Biofuel Causing Dramatic Increase in Food Prices

Hat Tip: Emre Evren

Using food sources for fuel is a bad idea. Petroleum gets used indirectly in many aspects of food production, and that usage leads directly to greenhouse gases the clean fuel is supposed to eliminate. Another problem is rising food prices.

The Worst Presidency Ever's preference for lying, it seems, has been hiding the truth once again. Bio-fuels are driving up food prices as much as 75%, according to The Guardian:

Biofuels have forced global food prices up by 75% - far more than previously estimated - according to a confidential World Bank report obtained by the Guardian.

The damning unpublished assessment is based on the most detailed analysis of the crisis so far, carried out by an internationally-respected economist at global financial body.

The figure emphatically contradicts the US government's claims that plant-derived fuels contribute less than 3% to food-price rises. It will add to pressure on governments in Washington and across Europe, which have turned to plant-derived fuels to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases and reduce their dependence on imported oil.

Senior development sources believe the report, completed in April, has not been published to avoid embarrassing President George Bush.

"It would put the World Bank in a political hot-spot with the White House," said one yesterday.

The news comes at a critical point in the world's negotiations on biofuels policy. Leaders of the G8 industrialised countries meet next week in Hokkaido, Japan, where they will discuss the food crisis and come under intense lobbying from campaigners calling for a moratorium on the use of plant-derived fuels.

It will also put pressure on the British government, which is due to release its own report on the impact of biofuels, the Gallagher Report. The Guardian has previously reported that the British study will state that plant fuels have played a "significant" part in pushing up food prices to record levels. Although it was expected last week, the report has still not been released.

--Mb

The Tide Turned: Real Issues Overtake Fake Ones

I've already written about the corporate media's silliness over Gen. Wesley Clark's contention that being shot down from a fighter jet didn't qualify someone for being President. It seems in most respects, the controversy has blown over.

I don't think He Who Must Be Read has been reading me, but we're certainly on the same page. In today's column, Krugman considers whether or no the tactics of Turd Blossom (aka Boy Genius (Karl Rove) will work this year. For a long time, it's been my contention that the media is slowly catching on to its own sluttishness. Krugman agrees:

Will Rovian tactics work this year?

In 2002 and 2004, Republicans were so successful at playing the patriotism card thanks to a combination of compliant media and cowering Democrats. At first, the Clark affair suggested that nothing has changed. News organizations reported as fact the false assertion that General Clark criticized Mr. McCain’s military service, and the Obama campaign rushed to “reject” his remarks.

“Two days into the Wesley Clark fallout,” wrote the Columbia Journalism Review on Tuesday morning, “the press, the G.O.P., and the Obama campaign all seem to have agreed that Clark’s recent remarks on John McCain’s service record were at best impolitic and at worst despicable.”

Since then, however, both the press and the Obama campaign seem to have recovered some of their balance. Opinion pieces have started to appear pointing out that General Clark didn’t say what he’s accused of saying. Mr. Obama has also declared that General Clark doesn’t owe Mr. McCain an apology for his “inartful” remarks and denies that his own condemnation, in a speech given on Monday, of those who “devalue” military service was aimed at the general.

In the end, the Clark affair may have strengthened the Obama campaign. Last week, with his cave-in on wiretapping, Mr. Obama was showing disturbing signs of falling into the usual Democratic cringe on national security. This may have been the week he rediscovered the virtues of standing tall.

Furthermore, my sense, though it’s hard to prove, is that the press is feeling a bit ashamed about the way it piled on General Clark. If so, news organizations may think twice before buying into the next fake scandal.

If so, the campaign has just taken a major turn in Mr. Obama’s favor. After all, if this campaign isn’t dominated by faux outrage over fake scandals, it will have to be about things that really did happen, like a failed economic policy and a disastrous war — both of which Mr. McCain promises will continue if he wins.

--Mb

Pet Projects or Legitimate Spending?

From a distance, it's easy to criticize someone else's earmark. $50,000 for a dance festival? $25,000 for a town's anniversary? Are these wastes of money? The Globe seems to think so. (What else to make of the headline "Lawmakers feeding pet projects: Bacon comes home to every corner of the Commonwealth"?). For every bridge to nowhere, money flows to deserving projects and disadvantaged communities. Pork is often in the eye of the beholder.

