Ten tasty tidbits of Charlestown news
By Will Collette
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| Bill (left) in happier days |
DiLibero gets a gig
Charlestown’s former Town Administrator William
DiLibero will be heading down to Texas on March 28th where a new job
as City Manager for South Padre Island awaits
him. Readers will remember Bill’s tumultuous service in Charlestown where he
made a rapid fall from grace – applauded by the Town Council for his great
service – to being forced to resign due to the “Kill Bill Campaign” waged
against him by the CCA Party.
Bill says South Padre has
“2,300 residents, 1 million visitors, $2 billion in commerce and $2.50
per thousand tax rate. They liked my experience in managing through storms,
project management skills, and my thoughts on improving economic development.”
I wish him well.
Quonnie Crime Wave
Charlestown Police Chief Jeffrey Allen told the Westerly Sun that least
nine vacant summer houses, mostly in Quonochontaug, were hit by bandits who
stole copper pipes and fittings from crawl spaces under the properties and from
outdoor showers. Crooks presumably sell the valuable metal as scrap at the
current going rate of $2.85 a pound.
These crimes are hard to spot since the
houses aren’t occupied for months at a time. CPD expects more reports of copper
thefts when the beach property owners show up as the weather warms.
I’m surprised the Charlestown Town
Council isn’t calling for volunteer crime fighting patrols to protect the homes
of the people who provide the Charlestown Citizens Alliance with the bulk of
its campaign funding.
Dead man found on Quonnie Beach ID’d
Charlestown ranked in the lower half
of municipalities with distressed homes
According to a new Zillow.com
report, Charlestown ranks #27 among Rhode Island’s 39 cities in towns for the
percentage of homes that are “underwater” – where the value of the property is
less than what the homeowner owes on it. The report says that 12.821% of
Charlestown’s homeowners are underwater, compared to Central Falls where 43.5%
of homeowners are underwater, giving the city the dubious distinction of being
worst in the state.
Richmond was ranked #19 with 19.5%
underwater, but the worst town in our area is Hopkinton, ranked at #7 because
31.48% of its homeowners are underwater.
Zillow also broke out the stats for
some of our local villages showing Bradford and Ashaway at over 22%. Read the
Zillow report here.
Very cool thing for soldiers with
housing issues
The RI Association of Realtors has a Troop Support Task Force that has raised
around $10,000 it will distribute to military service personnel and their
families for housing problems. Up to $500 can be given to troops rank E5 or
lower who live in Rhode Island and are in active service or in the Reserves or
National Guard. The money can be used for rent, mortgage, utilities, maintenance
or other housing related needs.
For more information about
the Realtor Troop Support Task Force or to find out how you can contribute,
visit the Realtor Troop Support Facebook page. For help, contact
the Rhode Island National Guard Family Assistance Center at 401-275-1242/43.
Spring is coming
As the snow banks melt, the birds sing louder and the
squirrels prepare to deliver their litters of squirrelettes, I received notice
that we’re already getting fairly substantial amounts of pollen in the air. Pollen.com is reporting pollen in Charlestown from junipers and elms
in the “medium” range on non-rainy days which is more than enough to affect
sufferers of seasonal allergies.
Speaking of annoying…
I get these regular notices from LinkedIn.com,
telling me I should network with specific people with whom I share a network of
connections. I just got one from none other than Ron Areglado, famed leader of
anti-wind energy NIMBY group Ill Wind and swami to his flock of Morainiacs.
His LinkedIn profile shows him as “President” of the “Center
for Educational Excellence,” which does not exist on the RI Secretary
of State’s corporate database or in the Westlaw corporate database. His very creative resume used to list him as President of
another unregistered fictitious business name, the Center for Moral and Ethical
Leadership. No sign of that one anymore.
Hartford got a promotion already
Ex-Westerly Town Manager Steve Hartford rebounded quickly
from his forced resignation in August after the Westerly Town Council showed
its dissatisfaction with his handling of the Copar Quarry Scandal among other
things. In January, Governor Lincoln Chafee hired him as a “special advisor on policy and legislative affairs.”
Hartford must have really wowed the Governor because after
just weeks on the job, Hartford has been promoted to be Governor Chafee’s Director of Policy.
Hartford probably won’t be there long. His job with Chafee
is a political appointment and Chafee is not running for re-election in
November. Whoever the new Governor is will probably bring in a new Policy
Director.
Hello, Charlestown: Uber-rightwing stink tank wants to
“help” municipalities
The American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) is a 40 year
old ultra-conservative group that has crafted and promoted some of America’s
most troublesome new state laws. You can thank them for legislation on “Stand
Your Ground,” Voter ID, charter schools, anti-green energy, pro-fossil fuel,
anti-Obamacare, corporate rights, private prisons, anti-public worker pensions
and a host of other right-wing causes.
They are funded almost exclusively by some of the nastiest
corporations, including the infamous Koch Brothers. Up until lately, their
principal focus has been state legislatures.
However,
they’ve just set up a new subsidiary called the
American City County Exchange (ACCE) that aims to recruit public officials from “villages, towns, cities and counties”.
One of
the purposes of ACCE will be to connect the lobbyists from the corporations
that provide the funding with what they expect will be a legion of local
politicians who join ACCE because it is “America’s
only free market forum for village, town, city and county policymakers”.
I’ll bet
the CCA Party boys who control the Town Council (Boss Tom Gentz, his deputy Dan
Slattery and George Tremblay) are wondering how they can become charter
members.
Not happy
The Gallup
Polling organization released its annual survey results on misery and happiness, ranked by
state, and – big surprise – Rhode Island came in at #39 meaning that people in
38 other states are happier than we are. We came up one spot from our #40
ranking in 2009, but we’ve actually been happier than we are now in 2010
through 2012.
Oh well, take
another Xanax with a swig of Gansett and toast the fact that we’re not the
worst-ranked state of West Virginia. And ponder why it is that North and South
Dakota come in first and second. Sure, they’ve got lots of jobs blasting the
crap out of the prairies to extract oil, gas and coal. But besides that? Well,
I’ve been to both Dakotas quite often and this is a mystery to me.