Search This Blog

Saturday, July 13, 2013

I NEED SOLUTIONS

As the blog is quickly approaching its 1 millionth hit, and as I said yesterday it is an engine for change in Hartford, it can also serve as a valuable asset to serve as a spot for solutions. With over 5,000 page visits on some days, I know people are reading. Many of those readers are City employees and government professionals. Many are business people and educators. Many are Police Officers and firefighters and many politicians, even a few Judges have confided in me that hey are regular readers.

I know the media follows because many of them grab their stories from here, Some are good and acknowledge where they got it, others don't, but it is still flattering even if they don't.

With all those eyes on the blog, all of those eyes are also attached to functioning brains. Probably different degrees of functionality coming from those brains , but I'll stay away from that for now.

Bottom line is that there is a lot wrong with Hartford right now. But the fact that keeps me here , is that there is far more that is right with Hartford. The solution is here, if Mayor Segarra and others just take the time to listen.

It is easy to point out the wrong. Unfortunately it just seems to get easier and easier everyday with the poor judgment and crazy decision making by the Mayor and his people. At least a few times a day, callers to me start the conversation by saying "you can't make this stuff up". No you can't.

I am going to post a few of my thoughts and I guess pet peeves here, like I usually do. But I am asking my readers to put some thoughts into their comments and post ideas that will make Hartford a better place. Feel free to offer guidance to Mayor Segarra, whether he will admit it or not, him and his staff are faithful readers.

I am asking that you keep the comments civil and actually  provide ways and suggestions that you think might work.

1.) First on my list is to let the Hartford City Council know why they were actually elected. They are the policy body and the budgetary of Hartford City Government. The Mayor is the Chief Executive Officer, he runs the day to day operation. The Council is not supposed to micro manage any City Department. They are not advisers to the White House, they are not meant to try to set or influence immigration Policy in Arizona through their resolutions. Quite frankly they should be focusing on anything that involves the people who put them in Office. Taxes, spending, fiscal matters, that's why they are there.

They are not there to question whether a police car has a corvette engine or does it a PPV or a passenger car. (PPV is a Police Pursuit Vehicle package that police cars come with, usually beefed up suspension, brakes, engine, transmission, everything to make sure the vehicles stay safe as they are used 24/7  usually under harsh conditions).

They shouldn't be questioning compensatory time or overtime The Council approves budgets. how those budgets are used is the reason we hire department heads and hold them responsible for their budgets. Furthermore, it is the Mayor's responsibility through his COO to make sure that works. Now I will give the Council a little bit of a pass here. If the Mayor has abdicated his responsibility and the COO is asleep at the switch, then hearings need to be held and the failings brought out in the open. The Council can not just step in and assume the Mayor's role and take over.

It is called checks and balances not divide and conquer.

2.) An immediate review of all non-union salaries both at the Board of Education and City hall needs to take place. I say non-union because most other salaries are set by collective bargaining agreements and aren't touchable until the next round of contract negotiations. Any regular reader knows my feelings already about the $120,000 plus salary being paid to the spokesperson for the Board of Education. I feel the same way for the Mayor's spokesperson ( although I think right now and for the immediate future she will be earning every penny of it)

 It is just inconceivable to me that the Mayor's spokesperson makes almost double what many media professionals in this market, some with over 25 years experience. These salaries need to be brought in line with something close to those being paid in the private sector. It is called public service for a reason and was never meant as a way to get rich

3.) Analyze and make sure that every revenue stream available to the City is being pursued to the maximum. It boggles my mind that rent payments from the use of the Pond House Building in Elizabeth Park are being paid to the Friends of Elizabeth Park, rather than the City of Hartford. Numerous politicos and nonprofits such as the Spanish American Merchants Association, a condo building on Woodland Street, home to a few politicians and at least the address for one Department head ( notice I didn't say home, because it is just a sham address for him to say he has a Hartford address)

But anyways over 15 of these locations have been getting totally free trash pickup from the City of Hartford for years. While most others have to contract with a private hauler, these addresses have been living on easy street when it comes to trash. Not only do they get the service for free, the City also has paid hundreds of thousands of dollars in tipping fees for the weight of the trash picked up.
Between the Pond House rent and the trash fees, not to mention the $500,000 they gave away on the SAMA land deal, the Police Department would not be worrying about budget cuts, the money would be there to fund them fully.

