Berkley's Very Own Blog

Reality Check...Mr. Senato

2005-10-19T12:00:00.000-07:00

I think it is time that Mr. Senato gets a little bit of a reality check about this website. His editorialized comments at the last selectmen’s meeting certainly were not accurate.

Lets first talk about Official Town Minutes. Mr. Senato keeps alluding to the need for an official town web site in order to have official town minutes posted. For some reason he thinks that if they were posted on the TownofBerkley.com site they would become unofficial. This is untrue. These are public records that in the past were posted on this site when Carol Mills was Chairman of the BOS. She agreed that they were public records and could be posted to the site and the BOS sent them to me. There was no issue with the posting of minutes at that time. That changed when she lost the election and Mr. Senato became Chairman of the BOS.

I can tell you that each organization and committee that sends minutes to this website know that they get posted exactly as sent and are not modify in anyway. How do they become unofficial? If a newspaper posts the minutes of a meeting exactly as given are they still official minutes? I would think so. What do you think?

Second, Mr. Senato keeps alluding to the town not having a website because the Finance Committee did not recommend moving forward with the Technology Project at the Town Meeting in June.

I believe that the Finance Committee felt that taxpayer’s money spent on a computer network and Internet access was wasteful until a detail analysis of present and future costs could be examined to ensure that it would benefit the town more than hurt it. The Finance Committee requested this from the Selectmen months before the town meeting but did not get a positive response from the BOS. I believe the Finance Committee also thought that there were other priorities that needed to be addressed first if the BOS could not justify their position on savings and benefits of the technology program.

Sorry, lets get back on point. This Town can have an official website anytime it wants! It DOES NOT need the technology project to do this. They can call up the company that host my site and get the following:
4,000 MB of Webspace
100 GB of Transfer Volume
25 FTP Accounts
1000 Email Accounts with virus protection and Spam filtering
1GB of Email Space
Daily Site Back-up
Password protected areas
SSL Encryption (used by banks for transactions)
5 free domains (www.mytown.com)
200 sub domains (www.BoardofHealth.Mytown.com)
MSSQL Databases
And lots more….

All for $240.00 a year…. WOW! Not a bad deal!

Of course you still need to have someone setup the website and put content on the website which costs money $$$$. Then again you have to do that if you had it on a system inhouse also. Believe me when I tell you that the BOS has no idea how much work it takes to post and maintain a site.

I’d give them the number for the company but Mr. Senato already has it from when he called them in his attempt to shut down the TownofBerkely.com website. By the way if he denies he did that I still have the call on my answering machine from the hosting company explaining what happened.

If you want a more canned approach you can use something like http://www.virtualtownhall.net/ which many towns in Massachusetts use for their sites.

Here is a list of the towns in MA that use them:

http://www.virtualtownhall.net/Pages/clients/massachusetts.

How much does it cost…I have no idea! It might be worth looking at as an alternative if Mr. Senato REALLY FEELS that a town web site is important to us right now…

One thing I disagree with is having the Town Website on a server located on the network of our town. It’s too easy nowadays to get viruses and hacks into a town network system thru a web server. The impact on other computers on the network could cause more harm than good for the town. You need to be vigilant and constantly maintaining security, which of course costs more $$$$

Lastly, this website does have areas that are editorialized. These are clearly label as editorial sections. It does allow comments of the Citizens of Berkley, which at times can get a little extreme. They sometimes do need to be settled down. But public comment needs to be present for divergent opinions. Do I approve of all that is written? NO! The difficulty is where do you draw the line on censorship? Where do cut someone off and bang the gavel down? Where do you say they are getting too combative and aggressive? I just feel the gavel needs to be used sparingly and only in extreme cases. I don’t feel I can always say, “I’m not going to allow that to be talked about.”

I will say that 95% of the website is just information. News Articles, Minutes, Films, State and Town Reports.

Remember, I built this site with the goal of having it interactive and informational. I’m sure on an “Official Site” what you would see is only what they want you to see…it would be a pretty empty website…don't you think...

And honestly, this site editorializes a lot less that Mr. Senato does every Tuesday Night at those selectmen’s meetings and in the newspapers (Bob…Remember the “Tiger can’t change its stripes” comment). The difference is this site really does try to back its self up with facts….something some town officials seem to avoid….

Questions and Answers

2005-09-24T17:00:00.000-07:00

Recently, the Chairman of the Board of Selectmen stated that if anyone had questions about his performance and issues in the town government he would be happy to answer them.

Would you mind if I asked a couple of questions, Mr. Chair?

You keep indicating that a mistake the Finance Committee made is the reason for the Special Town Meeting this November.