One item calls for $200,000 to be disbursed to the Boston Symphony Orchestra so the renowned group can renovate and repair Tanglewood. There is $25,000 in state taxpayer money to pay for the town of Halifax to have its 275th anniversary next July Fourth. There's enough to cover a merry-go-round in Holyoke, a ballfield in Fitchburg, and new seats at a theater in Medford.

In the $28.2 billion budget approved yesterday by the House and Senate, there are scores of earmarks to fund pet projects in legislators' districts in nearly every corner of Massachusetts.

Other set-asides approved yesterday included $50,000 for the Jacob's Pillow Dance Festival in Beckett. The Berkshire Museum in Pittsfield, the Merrimack Repertory Theatre in Lowell, and the Bing Theatre in Springfield are all beneficiaries. The Basketball Hall of Fame in Springfield, which charges $16.99 for admission, is getting $300,000 of taxpayer money, which a legislative aide said would go toward securing a Division II college basketball tournament.

Are these earmarks a waste of money? I can't speak for all the earmarks on Globe's list, but much of the spending seems to support tourism, one of the Commonwealth's major industries.

None of the municipalities have money to invest themselves. Tanglewood is essential to the tourist economy of the Berkshires. Along with the Holyoke Children's Museum and the Volleyball Hall of Fame, the merry-go-round in Holyoke are attractions for city that has a hard time attracting people. The City of Springfield certainly doesn't have much money to spend on itself.

There may be a bridge to nowhere in this year's budget, but I have to say, the Globe hasn't convinced me.

--Mb

Massachusetts Leads U.S. in Energy Policy

"I am here today to sign into law the best clean energy bill in America. Climate change is the challenge of our times, and we in Massachusetts are rising to that challenge."

--Gov. Deval Patrick

Gov. Deval Patrick reminds a little of Daisuke Matsusaka. The Governor may lack Dice-K's record, but he has gotten the job done on more than one occasion. There's almost always a mess in there somewhere. Dice-K rarely starts a game without walking too many runners, giving up a homerun, or a few runs. He's constantly pitching himself out of trouble.

On the other hand, for every victory for marriage equality there's a casino gambling mess. (In all fairness, Dice-K would never leave his team to sign a book deal in another state). For the Readiness Project, which has all the scope and appeal of the Huke Lau's all-day buffet, there's a clean energy bill worth taking notice of. The Globe reports:

Among the law's major provisions:

A requirement for utilities to invest in energy efficiency when it is cheaper to do so than it is to buy power. Historically, companies would simply buy more power when demand went up, which over time would lead to construction of very costly and polluting power plants. Now, utilities will have to invest in energy efficiency if to do so is equal to or cheaper than buying power. The law will also use at least 80 percent of the revenue from the regional effort to cap power plant emissions for efficiency programs, such as home energy audits to identify how to save on energy bills.

"The cleanest power plant is the one that never gets built," said Sam Krasnow, attorney for Environment Northeast, a research and advocacy group. "Energy efficiency is the cheapest and cleanest energy resource available."

Several efforts to promote renewable power. Utilities would have to enter into 10- or 15-year contracts with renewable energy developers, an effort to help those developers get financing from banks. The Patrick administration is particularly proud of a provision that lifts a prohibition on utilities owning solar electric panels and allows them to rent the panels to customers. The law is designed to allow utilities to recoup the cost of panels over time from rental fees while the customers reap energy savings.

Utilities will have to purchase a greater amount of their electricity from renewable power sources than under current law. By 2030, utilities would buy 25 percent of their power from renewables.

It is unclear whether that goal, one of the most ambitious in the nation, can be met, however. The current requirement of 3.5 percent has not been met, partly because of the difficulty in siting renewable projects. The utilities instead pay a fee to the state.

The creation of "Green Communities." The state will commit $10 million annually to help communities figure out ways to become more energy efficient or invest in renewables, including giving them no-interest loans. New buildings in the state will have to meet updated building codes with energy-savings provisions.

The energy bill encountered some controversy during the two years it took to become law. Early versions guaranteed a market for coal gasification, a technology that is cleaner than conventional coal-burning power plants but still emits large amounts of carbon dioxide.

The final language would give financial incentives to gasification technologies only in limited cirumstances and only to those that capture and store the carbon dioxide underground.