4.) We have a suite full of lawyers in the Office of the Corporation Counsel yet we still contract out a major portion of the legal work to outside lawyers. Why? Some of the work contracted out is for work that a lawyer fresh out of law school should be able to do blindfolded. Real estate closings and FOI hearings just being a few examples

Reports are that several hundred thousand dollars of hardwood trees, large red oak and others were cut down and sold by the vendor entrusted with managing Hartford's two golf courses, At the same time the vendor, MDM Golf, is in default of their lease agreement, not paying their rent, not carrying the required insurance, but yet being allowed to still collect the green's fees every days as most golfers are telling me the courses are in deplorable condition.

I am unable to find any lawsuits that have been filed against MDM by the City to protect from or collect these losses. Isn't that what lawyers should be doing to protect the City's interests?

5.) City cars. No ,I do not support vehicles for ERT. City cars have been abused for years.  I have seen the trunks of City vehicles used for hauling mulch from Home Depot like a delivery truck and City cars used to haul the family around for dinner out in replacement of the family having a car. It is time to change and revamp the policy.

 One of the most egregious examples was a former Assistant Police Chief who commuted to Stamford everyday in a City car, fueled by the taxpayers gas pumps. And not to mention his occasional romps into Manhattan on weekends  for dinner when he would run the tolls on the way back and the toll booth cameras would click his license plate and send the tickets to City Hall to be paid by the taxpayers of Hartford.

The occasional accidents and towing fees back to Hartford for repairs were just an added benefit of his car use.

The first step will be the creation of an inventory system for the vehicles and accurate tracking, because as we saw with the Kupiec joy ride, no one even knows who has the cars.

6.) The internal Audit department's recent reports regarding the poor cash handling procedures and the use of City credit cards is just clearly mismanagement and screams out for a change in leadership in the Finance Department
.
Receipts stored in a shoebox on a shelf and almost a half a million dollars in bounced checks sitting around without any collection efforts. Give those checks to HPD and tell them whatever they collect will be put back in their budget. That number will be cleaned up real quick.

7.) And finally for tonight, Councilman Kennedy's Special Events ordinance needs to be rescinded. A few years ago, the Council capped all of the fees for special events at a maximum of $10,000. This means that any group who has a parade or an event will only be billed up to a maximum of $10,000, no matter what the cost to the City/ Some Hartford parades run up a tab of $70,000 to $80,000 per event and they are billed $10.000. The taxpayers, or more specifically the HPD Special Events Budget eats the rest of those costs. And in many cases the initial $10,000 is never paid either.

This was done not out of any fiscal responsibility for the City, but purely to keep groups with political clout happy and not making them raise the funds to conduct their events. It needs to end.

I am sure there are many readers that have their own special insight or ideas to help Pedro and the City Council out and maybe help him see something they aren't t seeing. Only time will tell if they are listening, but then again, that is what elections are for.

Please keep your comments civil, constructive and on point. Thanks

OUCH

For the tongue in cheek version of Jared's Joy Ride, check out Colin McEnroe's column here. Can the music video be far off ?

Friday, July 12, 2013

WE AREN'T THIS BAD ....YET

As bad as things sometimes look in Hartford, I guess they could always be worse.

http://www.nancyonnorwalk.com/2013/07/norwalk-dems-battle-in-city-hall-parking-lot/

YOU'RE FIRED

 
 
This graphic apparently appeared today on television station KTVU in Oakland ,California regarding the Asiana Airlines crash in San Francisco.

I can only think it was some producer trying to play a poorly thought out prank on their last day of work at KTVU, if not I am pretty sure today will be their last day.

This is the statement from the station:

EARLIER IN THE NEWSCAST WE GAVE SOME NAMES OF PILOTS INVOLVED IN THE ASIANA AIRLINES CRASH. THESE NAMES WERE NOT ACCURATE DESPITE AN N-T-S-B OFFICIAL IN WASHINGTON CONFIRMING THEM LATE THIS MORNING. WE APOLOGIZE FOR THIS ERROR.

UPDATE:

NTSB statement on erroneous confirmation of crew names

July 12


The National Transportation Safety Board apologizes for inaccurate and offensive names that were mistakenly confirmed as those of the pilots of Asiana flight 214, which crashed at San Francisco International Airport on July 6.

