In a press release issued today after a City Hall event, Hartford Mayor Perez stated that the single-stream recycling pilot underway in targeted areas of the city has more than doubled recycling tonnage. The program was launched in May.

“After 25 weeks of operation,” Perez said, “Hartford’s recycling tonnage has more than doubled in the participating households, going from eight tons per week to 17 tons per week of recyclable materials. More households have also increased the variety of items they are recycling as a result of educational efforts to inform citizens about what can be placed in the blue cart.”

(more…)

Springfield Mayor Domenic Sarno has been jerking the city’s chain regarding the municipal trash fee and the possible pay-as-you-throw system currently under consideration. At least, we thought it was under consideration; CBS3 reported last night that Sarno is bagging the whole effort. From Matthew Campbell’s story:

After three weeks, Mayor Domenic Sarno is trashing his pay as you throw trash fee. “We are moving away from the bag system. It just doesn’t seem to make sense for the city of Springfield. …It’s just not a piece of the puzzle that’s going to fit,” Sarno says at [the Sixteen Acres Civic Association] community meeting, Tuesday night. …Right now the mayor is considering a myriad of options, but says the future is in “single stream” trash. That’s where you put everything in your green bin and have the city sort it out.

(more…)

Springfield City Councilor James Ferrera has prepared a draft resolution, which will go before the City Council on Monday, June 16, strongly opposing the proposed pay-as-you-throw (PAYT) trash program currently under development and consideration by city officials.

The basis for Councilor Ferrera’s opposition, according to the wording of the draft resolution, is that “the country as a whole is going through unprecedented economic hardships” including fuel price increases, and the new PAYT program is likely to cost residents more than the current $90 annual trash fee in place.

The possibility that many families can’t afford such an increase in fees, the resolution adds, could lead them to resort to illegal dumping. Similar concerns about affordability and possible dumping, it may be noted, were brought up last year prior to the implementation of the current fee.

(more…)

Springfield resident Becca Kennedy emailed me recently to report a troubling trend she has noticed in her area of the city’s Forest Park neighborhood, what she called a significant increase in the amount of “sketchy roadside debris.” Kennedy and her husband, Scott Jelescheff, live in the area of White Street between Sumner and Belmont Avenues, not far from 3hree Café.

“By sketchy,” Kennedy said in her email, “I mean large numbers of freshly-used condoms and condom wrappers, uncapped syringes—which we’ve ended up kicking into the sewer drains—and drug packets (with pretty designs on them!).”

Kennedy noted that the increase in this kind of debris on the curbside seems to go along with the warmer weather, as well as coinciding with the time of year when more kids are outside playing—largely unsupervised, she added.

(more…)

In New Haven, a proposed ordinance to regulate newspaper boxes—modeled, in part, on a law in Hartford—was the subject of discussion during a Board of Aldermen legislation committee meeting last night. One aspect of the proposal, an idea which is not in place in Hartford, is to install specially-made kiosks with slots for multiple newspaper boxes, prioritizing daily newspapers over weeklies.

The ordinance, put forward by the city’s transit chief, Mike Piscitelli, and its deputy chief administrative officer, Jennifer Pugh, establishes “reasonable and uniform guidelines” for the “placement, size, quality and durability of newsracks” in New Haven, according to an April 4 report by Paul Bass in the New Haven Independent.

Similar to Hartford’s law, the proposal calls for a $25 fee for a three-year permit for a newsrack, as well as a $12 per-location fee. Bass quoted the ordinance as citing newsracks’ contribution to litter, presenting a “hazard to the safety and welfare of pedestrians, drivers of motor vehicles and buildings, and persons performing essential utility, traffic control and emergency services.” They also block handicapped parking spaces and “interfere with the comfortable enjoyment of life and property by the community,” according to the language of the ordinance.

Aldermen did not respond very favorably to the proposed ordinance during the meeting, according to Thomas MacMillan’s report today, also in the Independent. (more…)

Spring cleaning time has arrived, and in Hartford and Springfield there are ample volunteer opportunities to pitch in throughout the upcoming weeks alongside residents, businesses and school groups.

In Hartford, Cleanup 2008 will be held on four consecutive Saturdays starting April 19. On Saturday, April 26, a special effort will focus on the city’s enormous Keney Park (see below).

In Springfield, a second annual citywide Keep Springfield Beautiful cleanup is planned for the morning of Saturday, May 3. (more…)

MEETING OF THE SPRINGFIELD CITY COUNCIL
MARCH 18, 2008

Reports of committees [and special permits]

A. From City Council Public Health and Safety Committee: 471 Cooley Street

To keep, use, store and sell petroleum and its products in quantities not exceeding 30,000 gallons (underground).

