Woodstock CT Café

by Dean Audet

The questions about whether we need a new highway garage and whether we should do it now are good ones. I have been working on the Highway Garage Committee for 5 years, here are some answers to your questions.

First, lets just be clear, the existing highway complex is polluting the environment and our neighbors. That needs to get cleaned up and a new salt shed is needed to prevent it from happening again in the future. We can do it now or wait for the state or our neighbors to sue us. At which point we will still do it while also paying lawyers fees.

Second, the highway garage expansion is being proposed for several reasons.

1) One of the storage buildings on-site needs to be torn down to allow for the environmental cleanup. The building leaks badly now (as anyone who went on the site visit two weekends ago can attest). We will have to build a new storage building anyways. Under this plan, this storage would be part of the highway garage building. No matter what, some building would have to be erected to replace this storage.

2) Today, we store 10 trucks and many other pieces of equipment outside. The trucks cost more than $150,000 apiece. Storing them outside shortens their serviceable life (think about the difference between storing a car in garage or outside). That costs us money today. The highway garage expansion will allow us to move those trucks indoors.

3) Even worse, their is no place to wash trucks on that site. It is illegal for the Town to wash trucks there as there is no system to collect runoff from the washing operation. It is not hard to do the math where we send trucks out to salt and sand our roads, don’t wash them and store them outside. This significantly shortens the life of our $150,000 trucks by years. The new highway buidling will have a state approved truck wash that can also wash fire trucks and school buses.

4) The existing building falls woefully short of building code and is unsafe in some areas. The improvements would also bring us to standard.

So why do this now?

1) Every day that we don’t do this we lose money by shortening the life of our expensive equipment. The people that are concerned that approving the bond for the highway garage will cause people argue against funding the schools need to keep in mind that spending money on trucks and other equipment does come from the same pot of money as the schools. Read the rest of this entry »

by Frank Corden

Acting to correct the issues at the town highway garage is a requirement by the Connecticut DEP. To date they have been very reasonable in their requests. As a former environmental scientist who addressed many Superfund sites over the years, I know what the high cost of addressing an issue like this can be. Handling this while the DEP is being supportive will be millions of dollars cheaper than handling it when the situation becomes adversarial should we drag our heals.

And for those of you who think “salt” contamination isn’t that big a deal, I’d suggest you look up the Florida Steel superfund site in Indiantown, Florida. The groundwater contamination prinicpally consisted of sodium (salt is sodium chloride) and was responsible for pulling into the ground water metals from the soil and rock, including radium. The long term cleanup at that site is pumping and treating groundwater and as Woodstock experienced during the cleanup of the leaking fuel tanks at the Woodstock Public Schools, pumping and treating ground water is an expensive proposition.

from June 15th, 2008

A half century of football memories recalled in the context of Academy athletic expansionism.

“It’s the bad fans and booster mentality that destroys the football experience … (and the) exploitation of the athletes by the school leadership to make money and remind themselves of their glorious childhoods … GLORIOUS IN THEIR OWN MINDS ONLY.”

I started to enjoy the game of football in high school. I went to every home game at Norwalk High and the final showdown at Danbury High my senior year. We never had a great team and we were usually demolished by Danbury in the final game of the season. But the year was 1960, November 24th, and Jerry Fishman was the senior fullback at NHS. Norwalk had only one play, Fishman up the middle. He ran the ball 50 times behind the right and left guards and tackles for 342 yards and Danbury could do nothing to stop him. It was an heroic effort that is still mentioned on the Internet.

The next time I saw Fishman was in a game on nationwide TV between Maryland and Navy. Jerry would run the same play up the middle against Navy, get tackled, get up from the pile, and run back knocking down his own teammates on the way back to the huddle. No doubt he was hated by his own team. The other memorable event of that game was Fishman standing on the 30 yard line giving the finger to the midshipman section in the stands.

After high school I continued to go to my college football home games at Bethany College in West Virginia (the “Small College of Extinction“). I think we had one above average year while I was there, but the thing that stands out the most in my memory was when a senior halfback was tackled on the sideline after making a decent run down the field. I can still hear his screams as players huddled around. His knee was twisted and crushed by the tackle. He never completely recovered from this crippling injury and was force to wear a metal brace to walk, probably for the rest of his life.

