problems with the charter changes!

Let me be the first to say that the passage of this proposed charter change will become a major problem for our towns infrastructor. Lets look at this scenerio. The town negotiates with the 7 unions and works on a deal for a 3% cost of living increase in FY 07 FY08 FY09. Lets say the charter passes and it takes into effect in 08. lets say the voters vote NO on a budget and then the follwing year No again. You have a flat line budget for 2 years but already agreed to pay the unions thier cost of living increase. Guess what gets cut first folks-Yes roads don't get done and capital programs don't get done- the part that is scary is that by the time your roadway is in such dis-repair the folks who brought you this change of goverment will be long gone. The very sad thing at that time will be when folks get mad- who do you turn to? Town council you say-The answer from them will be " don't blame me, the people voted down the budget. And then our goverment will be pitting one neighborhood against another. Folks, If you want change then vote on your council rep seat- Don't take this town backwards because to straighten it out again will be very costly and remember you have plenty of times to be heard in our current form of goverment-Don't let them tell you different.

Right on schedule

Well here comes all the sound bites from the "opposition". I knew it was coming and here it is. "The council is doing things behind closed doors" and they don't want the people to have a say and look it's the good old boys doing everything wrong. This is what the taxpayers can expect a heavy dose of till March. March is when 3 seats on the council will come up and the opposition wants all 3 seats so that they can control the town. If you believe this group is going to be the answer that solves all the towns problems, think again. Right now this group has grounded things to a snails pace and they want to focus on thier opposition and not on the big picture. Russ leaving- sure if and when they get power- watch the drain! We have seen the town administrator, the CFO, the public works director, both fire and police chiefs, all belittled in public mind you. I'm going to ask a simple question and maybe you should as well " What is your solution to the problems facing Derry" I have not heard one of them- they instead want to focus on " look at all the bad people in town. And now I read that they are picking on the Derry Village Rotary. These bad rotarians are all in together and associated with other that are well liked, respected and people who truly care about this town.( this is a big deal to these people?) Question is "what have THEY done for the town and what organizations do they belong to that help the people of this town? All I can say is be careful in what you wish for-you may get it and we will soon see what really happens.

Voting in May has a cost!

The towns Charter Commission which is mainly all members of the Alliance of Derry Taxpayers members as well, is proposing holding town elections in May. Thier reasoning is "warmer weather will bring more voters". Then off they go to the school board to try and persuade them to change the normal March elections to May so we can have one election. The school board basically tells them in a very nice way that they won't change the day because it does not make sense for them to make the change. So, the commission still keeps the May election day seperate from the school in the language they proposed ( which you can view for yourself on the towns web page www.derry.nh.us ) So if passed by the good people of Derry. We will have a March Election for school issues, then Town elections in May. The not so funny thing is that the Taxpayers of Derry will pay an extra $8000.00 a year for this arrangement. Kinda funny that members of the ADT whom are also commission members propose INCREASING TAXES!

Term limits anyone?

I got an interesting e-mail from someone I know last week and it asked what my thoughts were about term limits for the Derry Town Council. At first I was skeptical about answering it because the last time this happened, someone had edited my responses to make me look bad and my opposition looked like Einstein. Talk about cheap shot politics- anyway the author of the e-mail was someone I sat on the planning board with and he did say in the e-mail that I could call if I had questions.- I called! I then asked if this was to be used by the same organization who twisted everything and the answer was "NO" it was for a grass root effort of people who want to be heard and so I gave him my answer. "yes" I believe in term limits-I always have and always will. I believe that in any succesful company or organization, you need many people to give of thier time,mind, and effort and if you don't have that, things get stale and no new ideas come foward. I read a book that asked why do you think big companies like Wang and NEC were big at one time- IBM got to stale- No new ideas- same old same old and the young companies gave them a run for thier money. IBM has since seen the light but will always remember its past mistakes. Term limits are good and what this man is proposing would allow a councilor after 6 years to wait an additional 6 years before he could hold a council seat. I say 6 years and no more! ( unless of course apathy sets in and nobody wants the seat)

Where is the Rep help?

I e-mailed two state reps today to solicit thier help in trying to alleviate a tax burden in our upcoming budget. Between the town and school retirement fund, we the taxpayers of Derry, will need to come up with an addition 2.5 Million dollars for FY08. In the e-mail I ask the Alliance of Derry Taxpayer members and state reps Paul Hopfgarten and Howie Lund this simple question. What are you doing at the state level to help us get out of this mess? One response I got from Paul was- Don't expect much because the Democrats have taken over. I thought the people of Derry elected him to represent us, the Derry taxpayers. I don't care how many Dems or Rep are in the state house-why dosn't he try to get a bill together and try something, anything. I have yet to hear from Mr Lund. I know he has supported gambling why can't he support or create a bill with Derry taxpayers in mind. These two members want to change our local form of goverment from a represenative form to an offical ballot form. Maybe thats why we don't feel represtented in Concord, they don't believe in it.

Marcoux leaving?