Earlier today, in response to an inquiry from a media outlet, a summer intern acted outside the scope of his authority when he erroneously confirmed the names of the flight crew on the aircraft.

The NTSB does not release or confirm the names of crewmembers or people involved in transportation accidents to the media. We work hard to ensure that only appropriate factual information regarding an investigation is released and deeply regret today's incident.

Appropriate actions will be taken to ensure that such a serious error is not repeated.

Office of Public Affairs
490 L'Enfant Plaza, SW
Washington, DC 20594
(202) 314-6100
Kelly Nantel
kelly.nantel@ntsb.gov

WHY?

I try not to take the blog too seriously, most times, at least. I am starting to realize what people have been telling me for a while. "We the People" has definitely become an engine for change in Hartford.

As much as I appreciate that though, I really do have to ask...Why?

I have some excellent partners and sources that make it all possible, but it would be so much easier if the City was just run right.

With the number of high priced, most of them in the six figure salary, so called managers, it seems as though  very little managing is taking place.Whether it is the p-card abuse or Kupiec's joy ride, why does it come out here first. Shouldn't our managers and our double dipping COO have a handle on the operation first?

I just wonder what the outcome would have been if I didn't develop the information regarding the former Chief of Staff and his apparent theft of a City vehicle. Would anyone have even known?
And when would the vehicle he took without permission have been noticed as missing? Maybe when the dust on it from the parking garage got too thick that it bothered some city Hall manager with allergies?

As the incident unfolded Monday morning it was amazing that no one, not even the HPD Fleet manager knew who the vehicle was issued to. Cops were saying the registration cam back to HPD but apparently no one had a record of who the vehicle had been issued to.. That is just amazing that there is no vehicle data base that should show any City vehicle at a moments notice. If people are being paid to manage a fleet, then damn it, manage the fleet.

That would also require though that those in power play by the rules and allow the people being paid to do their jobs. You can't bypass the rules and hand out vehicles or cellphones or I-pads like candy without following a process in place. To the best of my knowledge there is no small asset inventory in place for the City of Hartford. I have asked for it and no one has provided it.

That means if you are a City of Hartford employee and are issued an I-pad or a cellphone or in the Case of Jared Kupiec, a car. No one even knows you have it, so there is no procedure to protect the city's assets to make sure that property eventually makes it back to City Hall, unless someone remembers to ask for it back.

This just crazy that we run a half a billion dollar corporation like this, if you can even call it "running". It is a free for all allowed to flail out of control because of misplaced loyalties to law school study buddies and chronies rather than qualified professionals.

Council President Shawn Wooden today requested an Audit into City Vehicles based on the Kupiec incident. An incident that was revealed through a blog posting, not an observant City employee or even a highly paid Department head doing their job.

Even more troubling though is the comment in Wooden's letter that " I understand that an audit of this scope will likely be a labor intensive one, so I am asking that it be completed by September 30, 2013". This report would most likely be a few key strokes on a computer to generate for management at any properly operated business.

The report would probably also tell you the last time it was serviced, the mileage etc, etc. And if it was a really well run business, the entire fleet would be tracked by GPS and able to tell you where that vehicle was at that exact moment and how fast it was travelling.

It is definitely time to start reviewing the City Vehicle policy. There should be three people with City take home privileges, the mayor, the police Chief and the Fire Chief, period. In addition all other City vehicles should be clearly marked  with city seals and markings. What is the need for stealth by the Fire Chief or the Fire Department. no HFD markings and in most cases  not even municipal plates. Why?

In a City struggling with the need for additional police presence and visibility , other than detective's vehicles, every other vehicle should be clearly and very visibly marked a s a police vehicle. If you don't want a marked police vehicle in your driveway, don't take it home.

And as far as DPW, no one is owed a ride back and forth to work by the taxpayers. Follow the Weather Channel, if a blizzard is predicted, either stay local or take an SUV home for the night, but there is no need for vehicles to go home on a daily basis.

There is  no reason for the Chief of Staff , the COO or even Department heads to have take home cars

The City of Hartford residents deserve so much more from those who are supposed to be running the operation. Allowing the direction and management of the city to be dictated by a blog is wrong.