Environmentalists had nothing but praise for the law yesterday, saying it was a paradigm shift in the way energy will be created, bought and sold.

"This is a tremendous advancement that comes not a moment too soon, given rising energy prices and the climate crisis," said Sue Reid, a lawyer with the Conservation Law Foundation.

--Mb

Can't Be Good, Can't be Bad: McCain Campaign Shake Up

A campaign reflects on a candidate, whether anyone likes it or not. Whether that reflection is a mirror to his soul, however, is an question (at least to me). Sen. John McCain certainly lacked the right people in right places for much of the primary. The beginning of the general election campaign has not been much different.

As one of McCain's advisors points out, voters don't really care about campaign shake-up's. It's not good that the campaign has been terrible for this long. It's probably good for his candidacy that his campaign might improve.

The NYT reports:

Greg Jenkins, another veteran of Mr. Rove’s operation who is a former Fox News producer and director of presidential advance in the Bush White House, was hired by Mr. Schmidt last week after a series of what Mr. McCain’s advisers acknowledged were poorly executed campaign events.

Mr. Rove, who was Mr. Bush’s senior political adviser until he left the White House last year, was said by Mr. McCain’s advisers to have offered advice in recent days to Mr. Schmidt and others on how to get Mr. McCain’s campaign on track, but has stayed mostly on the periphery. Mr. Rove is aware, his associates said, that his own legacy could be helped should Mr. McCain win the presidency.

Mr. McCain’s advisers said that Mr. Davis would continue to hold the position of campaign manager, but that Mr. Schmidt had taken over every major operation where Mr. McCain has shown signs of struggling: communications, scheduling and basic political strategy. Mr. McCain’s aides said that Mr. Davis would now focus more on longer-term campaign efforts, including helping with the selection of a running mate and planning for the Republican National Convention, which is now just two months away.

Mr. Schmidt and Mr. Davis declined a request for comment. The McCain campaign played down the significance of this latest personnel shift.

“Voters don’t care about the organizational chart of our campaign,” said Jill Hazelbaker, the campaign spokesman, adding: “Today’s move is simply an expression of our understanding of the need to scale up for a general election campaign against Barack Obama.”

Republican circles have been awash with rumors for weeks now that Mr. McCain would seek to bring Mike Murphy, a longtime friend and adviser who helped direct his 2000 campaign for the White House, back into the fold. Mr. McCain’s advisers, noting the deep tensions between Mr. Murphy and many of the people in Mr. McCain’s inner circle — including Mr. Davis and Mr. Schmidt — said such a development was highly unlikely.

--Mb

Watch Out for Rabies

Rabies has a 100% kill rate.

Without treatment, anyone bitten or exposed to the saliva of a rabid animal will die. The disease is going around. A few weeks ago, Amherst residents were bitten by a rabid baby fox. This week two South Hadley residents were attacked by a rabid cat.

The Daily Hampshire Gazette reports:

SOUTH HADLEY - A man and a 9-year-old girl are being treated for rabies after a cat that bit them last week tested positive for the disease Monday.

It is the second cat with rabies found in town in less than three weeks. The attack occurred June 26 near Newton Street and Roosevelt Avenue, said Robert Dufault, the town's animal control officer.

"It came out of a woodpile and bit a little girl first, and then a man tried to push it away and he got bit," Dufault said.

The cat was described as small and dark gray. It was captured in a trap and tested at the state Department of Public Health laboratory in Jamaica Plain.

Both the man and the girl began treatment for rabies even before the test results were known, Dufault said. Rabies is a fatal disease if not treated. Anyone who believes they came into contact with the cat should call the Board of Health at 538-5013.

Over the weekend of June 14 and 15, three dogs and four people were bitten or scratched by another cat in the area of Hillside Avenue, Granby Road and Wellington Avenue.

ZBA Allows Dean Hatch to Build New House

Dean Hatch's representative bdbirmingham announced on Masslive's Granby Forum:

Last night the zoning board agreed that the Town cannot stop Dean from replacing his home as State Law states that even after a zoning change a person in the Commonwealth has the right to continue using the property as it was being used before the zoning change as long as the repairs/replacement doesn't adversely affect the Town and as he is replacing his home with one half the size the Town cannot restrict him from replacing his home even if now it would not comply with the new zoning. Dean and Mary were advised that the Board was advising Mr. Demers, the building inspector, to issue a permit. Mr. Demers has wanted to help since day one and now Dean can build a home that he can use more than 2 rooms. The house is going to be a stick built ranch style home and he really could use help with the framing and roofing. He has a contractor who is donating his time with framers working for cost but many hands will make the job go faster.