Russ has finally had it! When myself and two of the newest councilors were in meeting with Russ the questions from the freshmen were " why are you leaving" and the answer was "I'm spinning my wheels here" which is code word for he can't get anything done because he is bogged down in petty little things and the big focus is missing. Russ was brought in for economic development purposes and the council is squabbling about DEDC and $30,000. We need to get over all the personal agendas and focus on whats best for the town. In Bedford he will not have to put up with all the petty politics, name calling and jockeying for council seats. Its a sad day in Derry when good employees are leaving. Lets hope we don't lose more good people.

Tax rate set

The new tax rate is set for Derry $22.06 per $1000 of market value on your home. I was told during re-valuations that typically, 1/3 taxpayers will stay the same, 1/3 will pay less taxes and 1/3 will go up. Mine, of course went up $450 more. From 4200 to 4600 per year. 2 other councilors' tax rate actually went down. ( I can't catch a break) Now I know being in a big election year with three seats up for re-election, that we will start to see the always vocal always angry same people who complain about everything being very mad at the present council for the taxes we will have to pay in December, however for the rest of the taxpayers, I would like to point out that the town side portion of your tax bill went up 3.3%, School side 10% County went up 7%. Speaking of town side 80% of budget is personnel costs and costs associated with personnel such as Health care and retirement funds- Increases that we have to pay and let me tell you that those increases are more than our allowed tax cap inrease of 3.5%. It is not an easy task to balance town side budget. I will not speak for school side or county because I am not well versed in thier budgets. What I do know is that the council is the lightning rod for all the bad things that happen even though we always have the least amount of effecting the budget. I know it comes with the territory but someone needs to point to the facts. Also it's nice to know that we are the 3rd least taxed state in the country- We just get hit all at once and at the worst possible times- The Holidays. More on the tax rates in future write-ups.

Pinch Me! I must be dreaming!

Well folks, things just got really freigntning today.( we are close to halloween )In Todays Derry News article about the 1M in legal fees in 5 years, Kevin makes his true intentions known. He wants to hire 3 yes 3 in-house attorneys at $100,000 each. I don't know where he went to school but I do know this. 1M divided by 5 = $200k. We averaged 200k in legal bills and Kevin wants 3 lawyers x $100,000 = 300k. He says he is going to save us money, but you do the math. I can't fiqure out the savings can you? Then he goes on to say that we have two prosecutors that make $100K each. Thats funny, I know one officer who retired( no he did not make 100k) and we have one that handles the court cases but he does not make 100K. I find this very interesting as Kevin is considered the champion of the taxpayers association and I'm wondering what taxes kevin has cut or attempted to cut. It was he who when we were 5 cents under the tax cap voted to increase the budget 3 cents to 2 cents under the cap or to make it easier voted to add in an additional $44,000 to the taxpayers. It is he who wants to add an economic coodinator at 45K plus benefits as an employee. Wow Kevin Coyle wants to add 4 new employees at a cost every year of $345,000 and then what, we will need more secretaries, more furniture, more office supplies. I'm hoping that the new employees don't all take the family buy-out plan YIKES! well read it for yourself
http://www.derrynews.com/Derryedition.htm#tag2

6th annual infrastructure summit

My first infrastructure summit was very inspiring. Being involved in planning in Derry and being a southern nh planning commisioner gave me great insight as to planning infrastructure not only in Derry but with neighbors like Londonderry, Chester, Auburn, Windham, Manchester. The meeting really made some great points of where we were 30 years ago and where we are today. What was really funny was looking at pictures of the airport terminal in 1961 ( little old shack ) then 1993 and then today. We have made great improvements! Now we also spoke of Rte 93 widening, The bridge from Rte 3 to the airport and also spoke of Derry's positive new steps in Economic Dev. ( TIFF). We also had a great key speaker who with outside eyes told us we need to think more as a one New england state and work together in many aspects to compete on a regional level. Housing- Rail Service-Airports-Roadways-Energy costs-Businesses-Jobs-Education. We have an opportunity to do great things, however we need to think outside of the box and put our collective heads together. It was a very inspiring meeting and one that I enjoyed.One things for sure, we need to make the right decisions for our own society.

Economic Development Anyone?

The most important goal our town has is Economic Development. How we accomplish what are needs are was finally talked about in a workshop the council just had. The majority is leaning toward using a combination of outside agencies such as DEDC, Derry Chamber of Commerce, Derry Housing and Redevelopment and hiring a new town employee whos title will be Economic Coordinator. ( we did have an option of a ED Director at a cost of $94K) The coordinators' salary will be in the 45K range ( before benefits of course) Now we must get to the details of how everything will work so stay tuned. My suggestions are as follows: We fund the DEDC 30K first and get them going. They will report to the council on a quartely basis and both parties may terminate contract with proper notice. lets take the balance that was in the budget 30K and the 50K from Admin budget and the 45K that was interest payment from the planned but now defunct firestation and lets use this for the Exit 4A EIS study instead of making a supplemental appropriation - this way the taxpayers save 125K. Now we need to fund the coordinator postion. I say because we are late in the year and the fact that we have an important March election coming up. Let the elected councilors put the position and the funding in the new budget come march. This also gives us a chance to see what then the DEDC will accomplish. I think this is the best way to go and we don't rush into hiring someone. We need to do it right!
I'm interesed in your thoughts!