Shovel Ready In West Hartford

Governor Rell has asked CT municipalities to provide her with a list of "Shovel Ready" jobs, now that President Obama is getting his jobs program prepared, which of course will be funded by more stimulus money.

The Connecticut Conference of Municipalities just came out with a report that lists all the projects and dollar amounts for each Connecticut town. 94 Municipalities responded with $2.6 Billion dollars listed.

The report begins:

The projects on this list include a wide range of infrastructure projects that will benefit our state -- from road and bridge projects to mass transit to fiber optic/broadband.
Taken as a whole they will have a significant positive impact on the quality of life in Connecticut.
Funding for these projects would get people to work quickly and help build a solid platform on which Connecticut’s state and local economies can grow.

In this report West Hartford has identified only $9.5 Million worth of projects. It would seem that with the cancellation of certain Capital Improvement Programs that we could have done a little better than this.

In comparison, Hartford has asked for $223 Million, East Hartford $74 Million, Bloomfield $23.5 Million, Greenwich $15.2 Million, Manchester $27.2 Million

The shovel ready projects identified in West Hartford were:
$500,000, Mt Rd ‐ Albany Ave,
$5,000,000, arterial street improvements,
$2,000,000 widening sidewalks along arterials,
$1,000,000, Trout Brook trail complete remaining sections,
$1,000,000, Improve storm water sewer system

What about the pool repairs? (isn't that infrastructure?)
Garage Lighting and other Town Lighting upgrades (for future energy conservation)
Modular Classroom upgrades (Newtown is asking for that)
School security upgrades (New Milford is asking for that)
Solar Panels for all Town buildings (also energy savings and Oxford is asking for that)

The list is interesting reading in any case.

Cronyism Alive And Well In West Hartford

Saint Karen - perfect in every way

The announcement was made today

The West Hartford Board of Education is very pleased to announce it has selected Karen L. List, the current West Hartford Public Schools Assistant Superintendent for Curriculum and Instruction, to be the next superintendent of the West Hartford Public Schools, pending successful contract negotiations. This appointment will be formally voted upon at an upcoming meeting of the West Hartford Board of Education, and will be effective July 1, 2009.

During an extensive interview process, Karen demonstrated a greater understanding of and vision for how to improve student achievement than the other candidates that we interviewed. Karen’s passion for our children, record of innovation, commitment to building and sustaining relationships with faculty and staff throughout the district, interest in actively engaging the entire community in dialogue, and work ethic were also major factors in her selection.

Board of Education member Bruce Putterman stated that Karen List rose to the top of the interview pool that included four current or former superintendents, three of whom were from out of state, and two of whom had been named “Superintendent of the Year” in their states.

If in fact "Karen demonstrated a greater understanding of and vision for how to improve student achievement than the other candidates" then why hasn't she accomplished this as assistant superintendent? Perhaps Dr. Sklarz got in her way. He'll probably be working for her soon enough anyway.

The search began in February 2008, with the formation of a search committee and a budget of $50,000.

Many people expected Dr. List to be tapped. No big surprises here. It would have been more surprising if they chose someone from outside the school district who could bring some fresh new ideas to the table and some new perspectives. We'll most likely see more of the same old same old.

What would be even more shocking is if she forgoes any benefits or pay raise to benefit the school district. Now that would be novel indeed.
Based on what we have seen in West Hartford, it's unlikely.

In the final analysis, it appears that the $50,000 spent on a "search" would have been better spent on textbooks.

Town Of West Hartford Posts A Budget And Finances Webpage

The Town of West Hartford has decided to take some advice from its citizens and post budget information up on a special webpage on the Town Website. Both the West Hartford Taxpayers Association and WHFIRST, as well as others have repeatedly asked for more transparency in the budget process in the past, and so this is a welcome policy change.

Here are the particulars:

Financial & Budget Information

Budget Information 2009-2010

This web page contains the Projected FY 2009 Operating Results as of November 30, 2009, the FY 2010 Projected Budget and Property Tax Levy, Department of Financial Services FY 2010 Budget Format Example, and Budget Guidelines

Budget Information 2007-08 and 2008-09

This web page contains the 2008-2009 Adopted Annual Budget and the 2007-08 Adopted Annual Budget.

