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Wednesday, April 25, 2012

DEMOCRACY AT WHAT PRICE?

The official number of Republicans voting in yesterdays GOP primary have been filed.

An impressive 158 Republicans turned out city wide, (yes, I'm being sarcastic). That averages out to 6.58333 persons per polling place. The City of Hartford paid to have 24 polling places open citywide, although I am being told that at least one polling location had no one show up. Most polling places probably had more paid GOP workers than they actually had voters.

The final dollar amount spent hasn't been tallied yet, but it will most likely be at least $400.00 to $500.00 per vote, if not greater. It would have been more cost effective to take every Republican in Hartford out to dinner and get their vote while they were dining.

Tuesday, April 24, 2012

ANOTHER WHEEL COMES OFF THE BUS

Hartford's political "machine", if there actually is such a thing, suffered another body blow tonight. The Hartford Charter Revision Commission had its second meeting tonight and the major item of business was the election of a permanent chairperson. The appointment and selection of the chair is important as that person, in theory, guides the direction of the Commission for its duration.

The permanent Chair is able to decide what moves forward as far as any changes to Hartford's Charter, what eventually is referred to the Council for change, and potentially to the voters of Hartford.

The choices tonight were political insider John Kennelly and former State Representative Ken Green. Kennelly was fresh from his pleading in Superior Court where he accepted probation and court imposed penalties for his recent drunk driving arrest. Ken Green was recently elected along with a "reform" slate, of which I am also a member, for the 7th Disrict Hartford Democratic Town Committee.

The votes of at least two Commission members appointed by Working Families Party
members put Green over the top in the vote count to become Chairperson as well as former Republican Councilperson Corey Brinson's vote for Green.

It was generally expected that those Commissioner's appointed by Mayor Segarra as well as Democratic Council members would have been enough to carry Kennelly, but that apparently didn't happen.

This should be an interesting 16 months under Ken Green's leadership and may result in substantive change to Hartford's Charter.

Maybe there is hope yet.

Monday, April 23, 2012

A VISION UPDATE


BEFORE PICTURE, JANUARY 2012


TODAY'S PICTURE APRIL 2012

In January, I wrote a post that was very difficult to write, not knowing what the future had in store and facing a possible prognosis of losing eyesight. You can read that original post here. Before I go much further, I just want to thank everyone for their support, words of kindness and the prayers that I know were being said, I never knew how many people have "prayer lists" until they began telling me I was added to theirs.

Two people in particular played a key role in helping me maintain my sanity during this difficult time, first is my mother who naturally did what mothers do by supporting me and even insisting on making sure she accompanied me to the office visits with the opthamologist and the laser surgery. She claimed it was because I shouldn't drive after having my eyes dilated or after the laser, but I think it was more to be there if the news got much worse than the first day I was given the diagnosis. I know she had many sleepless nights worrying about what could happen.

The other is my closest friend, who will remain nameless, but anyone close to me knows who he is, and he knows it also. We have known each other for over 25 years and his daily phone calls to make sure everything was OK shows what a friend is all about. The first night I was given the possible prognosis of going blind, he insisted on dragging me out for dinner and get me out of the house and my sulking that night. He is a great husband and father to his family and the best friend someone could ask for.

OK, so enough of the sappy stuff.

For all the original details , read the post above, but today was three months since the laser surgery on my left eye. I was on edge, not knowing what the "verdict" was going to be. The large smile on the opthamologist's face when he came into the exam room, was the first indication I had that it was going to be a good day. My right eye has some issues, but is holding its own compared to what the left looked like

Before he came in, they had tested eye pressures done a few other tests and then took color images of the retina and macula in the back of my eyes. I'm not a doctor so much of it meant nothing, but the images he showed me told me the story. I think the doctor thought he was given the wrong "after" photos, and he said even he couldn't believe the results, using words like "impressive" and "remarkable" to describe the outcome of the laser surgery.

The surgery was done in January, and because of the swelling and condition of the retina I was told at the time it would take three months to determine the results.

