Council mtg 3/11 (the pool)

First... there's a budget meeting tomorrow night. It'll will cover the Revenue, Employee Benefits, Debt Service and Capital Non-recurring parts of the budget... I should get a complete schedule up tomorrow....

But right now, tonight's meeting... specifically... did anyone catch tonight's discussion about the pool?? Damn.

I was truly surprised by the fireworks I lit up. Heck, I seem to recall being told (only two weeks ago) that my idea was good (for your own take, see here) and the problem were the rules of a special meeting. So I really had no idea it would get that heated... with suggestions about my lack of concern for transparency and voter participation... but I think the highlight of how nasty it got was when Matt Altieri made a veiled reference to me being immature... veiled as a comment about how he was glad I was finally showing some maturity... or something malarkey like that. And while I was even taken aback by that comment... I guess it didn't surprise me all that much. I mean I've been getting tattooed on this blog for the past year for my lack of maturity... and come to think of it... most of those anonymous comments (along with the annoying rhymes and tauntingly pro-Dem, pro-northend, pro-pavement, pro-turf, pro-Mary Fritz, anti-environment, anti-Republican, "errrt" comments) have been coming from the Wallingford Public Schools. And now that my mind is racing, maybe I should call long-time Wallingford Public Schools employee Matt Altieri and ask him who the appropriate WPS employee would be... if I wanted to contact someone under the Freedom of Information Act and determine who is using WPS equipment to post comments to this blog. Hmmm... the taxpayers might be interested to know who is using state-subsidized equipment to blog here... anyway....

Yes, the whole conversation got very heated. But I did bite my tongue several times in order to expedite the meeting. For instance, during this discussion there was a great deal of concern over terminology. Yet only two months ago, when I voiced concerns over the terminology of the fund balance... I was clearly told that it was unnecessary to understand the terminology. Huh?

And of course, with my pool proposal there was a legitimate concern about staff time being used on this... but personally, I think the $3,000,000 (one-time) and a $90,000/yr tax increase that related directly to the fund balance policy were a much bigger concern than a few dozen man hours... as well... there didn't seem to be too much concern about wasting $20,000 on that pool consultant... in fact, since one member of the majority said back in May of last year "we were looking for a third party to come in and say it is expensive to run and you're doing a good job," I have to conclude that there is no real sincerity on the part of a majority of the majority. To his credit, I think Matt Hall does want to take action... he's just not sure how to press forward.

And did anyone else notice how Matt Altieri told the world that I oppose the pool? Or something like that. Well, that's his point of view. He can say that... I can also take him to task on it... because I don't think I've ever addressed the pool in any terms other than cost... the same issue that most people have with it. So I'll probably follow up on that one particular comment, considering how outrageous I felt it was. Seriously, I believe Altieri was the person who made the motion for the pool consultant... and now he's gonna get up in arms with me over this? I hope people see him for what he is.

And one comment I've heard several times in the past six months... "(when it comes to the pool,) we need to get it right the first time... because we only have one chance." To that, I say hogwash. The only way that statement is true is if you're speaking in terms of the next election. And yes... it wouldn't surprise me to see nine incumbent Council members tossed out on their fannies in relation to another pool referendum... but I'm not about to start avoiding "tough" decisions based on reelection.

Finally, while I doubted I would find five votes to support the motion that I first introduced two weeks ago... I do believe that I got done what I wanted to get done... town staff is taking action... and before we need to hear from another anonymous poster from the Wallingford Public Schools, I'll point out that if the Council was going to take action... it would have done so years ago. If I hadn't pressed this issue publicly, we'd still be spinning our wheels.

And one last comment following the pool, I was happy I got a nod of approval from the Personnel Committee Chairman (Altieri) that he'll be compiling a brief synopsis of grievances filed by town employees. I'm basically looking to get a handle on employee relations in town... and my guess is that "grievances filed" would be some sort of indication.

Your thoughts?

Tim White
Town Council, Energy Commission liaison