--Mb

Dean Hatch Fights to Build New HOme

A year and a half ago, Dean Hatch almost lost his life. Unloading pipes from a truck, he was crushed when the 1,000 pound wall that doubles as a ramp for the loading bed fell on him. It was touch and go. Finally, it was a go. He lived, made it through surgery, and now lives at home.

For 150 years, Dean Hatch and his family have lived in the old farm house across from Dressels. Now he's looking for a variance in the zoning laws so he can tear down the old house and build a smaller, more accessible one. The problem: the area has been rezoned for business.

The Sentinel reports:

Now that Hatch is confined to a wheelchair, he needs a new place to live.

“This house is too old... it cannot be made 100 percent acceptable to me… I own three acres here. I want to build a new home. We've already gotten it surveyed, staked out, and we have plans for the new house…we are being held up because of zoning law issues at present,” said Hatch.

The location of Hatch’s home on Route 202 in Granby was rezoned by the town to business use, preventing him from building a more suitable home for him and his wife, Mary. Originally part of a much larger parcel, the farmhouse where Hatch currently resides, has been in his family for five generations.

“At one time it was 150 acres,” said Hatch.

Hatch said he is not ready give up the final three acres of the Hatch Farm.

“We are fighting with the town to try to get a variance…we’ve had two meetings with the town and my case has been continued,” said Hatch.

Hatch said he hopes that The Americans with Disabilities Act will provide him with the ammunition to win the battle to keep his property.

A letter sent to the Town of Granby’s attorney from the Stavros Center for Independent Living cites the American with Disabilities Act as a guarantee of Hatch’s right to build on his land: “…no qualified individual with a disability shall be excluded from participation in or be denied the benefits of the services, programs, or activities of a public entity, or be subjected to discrimination by any public entity.”

--Mb

Hang on to Your Jobs: We're in for a Bumpy Ride

Regular people knew we were in trouble long before the people in the Beltway. A month ago, George Will was trying to say that the economy wasn't in bad shape, that people were just overreacting.

We in deep and it's going to last another year, at least. The International Herald-Tribune reports:

Plummeting home prices have in recent months eliminated jobs for hundreds of thousands of people, from bankers and real estate agents to construction workers and furniture manufacturers. Tighter lending standards imposed by banks in the wake of huge mortgage losses have made it hard for many Americans to secure credit — the lifeblood of expansion in recent years — crimping the appetite of consumers, whose spending amounts to 70 percent of the economy.

Joblessness has accelerated, and employers have slashed working hours even for those on their payrolls, shrinking the size of paychecks just as workers need them the most.

Now, add to that unsavory mix the word from automakers that sales plunged in June — by 28 percent for Ford, 21 percent for Toyota and 18 percent for General Motors — a sharp sign that consumers are pulling back, making manufacturers more likely to cut production and impose more layoffs. Until recently, the weak labor market has been marked more by the reluctance of employers to create new jobs than by mass layoffs.

Among economists, the sense is broadening that the troubles dogging the economy will be stubborn, leaving in place an uncomfortable combination of tight credit and scant job opportunities perhaps well into next year.

"It's a slow-motion recession," said Ethan Harris, chief United States economist for Lehman Brothers. "In a normal recession, things kind of collapse and get so weak that you have nowhere to go but up. But we're not getting the classic two or three negative quarters. Instead, we're expecting two years of sub-par growth. Growth that's not enough to generate jobs. It's kind of a chronic rather than an acute pain."

--Mb

Big Media Shot Down By Clark Comments

“It doesn’t take a lot of talent to get shot down.”

--Sen. John McCain

The media lost the lastest skirmish between themselves and the people they try to make squirm. It's something that could happen more often if the people on whom the likes of Bob Schiffer and Andrea Mitchell prey, would stick to their guns and continue to speak the truth. Gen. Wesley Clark knows how to stick to his guns.

