Open forum 10/25
The Council candidates forum is being held tonight at 7pm in Town Hall. It's jointly sponsored by the League of Women Voters and the Chamber of Commerce... I'm not sure when the BOE will have their forum, though I'm thinking it's next week.
Steve Carroll is one lucky guy... he got to see my Sox trounce the Rockies in person last night. I did catch the end of the game on TV at least. Go Sox!
There are more and more political ads in the Herald. Has anyone seen anything of interest?
Tim White
31 comments:
ESTIMATED NUMBER OF CHIDREN IN THE 160 NE MALL APTS.
First of all the idea that limiting the units to two bedrooms
will keep the number of children low, is totally ridiculous and has no basis. Secondly, it is easy to understand that a 1500 sq ft apt, that is larger than most three bedroom ranches, could have more bedrooms simply by converting a study, exercise room, etc to more bedrooms. So space for even more children is really not a problem.
This estimate is based on the 11 children that the current Town Council members have either in grade school or preschool. IT DOES NOT INCLUDE ANY CHILDREN WHO HAVE GRADUATED HIGH SCHOOL.
11 divided by 9 is an average of 1.22 children per council person or per household.
Using this 1.22 children per household and multiplying by 160, we get an estimated ----- 195 CHILDREN.
So you see, this could have a large impact on our taxes.
The other thing to consider is that Cheshire's school system is highly rated over a number surrounding towns and cities and whose parents would jump at the chance to get their kids into the Cheshire school system and the fact 691 and I84 makes it easy for them to get to their current jobs without much trouble. You know our local realtors use our school system as an important selling point and will do the same to rent these apartments. They will be selling the Cheshire school system for profit.
Good point. The north end apartments are bad news.
What are are you talking about? We have units that are that size in Quarry Village and they have three bed room units and they have less that 10 students, you can be against this proposal but don't make up information and pass it off as fact.
Quarry Village isn't something a big developer will slap together fast and put up adjoining the Interstate.
Let's face it, the track record of residential development along arterial highways is they deteriorate very, very fast
Thinks people driving between Waterbury and Meriden dissatified with their local schools won't notice all the new apartments for rent in the NE...especially when the developer puts up a billboard for it
"make up information and pass it off as fact."
It's a fact that total number of children that the council members have is 11. There is nothing made up here. Check it out. You know most of them.
It's time for you developers to either present realistic.
information or to declare any apartments or condos will be age restricted. Why don't you want to make them age restricted? It's because you want to get the premium that is based on Cheshire's school system. Remove the controversy and make them age restricted and relieve the Cheshire taxpayers of paying the expense for your profit.
Just watched the "open forum" and I'd have to say the republicans seemed to have the most intelligent answers. When asked what involvement the council has in the northend development, most dems on the current council said the proposed project is in the hands of P&Z, Inland Wetlands, and WPCA and they trusted their good judgement in handling it. At least the republicans had the sense to realize that the council still needs to do long range planning for this proposed project and involvement/planning by the council (ie w/capital budget) is critical.
" most dems on the current council said the proposed project is in the hands of P&Z, Inland Wetlands etc"
Funny how the Dems passed the buck, as if they didn't vote for the changes W/S requested and as if they were not the cheerleaders of W/S's proposals. Not only that, they went out of their way to make sure the owners got taxpayer money for work on the tunnel, created a big deal about term date changes of the WPCA chairman to discredit him and then claimed that if it hadn't been for the shenanigans he would have been reappointed, but in reality they wanted him out as they were afraid he might use his knowledge and experience to carefully assess the capacity of the sewer plant and the W/S's impact on it. He was replaced as well as others who might raise too many questions. They attacked all questions about the sewer capacity as being motivated by people against the W/S project.
So, instead of taking credit for all they did for W/S and the local owner developer, they try to distance themselves from it and pass the buck. They gave the devlopers everything they could and the Cheshire citizens will pay the price.
Mike Ecke mentioned at the forum that this project will take 3 to 5 years to build so TC will have ample time to make the necessary infrastructure improvements. That sounds like a green light from the Democratic budget chair if I heard it right.
The project drags on and we build out the infrastructure. What a bargain!
Why do you hate children, I hope this project adds 200 kids, then you will have to deal with it.
Here's an intriguing plan In which Berkeley CA would pay for the installation of solar panels in residents' homes and recoup the cost over 20 years through a tax on the property.
All of this and the developer didn't even need residential and has never built residential but we changed all our zoning laws for them. Why ? Why? Why? Now the courts will decide what will happen in the NE and we(citizens) can't have a say. Great job by all. Due diligence has been trown under the BUS. To the people who signed the petition at Stop&Shop do you know what you are signing?
Perhaps they were signing a petition asking their elected officials to be open to new ideas regarding development and find something willing to go into the north end that has the capacity to bring in 1 to 2 million dollars in taxes to the town. Perhaps, they were tired of having vacant lots in the north end that bring in no revenue and do nothing for the town other then grow many dandelions. .