Capital Improvement Program Information

This web page contains information on 2009-2020 Capital Improvement Program and 2007-2009 Capital Improvement Ordinance.

Other Financial Information

This web page include the , Bond Ratings Reports, the 2008A Official Statement, 2007 Comprehensive Annual Financial Report (CAFR), 2006 Performance Measures, 2006 Risk Management Financial Report, 2006 Report on State Financial Assistance, 2006 Report on Federal Awards, 2006 Leisure Services Financial Report, and 2005 Retirement System Financial Report.

The Town is paying for their website,their webmaster, and other Information Technology Specialists and equipment, and it is good to see them making additional and beneficial use of it.

Bravo West Hartford.

WHCTV launches Online Web Stream

This is great news because you can now catch Town Meetings and other Town programming online!

From the Town Listserv:

West Hartford Community Television is pleased to announce that viewers of the non-profit, community station which telecasts exclusively on Comcast Cable Channels 5, 95 and 96 now has one more way to access their local programming: online.

To view the live web stream on your computer, simply log on to www.whctv.org. and click on the play button on the player in the top left corner of the website.

Executive Director Jennifer Evans said the new streaming capabilities will allow people to watch Channel 5, including regular town council and board of education meetings, on their computer.

“Allowing more residents to see town meetings and other local events enhances our role of providing a forum for open dialogue. With this technology people can watch WHC-TV even if they are out of town whether it’s a town council meeting or see their grandchildren graduate.”

“Our goal is to truly be a community resource,” said Andy Schatz, President of the Board of Directors.

The upgrade in technology was made possible through donations from private citizens.

“This was a main focus of last year’s membership drive, and we are very grateful to the many individuals who made it possible for WHC-TV to offer this new service on the internet,” said Geri Mandell, WHC-TV’s membership chair.

Next on the WHC-TV to do list is Video on Demand on the WHC-TV website where users can watch programs at their convenience on the website.

For more information about WHC TV’s new online capabilities, call 561-1260.

One Report Says Fringes Grow 704% In 8 Years

"fringe benefits" FOX Business - Fringe Benefits Grow 704% in 8 Years

Granted West Hartford isn't New York, but we offer healthy benefits.

American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) and Service Employees International Union (SEIU) Unions choke states and municipalities.

Look st this report of West Hartford Budget projections by our own Chris Johnson.

This end of year employee metric report demonstrates pending retirement numbers in West Hartford. 25% of our town employees are eligible to retire.

Those are some sobering numbers.

Our town probably ought to rethink what kind of salary and benefits new hires should receive, and we certainly ought to rethink what we include in our negotiated contracts. Clearly what Town/Municipal employees are getting are no where to be found in the private sector.

West Hartford School Superintendent Looking For Input

The Superintendent is making an appeal to the community for ideas on where to make reductions and savings in the education budget. Let's hope he is sincere in his efforts, especially since past suggestions in budget hearings have been ignored or pooh-poohed.

The School Superintendent, David P. Sklarz, is initiating an "electronic suggestion box" on the district's website and asking residents to e-mail their fiscal ideas to budget@whps.org.

The article states:

The retiring schools chief promises to read every message as he prepares a 2009-10 budget that caps any spending increase at 3.5 percent, a directive the school board issued earlier this month.

The current education budget is $123.3 million, a 4.5 percent increase from the previous fiscal year, and it is heavily filled with staff salaries and benefits that cost the district more each year because of contractual obligations.

Just to make the 3.5 percent target, Sklarz told the board Tuesday night, $2 million in regular services will have to be cut.

The most vulnerable costs are outside the classroom, Sklarz said, such as custodial, maintenance and security staffing. But he added that pupil services employees and department supervisors also "bear scrutiny," and he said charging students for parking or after-school activities, such as intramural sports, is one way the district will consider raising revenue.

What's certain, Sklarz said, is that "there will be fewer people working in West Hartford schools" next fiscal year.