The problem was not what he said about Sen. John McCain, which, in fact, was true. Being shot down in a plane doesn't qualify you for President. Schiffer, who was interviewing Clark, however, thought it did. His was the first gasket blown. Others followed suit. They wanted Clark to take it back. They had already decided that McCain's military experience qualified him for the Presidency. Clark challenged two of their narratives: 1) that character, rather than experience, is the most important qualification for President 2) that when the media decides you've made a faux pas, you're supposed to suck it up, squirm, and apologize.

McCain is doing his best to make political hay out of Clark's comments (as he should, that's politics), but make no mistake about it: Clark's comments were the mainstream media's issue. McCain has, in fact, said much the same about his own experience.

Clark was a pleasure to watch on television, refusing to back down to Schiffer, then Andrea Mitchell, and some guy on a MSNBC show called The Verdict. The guy was unflappable.

Check him out here. He knows how to stay on message.

--Mb

WFCR to Expand Programming & Presence in Springfield

Station manager Martin Miller took a lot of flack for cancelling WFCR's Saturday night folkie programs. Although the shows attracted only about 4,000 listeners, the area's folk music community was up in arms.

A protest group called WFCR Democracy Task Force eventually coalesced. Its mission to "to contribute to making WFCR a lively and interesting radio station, dedicated to carrying out its stated mission by involving and encouraging the active participation of the WFCR listening community." There were Amherst town meeting resolutions and a petition, but judging by the group's website, which hasn't had anything new for over a year, the forces of democracy have dispersed.

WFCR may not have been the most interesting of public radio stations, but it has certainly been serviceable, providing the best of National Public Radio programming and plenty of music. The station now offers three program streams on the internet. In the last couple of years, the station added an AM channel, WNNZ 640, which broadcasts various news and call-in shows; WFCR HD 2 (available on the internet) offers classical music and some programming with WNNZ news; and WFCR broadcasts classical music, Morning Edition, All Things Considered, MarketPlace, and Fresh Air. That's a lot of good programming. (The station also offers an all folk music station in Amherst).

The Daily Hampshire Gazette reports that WFCR now plans to expand its presence in Springfield building out space in the building that houses WGBY (Channel 57).

The new Springfield studio will enable the station to cover Hampden County better, and may spark more collaboration between the region's two public broadcasting outlets, said Martin Miller, WFCR's general manager.

"Having those facilities will allow us to do more programming, and listeners will notice the difference," he said. "And that's the point of this, not just to have a new place but to have production facilities to do programming."

An estimated 45 percent of WFCR's listeners live in Hampden County or Connecticut.

The original plan was for a new WFCR building near UMass, but the money didn't materialize, Miller said. The new plan is to renovate the longtime WFCR space in Hampshire House on the campus and to build the new Springfield studio.

"We need more space to do our production work and fulfill our mission to the community," Miller said.

WFCR will lease 1,145 square feet on the second floor of the WGBY building, starting around October. There will be a fully equipped control room, a studio large enough for interviews, and space for two staff members and two interns, Miller said.

"Our goal for next year is to have at least one reporter in Springfield every day," he said.

The station plans to hire a Spanish-speaking reporter for the Springfield bureau, Miller said. WFCR is also planning a pilot for a daily or weekly news-culture-public affairs show this fall, he said.

The two public broadcasting stations have already collaborated in a training project for Latino youth from Springfield and Holyoke and on the "My Source" branding and outreach campaign. A WFCR news reporter hosts a talk show that appears on Channel 57.

--Mb

DEATH NOTICE: Graydon Destromp, 1935-2008

I got to know Mr. and Mrs. Destromp working Bingo at Immaculate Heart of Mary Church. They were always very nice.

GRANBY - Graydon A. Destromp, 72, of Pine Brook Cir., died Friday, June 27, 2008 at his home in Granby.

He was born in North Hatley Quebec, Canada. He was the son of the late Frederick and Violet (Baron) Destromp. Graydon worked as the Transportation Director for the Chicopee Council on Aging and also worked at Rexam Graphics. He graduated from Holyoke High School and Holyoke Community College.

He was a member of the Chicopee Moose and was a former Selectman for the Town of Granby.

He is survived by his wife Lorraine (Kiernan) Destromp, his sons, Lyndon Destromp of Pennsylvania, Sheldon Destromp and his wife Sue of Shutesbury, and Graydon L. Destromp of Granby, also his brother, John Destromp and his wife Anne of Holyoke, his sisters Freda Burke of Canada and Virgina D'Ordine, of Belchertown and his two grandchildren, Lynden and Haley Destromp and several nieces and nephews.

