became a Selectman. Delpha’s husband is now a member of IWWA, the committee that regulates wetlands use and is under fire by landowner, Ken Rapoport, and developer, Nelson Douglas. This is the same IWWA that accepted Margaret Young’s resignation under fire last week after she was ‘outed’ for being wife of newly elected Selectman Mitchell Eaffy. Now we have Margaret Wholean as First Selectman who hadn’t expected to beat Delpha and who appears to have no agenda. She is off-set by republican foot-soldiers, Mitchell Eaffy (a democrat) and Delpha Very. Where will these three take us next – probably no where.

Who are the ‘real players’ in Woodstock. I believe one ‘real player’ is the developers like Douglas, Evans (out of Newton), the Woodstock Building Association, just to name few, who are cashing in on Woodstock’s almost ‘tax-free’ open space – ‘tax-free’ because Woodstock’s leadership, in its incompetence, has failed to manage PA-490 taxation the way the program was intended. The second ‘real player’ is the farmland owners, e.g. the Woodstock Agricultural Society, who ‘own’ the Woodstock Fair. I’m just speculating because Proposition 46 came about long before my time here in Woodstock, but Prop 46 may have been the brain child of the farmland owners to hold the Town in check. Read the rest of this entry »

“The Board of Fiasco has consistently used Proposition 46 as a dialog neutralizer.�

On Tuesday, March 14, 2006 from Noon until 8 PM the polls will be open at the Town Hall for a referendum on repealing Proposition 46. Mark your calendar… get there!

Do we really need to repeal Prop 46? Well, in the real world, outside the realm of Woodstock, maybe not. But here in our sleepy little hollow, I don’t think there is any other choice.

If only it could be avoided! I kind of enjoy having a pressure valve on the budget. What I don’t enjoy is watching reality and reason be ignored year after year by our esteemed elected officials. Proposition 46 does more than curtail spending. It eliminates thought, consideration and discussion. It allows us to pretend. It is like a peep-hole in the door… we feel like we’re safe because we don’t see anything. Read the rest of this entry »

“Woodstock should set a reasonable minimum acreage requirement for tax status qualification under PA-490…in the spirit of PA-490�

In the years that I have lived in Woodstock I had never heard about “public act 490� (PA-490) until it was mentioned in a comment in the feature article entitled “Woodstock Education Budget…� – so I guess this site is serving a purpose in bringing attention to important issues in town. I suppose that it was no one’s business to tell me about this tax shelter offered by the State of Connecticut. When I bought my first house in Woodstock neither our real estate agent nor our lawyer mentioned it. No one at City Hall has ever mentioned PA-490 to me either.

PA-490 “allows your farm, forest, or open space land to be assessed at its USE value rather than its fair market value…for purposes of local property taxation.� This act, passed in 1963 and amended for 2005 by the state “allows farmers to continue to farm, and other landowners to continue to own forest and open space land� with a reduced tax rate. It is clear that the plight of the farmers was foremost in the minds of legislators that voted in favor of this bill. The recommended PA-490 land use values, according to the CT Dept. of Agriculture, are as follows: $1200/acre for “Tillable A� land (excellent soil; tobacco, some crops), $720/acre for “Tillable B� land (very good soil; selected crops), $445/acre for “Tillable C� land (very good soil, corn silage, hay, selected crops), $335/acre for Tillable D� land (good to fair soil, moderate to considerable slopes; hayed, corn silage), $165/acre for “Unmanaged Pasture�, $40/acre for “Swamp, Ledge, Scrub Lands�, and $190/acre for Forest/Woodlands (on a farm or forestry “as defined with a Forestry Certificate�). To qualify for these reduced tax rates under “Forest/Woodlands� “you must have your land designated as forest land through the Forestry Division of the Connecticut Department of Environmental Protection using the services of a private certified forester.

Furthermore, to qualify for PA-490 tax rates you must submit a State approved application form to the Town assessor’s office between “September 1st and October 31stâ€?. When applying for “Forest/Wetlandsâ€? designation, “the application must be submitted by October 1st and be accompanied by a certified forester’s report.â€? If a PA-490 tax rate is approved it comes into effect the next fiscal year (July of the next year). Read the rest of this entry »

“We need people of wisdom and creativity on the Board of Finance, not the old dogs we have now.�

Hear Ye, Hear Ye! There is talk about a petition that is circulating within Woodstock – very interesting. This is a petition to repeal Proposition 46.

It is a shame that we have come down to this if the petition indeed exists. Proposition 46 was conceived with good intentions. It included wise exceptions that were intended to accommodate changes of circumstances into the future. It was, at its inception, a good tool for fiscal management born of prudent responsibility. But after all this time, we find ourselves wondering if we are the masters of or slaves to Proposition 46?

It is the Board of Finance that is to blame, if Proposition 46 falls. In their ‘infinite’ wisdom, the Board of Finance has consistently acknowledged certain exceptions to 46 like debt service and emergency expenses. On the other hand, they have been unwilling to acknowledge state mandated programs as exceptions. Year after year, we have heard from the BOF that education is NOT a state-mandated program. And year after year, we have continued to strip our budget in order to fulfill the BOF’s interpretation of Proposition 46. Ultimately, this shortsighted interpretation will be the undoing of 46. Read the rest of this entry »

“…the Board of Education may have to lay off 15 teachers and eliminate programs.�

One of our visitors, “Simon�, has suggested that we consider hiring non-union teachers to gain control of our increasing educational costs. He proposes that such non-union teachers could receive merit pay increases as opposed to the standard 5% pay increases mandated by the teachers’ union contract. Simon says this in the spirit of Proposition 46 (see comments in How Much Does Feeling Safer Cost?).