On Feb. 3, Sklarz plans to give the school board a glimpse of how the education budget would look at increases of 3.5, 2.5, 1.5 and zero percent — and the eliminated programs and staff that each option would require. He will formally submit his proposed spending plan to the board in March.

One thing is for certain, with talk of a new superintendent coming in at a higher salary than the current guy, and a new teachers contract which raised salaries and required one less working day, that does not sound much like a desire to cut expenses. Talk is that the new Superintendent's salary will be $200,000 plus benefits. Why isn't the Superintendent calling for salary and benefit decreases across the board? Why isn't the Superintendent demanding zero budgets from his principals?

It also looks like the school district wants to make up its appetite for increased spending on the backs of students and their families by charging them more in fees. Heaven forbid they fire a few highly paid administrators or make reductions in their salaries. How many assistant to the assistants do we need? Why aren't any of those administrators teaching classes? How many teachers are listed as teachers but do not teach? Why do we need multiple assistant principals? We are paying for social workers and therapists and specialists on staff too. Those services could and should be private referrals. Can the public see a complete roster of staff and their salaries for each school?

We have 16 schools in the district.

West Hartford is served by eleven elementary schools, three middle schools, and two high schools. The school population at the beginning of the academic year was approximately 10,000 students. In addition to those sixteen school sites, WHPS also operates the Continuing and Summer Education programs, the Early Learning Center at Whiting Lane, the REACH alternative high school, the STRIVE off-campus program, and the HANOC (Hillcrest Area Neighborhood Outreach Center) After-School Homework Center.

It's about time that Dr. Sklarz do some real analysis of the programs we are paying for to see if they are paying off. Based on test score trends it doesn't look like it. Even if we are listed "in the wrong District Reference Group", we still have been declining in our scores over the years. That is a concern as we spend more on salaries and benefits and less on materials and programs that actually work and produce results.

Maybe we ought to be looking at ways to cut our school population too. Suppose we didn't take in so many kids from Project Choice. We are losing money on that transaction since it costs a lot more than $2500 to educate each student. How about we offer some early graduation programs so kids can graduate in 3 years of high school instead of 4? How about we offer $7-10,000 to a family to be used towards a private school tuition for one child and set a limit of the number of families who can participate? Less kids in our school system might be a good thing, and ultimately lowers class sizes.

A 3.5% increase in the school budget is uacceptable in this economy. We also cannot expect to give up other town services like library hours or firehouses to pay for the excesses of Dr. Sklarz's empire.

Here is one suggestion: Now that your teachers union have so graciously forced us to take their contract increases - you fire the number of teachers and administrators that it takes to make up for that budget increase. Union head Dave Dippolino should be the first to get the ax.

Please don't expect kids and families to shell out more in band uniforms and parking fees to cover the Union's greediness.



Want your voice to be heard? Want to hear what our Town leaders have to say? Come to the Tax and Budget Forum on January 28th at the Town Hall Auditorium at 7:00 PM.

UPDATE: Due to the expected inclement weather, the tax and Budget Forum has been postponed until Wednesday, February 4th. Same time same place.

The Magnets Pull Money Out Of Municipalities

As if the strain on education budgets weren't enough, the magnet schools are now billing tuition and demanding more money from surrounding area schools.

This article was filed in the Hartford Courant -

On top of paying tuition for magnet schools run by the Capitol Region Education Council, Hartford's suburban districts are being billed for the first time if they send children to one of the city's district-run "host" magnets.

Most districts have paid the $2,500-per-child bill from the Greater Hartford Classical Magnet School, but officials in Manchester and Bloomfield say they're not going to do so.

"We've suddenly been receiving invoices from Hartford for a host magnet, and we will not be paying them," said Margaret Hackett, a Manchester school board member. "These schools were supposed to be free."

David Title, superintendent of schools in Bloomfield, said his district has objected to the bill for local students attending Classical Magnet because his town doesn't charge Hartford for its students who attend the magnet school in Bloomfield, the Big Picture School.

"We don't believe that's proper," Title said. "If all of a sudden districts start charging for host magnets, it has the possibility of crippling participation in those schools."......