I went on to the University of Pittsburgh to work toward my Ph.D. in Biochemistry. I made a point of attending nearly every home game at the stadium next to the medical school where I was working. Read the rest of this entry »

by Kevin,

I think you are both right to some extent (JK and nanny). The chair’s position isn’t that of a CEO or president talking to his EC. That’s more the roll of Dr. Baran and his senior staff. However, it does have some power. For example, it does take a super majority (2/3) vote to add an item to the agenda once in meeting. If Mr. Walker decided an agenda item wasn’t going to be brought up, he does have a fair amount of power to keep it off the agenda. Having said that, I have seen no indication Mr. Walker will do this.

The chair also gives committee assignments. This can be changed via the will of the board (voting) but you would then have to publicly fight the chair. The default position is that he assigns them. Once again, I don’t have any indication that Mr. Walker will unfairly dole out committee assignments.

The chair can also choose the order of who speaks on an issue. This can be major if the chair wants to make sure that someone who supports his beliefs gets to make a motion he believes in first. Then it must be shot down before a competing motion can be voted on. That is a pretty major way to control the direction of the discussion because then you are discussing the merits of a particular motion. I don’t know if this will be a problem.

In my research into the position I’ve found that the common recommendation is for the chair to present himself as impartial, particularly during debate and not debate from the position of chair. This is because the chair does do what I mentioned above as well as making rulings as to the disposition of procedural disputes (which can still be appealed to the full board). The membership should have faith that the chair is making impartial decisions which is difficult when the chair is simultaneously pushing a position. Ms. Paul wasn’t in complete agreement with this and from what I’ve seen Mr. Walker is much less so. That is, from what I saw in one meeting he will use the position of chair as a pulpit to push his agenda. This is truly unfortunate as it will not serve the board well. Mr. Walker stated that he didn’t really know Robert’s rules yet and I hope as he studies them he will come to the conclusion that there are good reasons for the chair to maintain the appearance of impartiality.

Thanks,

Kevin

This post represents my personal opinions and in no way should be considered an official act of the BOE or that I am speaking on behalf of the BOE in any way.

by Ron

As the Woodstock Girls recreation basketball season starts up soon for this winter, I wanted to take the time to send a thank you message to the parents and young ladies of Woodstock that I have had the pleasure to coach. Last year was my 12th consecutive year working with young ladies on the basketball courts early on Saturday mornings. Many changes have occurred with the program during this time, from the girls only playing one another (totally in house) to where the girls are now playing two other towns in a formal league with a championship tournament held at the end of the season!

There has been a great deal of progression in the level of play and the approach that the young ladies take to the courts from this program. I have been fortunate to have worked with many great volunteer parent coaches over this time. Recreation activities within the town that are vast, allows people to meet and get to know each other who would not normally do so. One example is that my daughter is now 22 and as such I would not have had the opportunity to meet so many other families in town that have children that are not the same ages as my own.

I want to especially thank Mike Bernardi for his time and energy over the years. Mike did so much of the administration work behind the scenes to help grow the girl’s side of the program into the multi-town event it is. Read the rest of this entry »

by teachref09

Changing leadership on a yearly basis does nothing to keep continuity. And it takes at least one year to get familiar with the workings of the board in general. I don’t think that it is a good idea to just change leadership for the sake of change. But then again what do I know? Seems like a whole lot of ‘politicking’ has been going on behind the scenes and the current board has only a couple of experienced and devoted members who really know how the board functions. Good Luck to the new members…I hope they do live up to what they look like on paper.

by George 

Two things that also need to be addressed to the town’s residents and taxpayers, that Good Old Dave fails to understand:

1. The town is under orders from CT D.E.P. to get this corrected- NOW! or else they will come in and do the job ANYWAY! This can be verified by simply calling our First Selectman’s office.

2. Another “No Brainer” that even “Good Old Dave” fails to see: Who is more likely to get this job done at the least cost to the taxpayer? The Town of Woodstock or the State of CT?