Question 1:Why do you say that and can you explain your reasoning?

A little background for those that don't know the reason for the town meeting. It appears that some are saying that the budget for this fiscal year is not balanced because money wasn't transferred out of the Ambulance User Fund and into the General Fund for use by the Fire Department. For that reason we cannot set our tax rate.

The Ambulance User Fund is an account that holds the fees that are charged when someone uses the town ambulance service. This fund was set up in 1992 to help defray the cost of running this service ie. Paying for the ambulance, paying for supplies, maintenance and staffing of the ambulance.

A little more information...

I have both the Selectmen's Budget and the Finance Committee's Budget that was presented at the June Town Meeting. They both indicate that the ambulance user account as a revenue source but neither seem to show a transfer to the fire department. Why should it?...These are just the budget numbers. Wouldn't you need an written article to do the transfer?

I don't know, but the Attorney General's Website says this:

What's a warrant?

The warrant lists a meeting's time, place, and agenda. A warrant is also known as a warning. A Town Meeting's action is not valid unless the subject was listed on the warrant.

Wouldn't that mean that if the transfer is not written on the warrant then it can't be done?

The Attorney General's Website also says this:

Who makes up the warrant?
The selectmen, who issue it.

So wouldn't that mean the Selectmen would write the transfer into the warrant? It seems like this would be true, but who knows.

Question 2: Could you please explain the process of how this transfer should have taken place and where it is in your budget?

I'm sure the Finance Committee did overlook this transfer as they don't write the warrant and as it was their first year together the didn't know the ins and outs of the process, so they could be partially to blame in some small way.

Something else the Chairman of the BOS said leads to the next question. The Chairman stated that this transfer was in the Selectmen's budget and if town meeting passed the Selectmen's budget everything would have been fine. Wouldn't that indicate that the Selectmen must have known about the transfer at the town meeting?

Question 3: Why did you not stand up and address town meeting and make sure the transfer took place?

Oh! Couple of other questions.

Question 4. Why would you not meet with the Finance Committee until only a short time before the June Town Meeting?

Maybe this problem would have been talked about or brought up at that point.

Question 5. Don't you think that working with the various committees would be more beneficial to the town than not working with them?

Seems like there are more questions than answers.

I'll finish up with a couple of other comments.

Mr. Chairman, you made mention that the Finance Committee did not seem to care about the legal opinions of its new bylaw or the articles it wishes to place on the warrant for the meeting in November. You mentioned that in the past the finance Committee did not take town counsel's opinion to heart in regards to the New Finance Committee Bylaw. You also said that the town spends alot of money to get his opinion so we should take him at his word.

Here are a couple of facts about the bylaw issue.

The Chairman of the Finance committee requested to meet with the selectmen about the Bylaw but you wouldn't recognize him to discus it.
He requested to talk to town council about it. You told him No!
The finance committee talked to the DOR reps that did the Fiscal Management report for the town who said the bylaw was strongly worded but perfectly legal.
Each section of the bylaw has been implemented in other towns in the commonwealth without any legal issues arising from them and lastly....

Lastly, would you believe a highly paid town counsel who also gives an opinion that the town has exclusive ownership of the word "Berkley" and its derivatives when a simple web search indicates that a location cannot be trademarked or owned.

I wouldn't, would you!

Same Old, Same Old in Berkley

2005-09-14T12:33:00.000-07:00

Did anybody watch the Non-Meeting of the Board of Selectmen Tuesday, September 13th 2005. The Chairman was an almost no-show. I understand that a person's job can interfere with getting to meetings but how are you running government efficiently if you aren't there. Should you be running the town if you can't commit the time to it?

Do you think there is a pattern to committee appointments in this town?

The Chairman of the Council on Aging was not reappointed even though the COA endorsed her.
The Chairman of the Recycling Committee was not reappointed even though the the Recycling Committee endorse him. Actually they were preventing others to be appointed until they realized that they could not do that.
They wouldn't reappoint a member of the finance committee whose term was up in June. This was not done in front of the camera where the public could view the discussion of why this appointment was not made. I understand no real reason was given.

Now lets return to last night.

A gentlemen submits a letter of interest and resume in April of 2005.
Bruce Lacerda, Chairman of the Finance Committee at that time, reports to it's member that the Chairman of the Board of Selectmen had received his information and asks if he wants another member. Bruce say yes.
After nothing happens with the appointment, Bruce is told that the Board of Selectmen(BOS) can't find the information.
The information is again place in the selectman hands in June, but nothing is done.
The George Kelly,the new Chairman of the Finance Committee, presses the BOS about the appointments at a meeting in July/August. Nothing!
He asks for a meeting on September 8th with the BOS to discus financial issues as well as the appointment process. No show for the Chairman of the BOS.
Last night the Members and Chairmen of the Finance committee endorse this person, he has shown great interest becoming a member and what happens....Nothing...Postponed....