The state gives Hartford $6,740 to educate each of the 1,900 suburban students in its magnets, but that's millions less than what it actually costs, Leone said.

Hartford officials say they may have to charge $8.7 million in 2009-2010 if state support does not increase.....

State Rep. Andrew Fleischmann, D- West Hartford, co-chairman of the legislature's education committee, said Hartford officials probably feel they have no choice but to bill suburban districts.

"I'm sure it wasn't an arbitrary decision," he said. "When out-of-district participation goes up, the financing of these schools can start to get precarious."

Fleischmann called the education funding situation grave, but said there might be some help for Hartford.

"The state has entered into an agreement that it must uphold, so there could be some additional funding for Sheff [v. O'Neill] magnets," he said.

Open Choice supposedly pays West Hartford $2500 per kid coming from Hartford, even though it costs us more than $11,000 to educate a child here. Our education budget (and taxpayers) has to eat the rest. A student who treks from a suburban school into the Hartford area magnets brings in to that school $6740 from the state, and now the Magnet schools want more money. Perhaps we ought to cease sending kids to other schools and stop taking them in as well.

Desegregation and upholding Sheff v. O'Neill apparently doesn't come cheap, and for some school districts it can be downright challenging to pay for, given this economy and already strained budgets. It is yet another unfunded mandate; money and resources that the suburbs are expected to pick up with regard to the outcome of the Sheff v. O'Neill lawsuit. The problem is that the suburbs are already tapped out.

Of course West Hartford's Fleischmann has no answer other than for the burbs pony up. Fleischmann ought to move to Hartford so he can run and represent Hartford's interests since he is already doing that now, and has been doing that for years.

An Issue Of Race

This announcement came over the West Hartford Listserv today:

Top African-American Scientist Visits The Children’s Museum for Martin Luther King Jr. Day Physicist and Author Dr. Ronald Mallett Will Speak to Students and Families

Ronald L. Mallett, Ph.D., Professor of Physics at the University of Connecticut and author of Time Traveler: A Scientist's Personal Mission to Make Time Travel a Reality, will speak at The Children’s Museum in West Hartford on Martin Luther King Jr. Day, Monday January 19, 2009 at 12:00 pm. One of America's first African-American Ph.D.’s in theoretical physics, Dr. Mallett will discuss his life and Time Traveler, an account of his childhood and what inspired him to discover the basic equations for a working time machine. Time Traveler is being made into a movie by Spike Lee.

The announcement goes on with some words from The Children's Museum CEO, Kevin Sullivan, and other details of the program.

In this day and age when we are all striving to be "color-blind" why is it that we continually reinforce labels of race? Why isn't Dr. Mallett simply recognized as being a pre-eminent physicist or scientist? Why does he have to be showcased as the "African American" for Dr. King's remembrance?

Dr. King's dream was such that no man is judged by the color of his skin and no man should be seen for just the color of his skin. Perhaps Dr. King would have liked it much better for the celebration of him and his dream for The Children's Museum to present "an accomplished Scientist" instead of specifically an "African American" one.

There is no mention of his religion or his height or age. He could very well be an African American Buddhist Vertically Challenged Senior Citizen. Of course that is silly. But honestly do we need the labels for anything other than this man's wonderful accomplishments?

To rid ourselves of racism, and any other "isms", we surely must dispose of the labels which perpetuate differences.

Just something to think about as we remember Dr. King.

7% Tax Increase Forecast For West Hartford

Yowzers!
The Courant is reporting a possible 7% increase in West Hartford property taxes.

If no programs or personnel are cut and state aid doesn't increase, residents will likely be facing a tax hike of about 7 percent in fiscal year 2009-10.

So the Town Council is calling for a townwide pow-wow.

The town council and school board will host a community summit Jan. 28 to begin identifying which services to preserve and which to cut, and to spell out what local officials can and cannot do with respect to union contracts, property revaluation and other issues.

"We think that 7 percent is unacceptable, but it's going to take significant program cuts to lower it," Mayor Scott Slifka said Tuesday. "The changes could be dramatic, and the community needs to be part of that discussion."