This job is going to get done, whether or not anyone likes it. I suggest we be proactive and not shoot ourselves in the foot, as we have been known to do in the past! Let’s finance this while interest rates are low and get the job DONE! We owe it to the Bennett’s, the town and future generations.

-George McCoy
These are my personal comments and in no way should be viewed as an official statement from the B.O.F.

by Becki 

Just in from the Board of Education meeting…….

The BOE voted and elected Anthony Walker as Chairman, Scott Sincerbeaux as Vice-Chair and Carol Andrzeicik as Secretary.

Chairman Walker took the gavel and started conducting the meeting with a personal greeting – a positive and inclusive message. One item Chairman Walker brought forth was the suggestion that the chairmanship be a rotating, one-year position with a new chairman voted each November. Members will consider this and revisit the matter at their December meeting. The agenda item concerning committee assignments was put off until the December meeting as well. Members were requested to email their preferences to the chairman. Walker also would like to see a board member at each of the town committee meetings to enhance the flow of communication. He also suggested the board consider a new committee to address academics/raising test scores. There was a general consensus that this could be piggybacked to one of the current standing committees.

Dr. Baran presented an update of the budget and where the district stands currently. He was able to illustrate the fluidity of expenditures versus changes in revenues and expenses. The newly elected members asked many questions and actively pursued items to clarify their understanding of specific issues. There were a multitude of suggestions and requests pertaining to information that would augment/increase their understanding of an array of subjects. I guess the district office will be fairly busy for awhile.

The upcoming budget timeline was revealed and a list of dates was provided. Several possible additional meeting dates were discussed as well. The first draft of the budget will be presented to the board at their January 28th meeting.  The BOE presentation of the finalized 2010/2011 budget to the Board of Finance will be on March 23rd. The town meeting for the budget will be on May 27th. There were other dates listed, but I will refrain from putting them in here because I had to leave the meeting (I get up at 4:45 AM) before the board considered their 2010 Schedule of Meetings.

There will also be a ‘Meet and Greet’ sometime in January, but those dates as well are not set.

So, there you have it in a nutshell. I’m sure there will be much more to come.

by Nary
 
The leadership of Woodstock’s RTC has successfully reinvented itself. Gone is the puffed up, chin out attitude that effectively saw Joe Breen drawn and quartered. Gone is their pal-ship with the CPS crowd along with whispered encouragement to recalcitrant Steve Rosendahl.

The RTC gave no public statement last summer regarding the referendum to unseat the BoE. Instead, they chose to sit tight, wait it out. Failing the results they were looking for, a new RTC platform soon emerged containing words like “environment,” “communication” and “Preservation.”  A kinder, gentler RTC is what we see now. Indeed, the new RTC is as sweet as a little lamb.
 
A few months back, ace Villager reporter Matt Sanderson wrote a charming piece that featured arduous work being done by one stalwart leader of the RTC. According to the article, the good lady is probably still out traipsing the wilds of Woodstock in her hip boots and waders with notepad in hand while she catalogues miles of historic stonewall. Thank goodness we’ve got such a prominent member of the RTC and PZC doing the hard work of preserving Woodstock. Keep mindful that this is the very same woman who was the strongest advocate for the complete removal of any and all stone walls (plus forest and wetland) that threatened to impede an Academy player’s ability to score a touchdown in a hoped-for, state-of-the-art Football Stadium. Does the RTC really think they are pulling the wool over our eyes?
 
Presently, a key administrator at the Woodstock Academy is “concerned,” about the good Preservation of the Woodstock Common. Parked cars are causing erosion! says the Official. Apparently, the Academy wants to “Preserve” this ancient common land that has progressed since its use in the 17th century of common grazing land to that of parkland then parking lot. Presently, it’s a sewer overflow basin. Naturally, the large Academy planned development now in suspension for over a year due to environmental risks is NOT a polite topic of conversation for it causes no one any concern. No worries either about the good Preservation of the Common. The Historic District Commission’s SWAT Team was dispatched immediately to quell the anxiety. They will begin by cataloguing all the plantings on the Common. Read the rest of this entry »

In typical fashion Mr. Richardson is advocating irresponsible management of town affairs as practiced by First Selectmen Neuman, Wetzel, Very, and Wholean. Because of their failure to address the salt barn problem, we have no choice but to deal with it now. We are now seeing signs of improvement in the housing market, so the picture is not as bad as Richardson has painted.