Today was the day and you can see from the pictures above the difference. The "before" picture was taken on January 6th, 2012. The yellow and green colors are relatively normal. I guess the green is the preferred shade, but some yellow can be expected for someone with diabetes and my age. The red is not good, white is bad and black is the worst. As you can see from the before pic, the upper half of my left eye was definitely in trouble.

On January 26, 2012 I had laser surgery to try to stop the swelling, or macular edema, in the macula and the retina which had the potential of causing blindness within a year if left untreated and at the time, even the laser wasn't a sure fire fix. My vision had deteriorated so much in less than two months, I was scared of the outcome. I was already being prepped mentally for the next possible step which were steroid injections directly into the eye. I had enough trouble getting used to putting contacts into my eyes, never mind watching a needle coming toward my eye.

The after picture above shows the results after three months. It is not perfect, but the whites and black are gone and just a tinge of red is left. It is still something that needs to be monitored closely for both eyes , but I feel much better than I did on January 6th. And whoever perfected the laser for this surgery is amazing. Prior to the laser this would have been definite blindness.

Thank you again for all of your support.

Wednesday, April 18, 2012

WFSB'S HALLIE JACKSON MOVING ON




WFSB's Hallie Jackson will be leaving the Hartford area to accept a new position with the Hearst Television Group in Washington D.C.. Her assignment will be covering Federal government and political stories for almost 30 Hearst stations.

Hallie's last day in Hartford will be May 13th. Good luck to Hallie and her husband Doug

HPD UNION OVERWHELMINGLY APPROVES PROPOSED CONTRACT

In a vote held today by the Hartford Police Union membership, their tentative new contract was approved with over 300 voting in favor and 11 against according to sources.

The contract will now go before the Hartford City Council at Monday's meeting for their approval.

The new agreement is the result of negotiations conducted over the last 22 months since the previous contract expired

MORE OF THAT "SHARED SACRIFICE"

Last Friday, Jeff cohen at WNPR reported on more raises that were being given out to top level employees at Hartford city Hall. Those raises were in addition to the Mayor's own raise as well as the $20,000 raise given to his Chief of Staff Jared Kupiec. Click on the link in the right column to go to Jeff Cohen's blog to read his articles

According to Jeff's article, Hartford's Chief Operating Officer David Panagore stated "As a management philosophy, it's within the confines of the budget to be able to keep management and upper level staff focused and be able to keep them happy at their work because certainly the demands and the stress during these financial times just continues to build."

I can understand the stress though. Luckily only upper management feels the stress, imagine if our police officers, firefighters or even teachers had to deal with stress on a daily basis, imagine how much that could potentially cost us.

Newsflash Mayor, you might want to consider the stress levels of the taxpayers of Hartford who have to pay for the raises for these unfortunate, over-stressed city employees , most of them making over $100,000 a year in salary. It must be tough, I certainly can feel for them.

I guess those other residents that don't have the luxury of over inflated city salaries will just have to continue to decide whether to pay their steadily increasing tax bills or pay for their medications or put food on the table.

I guess it is just part of the shared sacrifice we all must buy into for the good of the Mayor.

But now, at the same time that the Mayor is trying to sell Hartford's unions on carrying their weight and being part of the solution,the Mayor actually calls it "shared sacrifice", the latest list of bonuses from City Hall is available. The largest bonus issued, $15,000 was given to one of the Mayor's "cabinet advisers" Jose Colon-Rivas, who also receives a six figure salary already as the City's health director.

In good times, I might actually be able to support the bonuses, but in a cash strapped city facing a $56 million dollar deficit next year and the potential for an estimated budget gap exceeding $150 million in 2017, there is no other term that applies other than "reckless spending".

In the Interdepartmental memo below detailing the justification for the bonus for Colon-Rivas it is stated that he has " improved the quality of service rendered by his department...generated savings of revenue for the City, improved service to the public in a manner not achievable by established procedures and processes". Isn't that what a department head is actually paid a salary to do? Do we really need to pay someone a $15,000 bonus for doing the job they are expected to do?

I still am unable to comprehend how you can possibly explain "shared sacrifice" to any City employee when they see raises and bonuses being paid out while they are asked to give back.

It just isn't right or honest and definitely doesn't show good faith.

Colon Rivas ESI Letter 0001

2012 ESI spreadsheet0001