In addition to soliciting ideas, the summit at town hall is an opportunity "to try to gain a community consensus on the facts — what we're facing, what we can afford, what's in our local control and what isn't," Slifka said.

Hoping for a large turnout, officials are seeking participation from business owners, parents, union members, the Exchange and Rotary clubs and other fraternal groups, the West Hartford Taxpayers Association, which has opposed the last several budgets, and West Hartford FIRST, which has supported those budgets, particularly in the area of education funding.

Meanwhile back in the school superintendent's office:

The school board directed Superintendent David P. Sklarz Tuesday night to prepare a budget that caps the spending increase next fiscal year at 3.5 percent.

That means the 2009-10 education budget would top out at $127.6 million...

The current schools budget is $123.3 million, a 4.5 percent boost from the previous fiscal year, and that's after the town council ordered the school board to cut $1.4 million when voters rejected West Hartford's total budget in a June referendum.

The school board last imposed a spending cap on Sklarz in 2005. That year, at a time when board members thought they were cracking the financial whip, they asked the longtime superintendent to limit his requested budget increase to 6 percent.

Hey, Board of Education, how about a zero increase? Take that teachers raise that you just approved and deduct the amount from somewhere else in your budget or don't give it out in the first place. We are in a financial crisis in this country, or haven't you noticed? Is there something about the term economic crisis that you do not understand? Do you know that other places are even rescinding teacher raises?

Hey, Mr. Mayor, how about a zero increase? Other CT towns like Newtown are doing it!

A consensus among members of the Newtown Boards of Finance and Selectmen point to a 2009 municipal budget strategy that will deliver a zero sum tax increase. But several town leaders, including First Selectman Joe Borst, agree that such a goal can only be achieved by reducing the town's workforce.

Whether the staff reductions will come by attrition or layoffs has not been made clear...

Now, Mr Kortze said, as the town is teetering on the potentially darkest and most unpredictable period of financial uncertainty in anyone's memory, it is appropriate and important to present taxpayers with a zero-increase budget.

There is a mindset on behalf of our elected officials that has to be changed, the reality of dismal economic times is somewhat forcing that mindset to change. We can no longer spend for the things we want, because now we have entered into a survival mode. Just like the average family budget decisions, sometimes you have to forgo the new roof for another year or wear the same pair of boots for another winter season. You might like that HD TV that's on sale, but the money just isn't there, and the credit card is tapped out. Sometimes junior has to go to community college because or a state school, because a private university is just not affordable.

We can't be giving out raises now, as much as we'd really like to, unless the shortfall is made up elsewhere. Something else has to go, but we all know that we simply cannot spend more. It will not destroy our school systems if we choose to spend less. No one is asking to cut below what we already spend. Can we not make do with what we already spend?

Also WHFIRST put out a paper outlining some suggestions regarding budget process and transparency. It is the same ideas that have been put forth by another group of taxpayers in town. However, this issue is not just about "transparency"; this is an issue of changing the tax and spend mentality that we have dealt with for years. The budgets and contracts we have established are simply unsustainable as we go forward.

We no longer have the resources to pay a new superintendent over $200K and give the outgoing superintendent full medical benefits - give step raises to our teachers along with 1-1.5% increases, except that we are doing it anyway. We no longer have the resources to maintain the level of wages and benefits and numbers in our staffing, except we are doing it anyway and we even dare to increase it! It seems we are loathe to change that and will hide behind lots of excuses to make those changes.

We should be saying that for any increase somewhere a decrease somewhere else has to be made. That isn't happening.

The bulk of the expenses are in staffing, and we cannot penny pinch our way out of this budget problem by closing a firehouse or eliminating leaf collection.

The West Hartford Taxpayers Association continually harped about the unsustainability of the budget going forward, which was evidenced a report graciously done by a town resident, Robert Sisk (which was later said to be an accurate forecast by the Town Manager). If anybody thinks that past budget referendums were merely about raising or lowering taxes a few extra bucks per household, then you completely missed what the discussion was all about.

The budget and our spending trend as it is, is unsustainable and even more so with less state funding on the horizon.