There will be a funeral mass held for Graydon on Monday, July 7, 2008 at 10 am in St. Patricks Church in South Hadley. There are no calling hours. Ryder Funeral Home of South Hadley is handling arrangements.

Memorial contributions can be made to St. Patricks Church, 30 Main St., South Hadley, MA 01075.

RYDER FUNERAL HOME 533-1735

Patrick Administration Caught in DiMasi's Ethics Mess?

It's not that I'm not critical of the Patrick Administration. It's just that I suspect it was incompetence, rather than intentional wrongdoing, that led our state's executive branch to sign off on another sleazy deal of our ethically-challenged House Speaker Sal DiMasi.

It was the Patrick Administration that asked the state's inspector general to look into the hinky deal to buy some costly software for the state. Why ask for an investigation that would implicate the administration's secretary of administration and finance, Leslie A. Kirwan? My guess there was an arse-from-their-elbow, not purposeful wrongdoing.

Regardless, the Administration is in hot water over not following rules meant to preserve its own reputation. The inspector general found that the Patrick Administration had cut corners in rushing to approve a $13 million contract with Cognos, a subsidiary of IBM which creates software that helps analyze the operations of state governments. From the Globe:

Governor Deval Patrick's administration overspent by millions of dollars when it rushed to sign a $13 million computer software contract that has since been canceled and is now the subject of a state ethics investigation, according to technology analysts.

In making the purchase last year from Cognos Inc., the Patrick administration agreed to distribute the sophisticated management software to 20,000 state government users, many of whom, according to analysts, would lack either the skills or the need to use it. But by distributing the software to that many employees, it dramatically inflated the price.

"It is certainly not a tool for everyone in the organization," said Theodore Grossman, professor of technology operations and information management at Babson College. "It requires a level of sophistication to use it and understand the results."

While the Patrick administration paid $13 million to Cognos, Ohio put similar Cognos software in the hands of 6,000 employees. The Ohio price tag: just $2.9 million.

Keep reading this article to find out about DiMasi's role in landing this over-priced contract. Click on my link above to read what I posted earlier in the year.

--Mb

Advertorial Appeals Uses High Gas Prices to Sell Cars

For the life of me, I can't remember who told me about the Hadley automobile dealer who has promised car buyers 99 cent gasoline for a year. The story appears in a sort of print infomercial called an advertorial. The advertisement is distributed to look like a news story, but it's actually an advertisement. it makes persuasive reading. Called an advertorial by The Premier Group, which creates and manages advertising campaigns for dealers, this particular ad appeals to the high cost of fuel.

Here's a pull out quote reads as follows:

Vehicles to sell for $29 Down and $99 Per Month with Gas for Just 99 cents a gallon for the next year.

It looks like car dealers can use all the help they can get. The NYT reports:

The Ford Motor Company said on Tuesday that its sales fell 28 percent in June, the worst month yet in a miserable year for the automobile industry.

Through the first half of 2008, Ford’s sales were off 14 percent.

Sales of pickup and sport utility vehicles, have been hit particularly hard as consumers seek out more fuel-efficient alternatives. Ford said light truck sales were down 36 percent in June and 18 percent so far this year.

“Consumer fundamentals and consumer confidence deteriorated as the first half unfolded,” James D. Farley, Ford’s marketing chief, said in a statement. “The economy enters the second half of the year with a notable absence of momentum and a high degree of uncertainty.”

Shares of Ford were down more than 7 percent in trading. General Motors shares were off nearly 6 percent. G.M. and the other automakers are scheduled to report their June sales Tuesday afternoon.

Record-high gasoline prices, a housing slump and weak consumer confidence have led to a dramatic decline in sales of many vehicles, particularly the largest and most profitable ones for domestic automakers. The Ford F-series pickup truck, which has been the best-selling vehicle in the United States for 26 years, was outsold by four fuel-efficient Japanese sedans in May.

Mark

Sewer Proposal Defeated Again

Chances are that the New Ludlow Sewer Proposal would never cost the Town of Granby a cent. There would be no override. No debt exclusion. No tax increase whatsoever. No one would be forced to hook up to the sewer. No one would be forced to hook up to the sewer. And no one would be forced to pay for it.