The teachers union has historically been a source of frustration when the Town has had to deal with poor performance by teachers and a middle school principal during the Galton era. Another point of frustration surrounding discussions of the budget for Woodstock is that our educational budget is formulated based upon how much Proposition 46 will allow us to spend on education, as determined by the Board of Finance, rather than the dollar amount we need in order to provide our children with a reasonably optimum education. This dollar amount should be defined by the Board of Education, NOT the Board of Finance (see The Dancing Has Begun and All Praise to Woodstock’s Sacred Cow). The Board of Finance does not know what it takes to provide a proper education for our children. Unfortunately the mindset created by the proponents of Proposition 46, and the Board of Finance, is that we look around to see what we can cut out rather than what do we really need and how do we get it? Read the rest of this entry »

“…four State troopers briefed the Town…”

There is only one question that needs to be answered to evaluate the Town’s need for a resident trooper. How would the presence of a resident trooper impact crime in Woodstock? To begin with, it IS reasonable to ask, could Judy Nilan’s murder have been prevented if we had a resident trooper? I think the answer is NO and I think it’s truly inappropriate to suggest that the presence of a resident trooper would have prevented Judy’s murder. Wasn’t it Selectman Effay who used this inference in the Villager to support his continuing movement for a resident trooper? (See “Trooper up for Debate” on front page of the Villager, Feb. 3rd 2006 issue).

Perhaps a fairer question would be as follows – What proactive activity might be conducted by a resident trooper to reduce the probability of crime? It’s true that with the exception of Judy, Woodstock has been relatively crime-free. So any new trooper is likely going to have to explain why crime increased in Woodstock after he/she came on the job. Indeed, when the four State troopers briefed the Town at an informational meeting, they pointed out that the mere presence of a trooper WILL elicit more complaints by citizens. Read the rest of this entry »

“There was a big brown box on a table with a slit in the center…�

I voted on Wednesday, Feb.8th, along with 1349 other residents (29% turn-out, YES 1237, NO 113). I’m sure we all understood the issue on which we intended to vote as we drove to the polls and I doubt that there was any indecision about which way to vote by those that took the trouble. Most of us probably sensed that it might be a ‘slam-dunk’. Nevertheless, we were compelled to take the time to drive to the polls and do our civic duty (VOTE). As I entered into the City Hall parking lot, I noticed a pick-up truck with a sign inviting voters to sign a petition on “modification of the Code of Ethicsâ€? for the Town and a second petition that proposed to “elect committee members of the IWWAâ€?. It was cold and the wind had picked up so I decided to go into the warmth of City Hall and carry out my civic duty. It took probably only 10 minutes for me to exit the voting booth and head to the side door to exit the building. I always feel good about casting my vote in elections even if I know that I am voting for a loser. Read the rest of this entry »

“the rate of crime is lower now in Woodstock than it was in 1985″

I was disappointed by last Friday’s Woodstock Villager article about getting a resident trooper. A perfect opportunity to present the readers with information and facts was, once again, missed by our weekly ‘newspaper’.

Where was the analysis of cost and expected functions of such a resident trooper? Mitchell Eaffy deftly took advantage of the opening the Villager gave him to continue pushing his resident trooper pet project by suggesting a straw poll be taken.

I was disgusted by the implication that, if Woodstock had a resident trooper, somehow Judy Nilan’s horrible murder would not have occurred. Let’s keep in mind that the last person to have seen Judy alive WAS a state trooper. Read the rest of this entry »

“Feel free to draw your own conclusions.”

Funny coincidence that immediately after Glen Boies voted against the Douglas Proposal last April 2005 in IWWA – the deciding vote in its rejection by the town – he never attended again. Little wonder he never showed up again because he voted his conscience rather than with the republican herd and probably decided to remove himself from the fray to focus on his local plumbing business (Deep 6 Plumbing & Heating – good & responsive local contractor!)rather than gaining more enemies within the town. Sad fact because Glen had experience in road building & bridges through his army service which was detailed in his “questionnaire for boards and commissionsâ€? available at the town hall. Read the rest of this entry »

“…why did the three resign in one week?�

I read the article in the Villager entitled “Trooper Up For Debate Again� which began on the first page and continued on page 12. The discussion of the trooper issue continued in the first two paragraphs on page 12, but then the focus of the article shifted tortuously to completely new issues such as the a new legal firm for the Town, finding an architectural firm for the New Roxbury Village improvements, and comments by Ken Rapoport at the end of the last Board of Selectmen (BOS) meeting.

There was a square shaded gray box in the center of the of the article announcing “Open Positions on Woodstock Committees: Water Pollution Control, Zoning Board of Appeals (ZBA), Recreation Commission, Inland Wetlandsâ€?. Read the rest of this entry »

For those who may be pondering the obvious question as to who has developed this site, there is indeed some information to be had. Read the rest of this entry »

“…(it is) ironic that their statement (Snow and Dan Very: the IWWA) about accepting comments on issues NOT pending before them IS VIOLATED when they go on to make THEIR OWN statements regarding these exact issues?…”

My “no alternative commentâ€? (Ken Rapoport Re: Jay Livernois’ concern) was obviously based today on both hindsight and the prior election results…and supposes that you never asked me to comment on your campaign back in 2003, nor did I feel it was appropriate…but based on your performance in the debates, most people left the auditorium disappointed in your performance. You did not seem well prepared for the debate and possibly it was difficult to run with Ernie W.- who had a very thorough understanding of the issues – thus most everyone made a comparison. Delpha meanwhile had been casting herself as a “moderateâ€? with her involvement with the “Relay for Lifeâ€?. So, I believe many people voted for Delpha because they felt you were too radical and they had no other choice. I would have no problem discussing this with you further if, indeed, you care about my opinion. Remember “opinions are like _________ …..” Read the rest of this entry »