Perhaps they were signing a petition asking their elected officials to be open to new ideas regarding development and find something willing to go into the north end that has the capacity to bring in 1 to 2 million dollars in taxes to the town. Perhaps, they were tired of having vacant lots in the north end that bring in no revenue and do nothing for the town other then grow many dandelions. .
Dandelions don't cost $20k/child to be educated
Indeed they don't but they also bring in no money to the town to help shift the tax burden off of residents. For the record, when did educating our youth and investing in the future become such a sin? Have we become so selfish and greedy that we would rather clutch on to every penny then provide in education to our children? God Bless the generation that came before and looked at education as a neccessity and were willing and able to provide that benefit to each and every one of us.
let me get this right. A powerful deverloper from MA proposes to feather their nest by building multifamily housing that will turn the North End into a loss leader, and we are supposed to feel guilty about not letting them profit at OUR CHILDREN's expense?
To Saturday, October 27, 2007 8:54:00 AM:
"Dandelions don't cost $20k/child to be educated"
You embody many of the wonderful qualities of a CAVEMAN!
If you have children do you compare them to dandelions?
By the way genius, or is your name Bill, Dave, or Barney Fife, it doesn’t cost $20,000 a year to educate a public school student. It sounds like your “education” is worth about two cents.
It will be very amusing to see the cementheads who support paving the North End getting voted into the Stone Age
By the way, your side is the one who thinks screwing our own kids by overcrowding their classrooms is better than leaving the dandelions alone
Overcrowded classrooms would not be an issue if certain people did not cry about every last penny being spent on education. If education was a priority money would be responsibly spent and class sizes could be at the correct level. This is hard to do when misers in the community are more concerned about the welfare of their pocketbooks than the welfare of their children.
If all else fails we can follow the Bush model and put a fence around the borders of our town. Make it clear that no one, in particular those with children, are allowed in the community. Then the long term planning everyone promotes will be at its most effective. Fifty years from now the town will be a barren wasteland but at least we will have all saved money in the meantime.
No, the Bush model is selling out to multinational businessmen interested in quick profits and saddling local governments with massive long term obligations.
Like the caveMAn and his allies who will sell the town out to W/S of Needham, MA
. I actually agree with your analysis of the Bush Model. But, we need to have an open mind and look at the W/S plan. The money it can bring into the town exceeds what it will cost. Especially since certain costs associated with it, such as a north end firehouse, needed to be done by the town regardless and were in fact requested for years and on its strategic plan.
W/S will ptomise the world, flip the mall and apartments to some offshore investors, and leave us dealing with millions of dollars in new infrstructure costs....what's a new elementary school gonna run ...$50 million???? and don;t tell me the state will bond it because it won;t
4:01 PM
A careful look at the planning section of the strategic plan will reveal the seeds that were being planted for age restricted housing and changes envisioned for the the interchange zone.
I am not suggesting these were bad things but the push for many of these changes were sown in that plan.
Anon 3:37 How do you know how many children are attending Cheshire schools from Quarry Village? This answer can't and I repeat can't never be obtained or made available for the general public. Our school administrators keep that guarded like the gold in Fort Knox. I believe that the children should be kept out of this adult game that is being played in the NE. When is everyone involved with this start telling the truth so that a good example is set for our children to follow? For now all should go to "time out" for a while.
Stop the adminstrators have given over the numbers.
Stop what? Asking questions. Quarry Village and NE ??? are like comparing apples and oranges. How about the other two complexes on West Main st. that were apartments and then were converted to condo's? Also, the numbers that were given to the impact study people(W/S) will they be verified by the independent group that was hired by the town or the town's finance people? I for one hope it's the independent group.
A new elementary school? Come on! Stop the extremist scaring tactics and deal with facts and reality. These are one and two bedroom units we are talking about. How in the world could that bring in enough students to warrant a new school. Answer? It can’t but it sure sounds good to scare people! The idea is not even worth any further discussion. It is nonsense and not based on any type of reality.
I hope that they build the apartments and three kids per unit move in 480 in all and you have to pay to educate them. That would make me happy.
Anon 2:17....have you looked at the present enrollment at Highland and Chapman?
If you can count, you ought to be an alarmist about adding 160 family oriented rental housing units into the North End
"We have units that are that size in Quarry Village and they have three bed room units."
There is no comparison between Quarry Village and the NE apartments that will be stacked 4 stories. Why would any empty nester ever want to live in such a high density development with constant noise.
And you can't compare condos with apartments, it's ridiculous.
Remember it's just a mall and you people don't care about Cheshire.
You sold your neighbors out.
Even Waterbury stopped allowing condos in commericial zones.. and look what happened to the ones that got built before they changed the rules.
Corporal Klinger wanted a Section 8. I think the P&Z is equally insane since we will end up with Section 8
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