Using a low-interest loan and existing revenue, the Town of Granby would have subsidized the project until 25 homes were hooked up to the sewer line, at which time, the project would begin paying for itself. As more houses tied in to the sewer, the project would begin repaying the town.

There were questions that could have been answered about whether sewers would affect the development of farm land along the street. Selectman Bryan Hauschild stated that the property could be developed with or without sewers. I don't know if the town by-laws would allow more development with sewers or not, but I'm not sure that any specifics would have mattered.

The DHG reports:

GRANBY - Sewers will not becoming to the New Ludlow Road area, after a $5.6 million project again failed to receive the needed two-thirds majority of voters at a special Town Meeting Monday.

The first question, to borrow $522,500 to complete project engineering, was defeated by a vote of 99 in favor and 67 against, rendering the remaining three questions moot. A total of 169 voters attended the meeting at the Granby Junior-Senior High School. Borrowing requires the approval of two-thirds of voters.

Voters had already rejected the project, which would bring sewers to about 140 properties on New Ludlow Road, Morgan Street and South Street, at an April Town Meeting. The Board of Selectmen returned with the same plan but a different method for repaying the loans that would have been used to finance the project.

"The board has changed its thinking with regard to the construction of sewers in town," said Selectman Bryan Hauschild. Previously the plan was for residents along the sewer line to be charged a betterment fee of $19,835 to pay off the loans. The current plan, Hauschild said, would have the general taxation of the town be responsible for loan repayments and only those property owners who connect to the system be charged the fee, gradually repaying the town.

The project was brought back to the voters, he said, because some residents of New Ludlow Road petitioned selectmen.

The new Ludlow Road area was identified as benefiting from sewers, which would protect drinking water wells, the health of residents and increase property values, said Mary Monahan-Burgess, program director for EarthTech, the engineering company hired by the town. A move by the state Department of Environmental Protection to approve a project loan signals the agency believes sewers are needed, she said.

--Mb

BOH Throws Proposal Under a Bus

One of the more curious contributions last night was a long speech by Richard Bombardier, who seemed to be speaking from his position on the Board of Health, which, he said, had unanimously voted against the New Ludlow Road Sewer project.

In a speech that lasted between 10 and 15 minutes, Bombardier proceeded to provide reasons that had little to do with public health. The Board of Health, he said, had decided that the costs of the project didn't outweight the benefits. However, he offered no alternative to the proposal.

I may be wrong, but it's my understanding that the Board of Health is supposed to be concerned with the public health, not the costs and benefits of a project. If the Bombardier had offered some sort of solution to the failing septic system difficulties, his BOH expertise might have come into play. As it was, the Board of Health had about as much to offer concerning the project as the Council on Aging.

Mark

What A Good Town Meeting Looks Like

With the lights off, the doors open, and fans blowing, Town Moderator Albert H. Bail began last night's town meeting with an anecdote.

My dad had run into George Fortier at Center Pharmacy, and after exchanging some pleasantries, my father told Mr. Fortier, now 92 years-old, how much he used to appreciate the older man's questions at town meeting.

"You know," he said, "sometimes I knew the answers to those questions."

"I had a feeling," my dad said. "We could have used you at the last town meeting."

At the previous special town meeting over the New Ludlow Road Sewer Proposal, voting was over and the measure defeated without any questions, discussion, or increase in the knowledge of town meeting.

Last night's town meeting made up for the quality of the previous town meeting. The sewer proposal was defeated, but not without out plenty of discussion and many good questions. Town meeting may or may not have made the wisest decision last night, but due to participation, it certainly had the information it needed.

Spending usually requires a two-thirds majority at town meeting and the simple majority of town meeting members who supported the proposal last night was not enough to pass the measure. Of the one-hundred and sixty-nine voters that attended the meeting, ninety-nine voted in favor, 67 voted against it.

As more than one town meeting member pointed out, the financing of the project was not easy for the average citizen to understand. Confusion was almost guaranteed by the misperception that the project would raise the tax rate or require an override or debt exclusion. In fact, the project would be financed by a low-interest loan and paid for out of town revenues.

As I understand it, and bear in mind I'm not great with numbers, every time a homeowner hooked up to the sewer, the contribution from the town would decrease. After 25 houses had hooked up to the sewer, the project would begin paying for itself. Eventually, the town would be reimbursed for the money used to subsidize sewer hookups.