I understand that Mr. Senato posted the meeting for the appointing committee last week.

Why did he do that if he wasn't going to take action on this appointment?

Last night on TV he looked like he did not know there were others interested in getting on the committee when he took the folder given to him. Both Mr. Blake and Mr. Senato said that they were not doing a job interview but just wanted to see why they wanted to go on the committee.

Well, Mr. Nordeste was there and willing to answer the questions. Why not appoint him...There are plenty of open spots on the committee and this guy has shown up to talk!

Mr. Senato appears to bark at the guy, because he lives down the street from him and why did he not come down and talk to him. Hey, most people have a sense that your house and personal phone is part of your private life and unless your invited to call should be kept out of your duties to the town.

If I have a question I don't run to the Treasurer's house or Tax Collector's house or call them at home, I call town hall. Mr. Nordeste did everything right and he still keeps getting the shaft.

Why is that Mr. Senato and Mr. Blake?

Same Old, Same Old in Berkley!

One Man Rule

2005-09-09T11:33:00.000-07:00

Something occurred last night Thursday, September 8th that shows you just how far this town has gotten away from the principles of good government and democracy.

That night the Chair of the Finance Committee and its members wanted to meet with the Selectmen to discuss the warrant of the November Town Meeting, to set a plan for the budget process as suggested in the state audit so that this year's annual town meeting might go a little smoother than last June's, and discuss the capital requests that have been made recently.

Also present was a person who has been trying to get on the Finance Committee since last June hoping to ask why nothing has happened with his appointment.

What happened. Bob Anctil was there. Julie Taylor showed up but had to leave before the meeting could start stating she had another commitment and was not informed of the meeting that night. And Chairmen Mao, Oh Sorry! Wrong Name! Chairman Senato was no where to be seen.

Now mind you that from what I understand the Finance Committee Chairman called the Selectmen's Assistant to arrange this meeting at least several days before and at least one Selectmen appeared to know about it and was present (Bob Anctil). How could no one else know about the request or the meeting or not be notified of the meeting! Is this the well oiled machine we call Berkley Government. Do you wonder why our town struggles from year to year.

I happen to be going past the chairmen of the board of selectmen's house around 5-5:30 that same day and saw a car and truck in the driveway as well a someone outside his house looking strikingly similar to the chairman himself. Was it him? I can't be totally sure but with important town business to be done where do you think he should have been if it was him. If it wasn't how do you run an 18,000,000 dollar town when you can get to meetings, or when you only meet every other week.

Look at what's happened in the past few months.

Previous Finance committee members were not reappointed
New volunteers are not being put on the Finance Committee
The Chair of the COA was not reappointed even though the COA wanted her appointed
The recycling committee members were not reappointed so the selectmen could run roughshod over that area.
New members or the Recycling Committee won't be reappointed until they toe the selectmen's line.
They've added a new police officer without consulting the Finance Committee or having funds to pay for the new position allocated in the budget.
They refused to meet or consult with the Finance Committee on last years budget until a few days before the town meeting and appear to b obstructing the process this year.
They have not implemented anything the state has suggested last October in the audit of the town's financial management; but have done the exact opposite.

What wonderful leadership we have in this town! What consensus builders we have! Stalin, Lenin, Khrushchev would be proud of their proteges they have here in Berkley!

How long is it until May 2006?

Hello and Welcome

2005-06-20T10:27:00.000-07:00

This is a new addition to the TownofBerkley.com family of websites. I continue to look for ways to get those who come to my site to be more involved in the site.

Do you have something to say! Now is your chance to express your self! I am looking for a group of Berkley Residents willing to become Blog Writers.

What is a Blog Writer? How does it Work? It's Easy!

Whenever you want to write about what you think about an issue facing our town, an idea you have on how to improve it, or thoughts you have on any subject you want to discuss just sign into the Blog,write about, and post it. People can comment on your commentary if they want to or just read it.

How to I become a BlogWriter for "Berkley's Very Own Blog". Just contact me and I will send you back an Email with an invitation to become a feature BlogWriter. I will have to know who you are but you can post under a nickname and I will not reveal the real you to anyone. So please help us out and become a Featured BlogWriter...Without our local newspaper this is the next best thing...

Thank you and look forward to hearing from you