This article will appear in the Villager tomorrow.

by Kevin Ford 

I think it is important to recognize that the salt shed has become an ecological disaster and that it was a fully preventable one. It has contaminated the water supply, hurt the health and business of nearby landowners and may have long term impact on their land values. We, the citizens of Woodstock, collectively allowed this to happen.

Now that the problem has become so bad that the state has mandated that we fix the salt barn we are starting to hear the argument that we should just fix that and ignore the other facilities in the complex that are in a similar state. I cannot warn against that enough for many of the same reasons why it was harmful to ignore the problems with the salt shed in the first place. For example, if we can’t properly maintain and wash the salt off our vehicles what is the long term cost of replacing those vehicles on a more frequent schedule?

I understand why some people may be worried that groups may use this as an excuse to attack the education budget. However, from watching them for quite some time, they will do so anyway. They won’t need this excuse and their movement on the education budget will be the same either way. At the end of the day not voting to maintain or replace things of this nature because of apathy and fear of a minority interest is what caused the salt contamination in the first place.

We need to learn from that lesson; we should take a longer term outlook in our cost/benefit analysis. Not just in terms of finances but in terms of potential ecological harm, harm to land values, harm to the people who work in the facilities and harm to the people who depend on them. When overfed government can be dangerous but when starved the harm of neglected infrastructure can be just as great. Read the rest of this entry »

First published in December 2006

The front-page Villager article on the right side of the page (Dec. 15th, 2006) starts with “It remains uncertain as to whether there is a correlation between the contamination at Bennett’s farm and the sand and salt mixing at the highway facility.”

Hmmmm … doesn’t 1 plus 1 equal 2? Tons of salt have been stored several hundred feet away from the Bennett wells for decades. The next nearest pile of salt is several miles away at the State Highway facility on Route 198. It seems that anyone with a brain would conclude that the salt in the Bennett wells came from the tonnage a few hundred feet, not miles, away.

Let’s have a quick multiple-choice test to see how bright we are.

Question: Where did the salt in the Bennett’s four wells come from?
A. A giant undiscovered salt quarry underneath the Highway Facility or the Bennett Farm.
B. The story is completely made up by troublemakers.
C. The story is completely made up by the Bennett’s so they can cash in with a lawsuit.
D. The salt came from the salt facility miles away on Route 198.
E. The salt came from contamination of the aquifer by tons of salt stored several hundred feet away.
F. The salt was deposited in the Bennett wells by the Salt Fairy.

This is a toughie.  Let’s see what the evidence is. Read the rest of this entry »

Open to all Towns!

Please reserve your spot by emailing AGvocate@yahoo.com

Promoting Agricultural Viability

Free Workshop

Monday, November 30, 2009    7 to 9 pm

Canterbury Town Hall

Is Your Town Farm Friendly? Are you an agricultural producer, agricultural based business, a municipal decision maker, or do you just have an interest in keeping Connecticut’s working lands viable?

Join us on November 30 for a FREE workshop, sponsored by the AGvocate program, to learn about the tools your town can implement to promote farm viability.  Learn about the experiences of other Connecticut towns as they:

·      Implement Right-to-Farm Ordinances

·      Establish Agriculture Commissions

·      Update town regulations to be more farm-friendly

·      Develop educational and outreach programs about Agriculture Read the rest of this entry »

Ack!!! We’ve been flocked! This is what I get for joking about it and now the flock has come to visit us. But that’s OK because soon it will be visiting some other unsuspecting people…

 www.woodstockacademy.org/grad.htm

Thanks, Kevin

This post represents my personal opinions and in no way should beconsidered an official act of the BOE or that I am speaking onbehalf of the BOE in any way.