DanvilleDelivery.com

This week, WalGREENs has reusable shopping bags at 3/$1. You need a coupon and there is a limit of six per person, but this is a great way to reduce the amount of trash you put out each week. Plastic shopping bags are not recycled by WM. These bags hold more than the plastic bags and have nice handles for the last mile of your shopping adventure.

This offer is valid through Saturday 7/4. Walgreens is at the interesection of 111 and 121a (across from Hannaford’s).

1) Use Less, 2) Reuse, 3) Recycle!

At each of the last two meetings of the Danville Board of Selectmen, the delegate session has featured a resident who has lost their home to the tax collector for taxes owed. I don’t know the curcumstances of their tax delinquency. I’m more concerned with the way each was treated by the Board of Selectmen.
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 Danville BOS Meeting 06/22/09: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Subject: 15% Penalty Waiver

The BoS needs to hold off on sending out the letters today and reconsider the motion passed last night.

First, Mr. Moore was right to recuse himself last week and should have abstained from the discussion and vote last night. Instead, he acted as a lobbyist beating down the rest of the selectmen until he could secure special treatment for his friend of 37 years.

Second, the town’s lawyer clearly opposed this action. He should have been on hand — even via nonpublic session — to advise on the specific motion. I’m sure he would have advised against such an accommodation.

Third, any relief proposed by the BoS should be applied without prejudice to all tax delinquents. This measure rewards the worst offenders only. The board was unsympathetic to Mrs. Leonard who has had medical and personal problems, and voted to close the door of preferential treatment on residents who have not yet lost their homes to the tax collector.

It’s clear that most of the selectmen were uncomfortable with this accommodation — none supported this measure until the vote and at least one thought Mr. Moore should have recused himself from the discussion and vote. If Mr. Moore had acted properly, there would have been no vote. If he had participated in the discussion but abstained from the vote, I think it would have been 4-0 against.

Once the BoS sends out these letters, precedent will be set for forgiving the penalties. Last night I talked to a resident who told me that her family had sacrificed two Christmases to pay unexpected tax increases. I don’t think Mr. Moore’s friends have missed too many Christmases.

Len Mullen
39 Justin Drive
Danville, NH 03819

Taxpayer since 1991

Um…must see BoS meetings? They are getting interesting. For the second meeting in a row, the BoS heard from a resident who had lost property due to back taxes. These people have had tax issues for three decades. They claim to be able to pay the taxes but are unwilling to pay penalties. I’m starting to feel like a chump for paying my taxes. I’d like a little small town love too!

Waste Management was in. The post card coming to clarify the error filled flyer also contains errors. Even the selectmen do not understand what can be recycled. Waste Management provided the BoS with educational materials which may be posted to our cable channel and shared with the schools. I applaud the BoS for their forward thinking on this matter. They also asked Waste Management to poke us a little less on for fee pickups. Waste Management will look into it…

Looks like the town is going to increase our cemetery area by 500%. They have their eye on 50 acres. Every acre the town takes for historical, conservation, public buildings, cemeteries, or pounds is an acre that cannot contribute to the tax base. Is there any reason why the town forest cannot surrender a couple acres to a cemetery?

The selectmen discussed increasing the hours of their clerk by 30%. They want her to cross train with other employees and attend meetings. Is this the best time to increase the burden of government? We should be looking to reduce the burden. How about we move the town offices to the basement of the library? We could eliminate bodies being paid to occupy the generally empty part of the library, automate as many tasks as possible (ie., online auto registration), and consolidate all the clerk classifications. We could cross train these clerks to backup the tax collector and town clerk.

 

 Danville BOS Meeting 06/15/09: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Once again the school board came under fire for Mr. La Salle’s firing of the ski coaches. Supporters of the dismissed coaches filled the room. They testified on behalf of the coaches and presented a petition of support from parents. One parent noted that Mary Beth Torosian being a registered nurse saved the district money since her presence made it unnecessary to have a nurse on trips (to accommodate a special needs skier). Mr. La Salle responded that he was not compelled to make unreasonable accommodations. The supporters complained that Mr. La Salle refused to meet with them or even put them on the school board agenda. The take away here should be that the superintendent runs the school board not the other way around.

The school board was completely disengaged and the chair promised only to ‘take their concerns under advisement.’

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 TRSD School Board Meeting 6/18/09: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

The Board of Selectmen has struggled with waste management for as long as I can remember. Without ever studying the problem or consulting the electorate, our town managers have experimented with curb side pickup, a pseudo-transfer station, and, most recently, a cart system.

The cart system was quietly selected by the BoS in the spring of 2006. Each household — regardless of occupancy — was assigned a 64 gallon cart. During the rollout, you could choose a 96 gallon cart for no additional charge. You had to proactively ask for this. After the rollout, ‘upgrading’ from a 64 gallon cart to a 96 gallon cart cost $50. A second cart costs $240 per year.

We were promised savings of $36,000. Instead, the cost of collection increased $48,918.89 in 2006. Let’s not forget the fees — to upgrade your cart, have a second cart, or have an appliance removed. We pay extremely high rates for appliance removal.
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See your neighbor lose her home. Learn that your assessor is careless and is charging us for hours not worked. Listen to your BoS brag about how much trash they recycle (the idea is to produce less trash, guys).

 

 Danville BOS Meeting 06/01/09: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

I’ve just started watching this.  It begins with parents asking the school board to reconsider the dismissal of the ski club coaches.  Parents present testimonials and a petition.  Mr. La Salle warned the school board that reconsidering the decision to dismiss could make it harder for the administration and school board to dismiss teachers and staff going forward.

Interesting damning-with-faint-praise of district reading teachers.  Praise for their committment to learn to teach after decades of watching kids do what comes naturally (silent sustained reading).  I have been critizing the district for this waste of time for nine years.  He didn’t even mention me by name…

TRSD will be challenged to deal with the new dropout age of 18.  Need to compel dropouts dealing with drug, criminal, and personal problems to bring them to the high school every day.

Big problems in the cafe.  Kids are not buying the profitable stuff, so the district is not meeting the floor of the contract with the vendor.  Prices are going up.  Also, the kids are showing up to lunch with no money in their accounts.  There is talk of hiring a collection agency to collect funds parents did not authorize kids to charge.  There is talk of reporting these deadbeat parents to child welfare authorities.  There is talk of denying kids lunch.

That’s just the first hour.  The meeting is three hours long and ends in another nonpublic session for the reason of not tarnishing the reputation of an individual.

 

 TRSD School Board Meeting 6/04/09: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Do I have to say, “Must see?”  This is the one where the new calendar is rescinded.  Neither Danville rep made the meeting.  Good thing because both tend to rubber stamp Mr. La Salle’s initiatives and the vote to rescind was 3-2 for with one abstention.  A tie is a loss, so either voting for would have killed the initiative to rethink the calendar.

Also on topic was privacy.  The School Board was impatient with a parent who had had personal information shared by the district.  Ironically, the Chair chastened the victim for revealing the identity of the parties involved.  I would have expected a School Board that sealed the minutes of a nonpublic session for 99 years to protect the reputation of a pedophile to have been more sympathetic to a parent…what was I thinking…

 

 TRSD School Board Meeting 5/07/09: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download