congratulations to john phillips who will be the new

west hartford director of public works. i DO have an ulterior motive for saying that though. i have been (as well as a few others i know of) calling the town of west hartford to get a burned out street light replaced on asylum avenue. i have personally been calling for well over two years. YES OVER TWO YEARS (more like 3 or 4 i think). why is it bothering me so much? well i'll tell you. the burned out light in question is right near one of those effing stupid and effing dangerous and effing ridiculous lovely traffic islands on asylum. they should be lit up as much as possible to avoid MORE accidents than they've already caused. soooooooooooooooooooooooo mr phillips how about fixing that burned out light on asylum?

years is way too long to wait to replace a light. and tell whoever answers the phone when we call to stop lying. they always say it's on the list and they'll get to it. must be an awfully big effing list if that light has been on it for over 2 years.

(p.s. seriously though, i'm happy mr phillips got the job. i am glad they promoted from within)

U.S. Navy Veteran Named West Hartford Director Of Public Works

By BILL LEUKHARDT
WEST HARTFORD — - John Phillips, a U.S. Navy veteran hired in 1996 as a public works laborer, will be the new director of public works.

Phillips, the public works department's municipal parking manager since 2004, will replace Dana Hallenbeck, who will retire July 18 to start a new career as an ordained Lutheran minister.

"It was a difficult decision, because we had excellent applicants," interim Town Manager Ron Van Winkle said Monday. "John is an incredible hard-working person and has done a great job as parking operations manager."

The town recruited from within and had seven applicants. The pay range for the director's job is $65,000 to $119,000 a year. Van Winkle said Monday that he has not yet met with Phillips to set a salary.

Phillips, 38, said Monday that he looks forward to the challenge of running the department that maintains roads, supervises trash collection, cuts grass and, in Van Winkle's words, "basically [are] the ones who take care of the town."..........

do you know what i have to say to the town of west hartford?

luuuuuuuuuuuccccccccccccccccyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy you have some 'splainin' to do!!!

yesterday my sister pointed out to me some spray painted writing in the road. it was done either friday or yesterday morning. it says 'raised island' or something similar.

i phoned the town this morning and spoke to a VERY nice man. turns out they ARE going to put FOUR islands on asylum avenue between steele road and trout brook. i asked why. i was told it was for traffic ease. i am going to ask the town if i can see the traffic study on this. i drive on asylum EVERY day. not just five days a week EVERY day. between steele and trout brook. the ONLY thing that even resembled any kind of 'traffic study' was one of those light up signs that tells you how fast (i.e. how many miles OVER the speed limit) you're going. that was only there for a few days. i sure hope that wasn't their 'study'. there was NOTHING else. nada. zip. well nothing i'm aware of. that's why the town is getting ANOTHER call from me tomorrow. i'm going to ask to review that traffic study.

• i asked WHO was going to pay for these traffic islands since the town is on a budget. well i guess it's in the budget. who knows? i didn't get a real answer. that was NOT the fault of the person i spoke to mind you. he was as helpful as he could be. nice too. how the heck are we going to fund these traffic islands (which NO ONE i talked to who lives in the area is aware of. they were actually SHOCKED about it) when we're on a WICKED TIGHT BUDGET. taxes are up and the citizenry is up in arms over that. (well not the taxes so much as the assessments. it all boils down to we're getting our asses nailed)
• they did mail letters out (smartly so i think. they knew EXACTLY what they were doing) telling us the gas company was going to be doing some road construction. what they forgot to add was, THEY WERE GOING TO BE DOING SOME CONSTRUCTING OF THEIR OWN ONCE CNG WAS DONE. so west hartford, you weren't going to TELL US about the islands? we were supposed to wake up one morning and see them? hmmmmmmmmmmmmm
  

there is NO NEED for those traffic islands on asylum between trout brook and steele road. the construction done a couple of years ago (adding those two lanes on either side of the street. for parking and what not) did the trick. not much speeding (unless it's 2 am - then everything goes). it does get rather congested in the evening rush hour though. how would traffic islands ALLEVIATE THAT? (answer=they wouldn't)

expect my call in the morning

anybody else read this in the hartford advocate this week?

why am i NOT surprised the school board in MY town, west hartford, had stuff to HIDE?
why am i NOT surprised our taxes are going through the roof and they ARE INDEED EATING CAKE?
is anyone else as disturbed as i am?

Let Them Eat Cake
How much tax money does West Hartford's Board of Education spend on catered meals for itself? They won't tell us.
By Jennifer Abel
The current West Hartford school budget is close to $118 million, about $11,670 per student. According to the CIA World Factbook, this is more than the per capita income of 141 of Earth's 230 nations.
According to the board of education it's still not enough to teach the kids, so they're requesting an extra $7.5 million next year.
There's already grumbling in town about how taxes, once again, are rising higher than inflation. And since the school budget is over 60 percent of the town's total, much of that grumbling's directed toward school spending. It's mostly off-the-record, though, because people who speak against school spending are branded as selfish.
The budget's not presented in a line-item form that lists individual expenses. So when we first heard complaints about the board allegedly having breakfasts and lunches catered to meetings on the taxpayers' dime, we didn't know if this was a big deal or not because we couldn't go to the budget and read "Refreshments: X dollars."
Are we talking "coffee and donuts" or "five-course banquets"? A woman at the Avon Board of Ed. said she usually makes coffee for meetings; Simsbury said they'll provide a meal if they are scheduled back-to-back during the dinner hour. This sounds reasonable; is that what West Hartford's doing?...............