One piece of missing information: how many people planned or needed to hook up to the sewer. This proposal was begun in response to the need of homeowners in the New Ludlow Road area. Yet, as far as I know, none of them spoke up.

Mark

Tomorrow: Special Town Meeting Report

You should really go to town meeting tonight, but if you don't, I'll get around to posting on it at some point.

Mark

Closing Time: Downloads Killing CD & Record Stores

The internet is one of the greatest things to come along since, I don't know, refrigeration. I hang out online. I have friends I've never met online. I'm even a writer online. But Web 2.0 is killing a way of life I onced loved: going to record stores.

Now it's true that I couldn't afford to buy CD's more than a couple of times a year, but I spent a couple of decades going to For the Record. I'm glad that downloading is hurting huge corporations like Sony that have sucked a lot of creativity and money out of recording artists. But I'm sorry for the small stores that have gone the way of the icebox.

My buddy John Palmer feels even worse about it. He loves the idea of the album, the carefully selected compiling of songs into a coherent whole. Albums can, I supposed, be downloaded, but I can't figure out how to play one on my Walkman.

A big day out for John and me used to feature Chinese food at Panda East, a stop at For the Record, and a stop at Valley Books. Sometimes we'd include The Book Mill. As more business is done over the internet, however, bookstores are the next on the endangered retail list.

Here's a story about the trend that appeared in Newsweek:

I stopped going to Starbucks in 2003. It's not that I don't like the coffee. I stopped going because Erika was no longer behind the counter. It took some months of regularity, but it finally happened: Erika knew me. This corporate java behemoth actually employed someone who found the time to learn and remember my name and my order. Erika (not her real name) was a rock star to me. She knocked seconds, eventually minutes, off my waiting time. I'd walk in and, boom, a latte was in my hand. A minor thrill, but a thrill nonetheless. Once Erika disappeared from Starbucks, so did I. I just didn't have the patience to endure another hazing for an indeterminate outcome.

I learned a bit about Erika. She was a photographer, loved Italian food, listened to more punk rock than most people I knew, had a mutt named after the bass player from her favorite punk band and desperately wanted to move to New Orleans because "as much as I love New York City," she confessed, "I can barely afford The New York Times." I shared some information as well. I told her I had been married for more than 10 years, that I listened to music, including punk rock, six to eight hours a day and that moving to New Orleans was also something my wife and I desperately wanted to do.

Erika and I were friends. But she's gone now. No forwarding address. No e-mail contact. This bothered me. I wasn't really missing Erika. I didn't have a crush on her, but we did share something other than a love for New Orleans. For 13 years I owned a CD, DVD and record store, right around the corner from Erika's Starbucks. And for 13 years I was a rock star to many people.

--Mb

Is Washington Lying About Iraq (Again)?

Everything is better in Iraq since the surge, right? Well, the only serious coverage of Iraq at this point is being done by National Public Radio, which has at least a story a day. The rest of the big media, tired of costly, hard, and dangerous coverage, has mostly given up. According to The Columbia Journalism Review,

During the first 10 weeks of 2007, Iraq accounted for 23 percent of the newshole fornetwork TV news. In 2008, it plummeted to 3 percent during that period. On cable networks it fell from 24 percent to 1 percent, according to a study by the Project for Excellence in Journalism.

Maybe that's why it's been so easy for The Worst Presidency Ever to lie about the surge. And for the unfortunate Sen. John McCain to repeat their talking points. Spencer Ackerman has the story:

Whenever Bush administration or Sen. John McCain campaign officials open their mouths about Iraq, they portray the country as on a continuous path of Surge-based stabilization. "As security has improved, the environment has changed for the better," Amb. Ryan C. Crocker told Wolf Blitzer on Sunday. "I, of course, am encouraged... The progress has been significant but the progress is also fragile," said a more-intellectually-honest-but-not-by-much Sen. John McCain. And the latest Pentagon Iraq security report (PDF) to Congress reported that improvements in the security environment have been substantial over the past nine months but significant challenges remain."But rather than security improvements being "substantial over the past nine months," an assessment today from a leading private security and intelligence contractor in Iraq shows that the security picture hasn't changed significantly since October 1, 2007.

--Mb