Hearing held on November 26, 2007 and moved to committee by Councilor Williams and seconded by [then] Councilor Sarno, passed by a unanimous voice vote and referred to Public Health and Safety Committee. Public Heath and Safety Committee met on March 18, 2008 and a verbal report was filed by Chairman Jose F. Tosado, with the City Council stating that the City Fire Marshall John Cossaboom and the Petitioner had agreed to remove a leaking underground storage tank within ten weeks, and to use only two tanks until a new tank is installed and inspection and the failure to install a new tank with ten weeks would constitute grounds for revocation of the present license.

Council received the verbal report by a unanimous voice vote.

471 Cooley Street

To keep, use, store and sell petroleum and its products in quantities not exceeding 30,000 gallons (underground). Hiba Food Mart. By: Ali Riazat

The Petroleum Permit as amended was granted by the following roll call vote; Yes, Nine, (9) Councilors Rooke, Mazza-Moriarty, Tosado, Ferrera, Stebbins, Walsh, Markey, Foley, Williams; No, None (0). (more…)

While cars in front of my Hartford house continue to do the new dance known locally as “the speed bump,” cars near my old Springfield house will soon be doing a different, local version of this known as “the workaround.”

An article by Mike Plaisance in yesterday’s Republican notes that historic enclave Bellevue Avenue and Marengo Park, just a block or so away from my old stomping grounds (pictured) on the more bedraggled but much beloved Euclid Avenue, will soon be partially closed off to public traffic for six months as an experimental safety measure. CBS3 also reported on this yesterday.

Greg Saulmon, editor of the free weekly Local Buzz, is all over this subject in his blog, having even stopped by the streets himself late yesterday to get a first-hand look at the situation, with pictures. (more…)

This morning, I have been watching as a Hartford municipal truck works its way down my West End street collecting autumn leaves that residents raked to their tree belts in great, dark damp masses.

To my great surprise, one municipal employee politely came to my door, knocked, and asked if I knew who owns two cars parked directly across the street, blocking the way for a truck coming through and making collection there impossible.

Unfortunately, I don’t know anything about who the owners might be, and the man said kindly, “Well, cross your fingers,” and added that he had already been knocking on a few other doors in the effort.

For a short while, three city workers stood and raked stray clumps of leaves into a neater pile at the foot of my driveway, and I overheard their conversation, filled with insults and swear words as they engaged in some sort of relatively mild argument. My street is so very quiet, especially compared with where I lived in Springfield up until July, that I’m still struck sometimes at how easily I can overhear outdoor conversations in my new location.

We began to get the idea that the city collects loose leaves from the curb after we saw our neighbor across the street pile leaves in a great heap along the curb. At first I thought, what a wasted effort, because the leaves weren’t bagged and they would only get blown around. Then, the next day, a huge vacuum tube attached like a giant worm to a city truck came barreling through, and sucked it all up, and I realized the folly of my thinking.

At my own curb, over the weekend, my brother-in-law visiting from Salt Lake City had helpfully piled as many leaves as he could rake in a short period of time. The trio of arguing city employees diligently cleaned up the entire tree belt with rakes, and then the vacuum tube did the rest of the job, and the curb looks amazingly clean for late November. The rest of the yard is a mess, but the street is veritably shining.

A release from Springfield Mayor Charles Ryan’s office states that the city’s in-house street sweeping is set to begin, following the termination on September 30 of the city’s outsourced, three-year, $1.2 million contract with American Sweeping Co., as was announced last July by Mayor Ryan a week after mayoral candidate and currently city councilor Domenic Sarno had called for it publicly.

Similarly, the news in today’s Republican as well as at 22News (pictured) is that Sarno has called for the resignation of Police Commissioner Edward Flynn, in response to the news break that Flynn is a candidate for a police chief post in Milwaukee. Down from eight, the short list now consists of five people including Flynn; they are set to be interviewed publicly on October 24. (More on that below.)

A press conference with the mayor will take place today at 3:30 pm to make the street-sweeping announcement, at the Department of Public Works, 70 Tapley Street. The event will feature the unveiling of the city’s new sweeper trucks. Streets are expected to be swept three times a year, except for the downtown area in the summer, where streets are expected to be swept “almost weekly.” (more…)

If this were your basement, what would you do? What if it were the basement of your friend or relative? It happens to be the basement of 91-93 White Street in Springfield’s Forest Park neighborhood. The attic in the house is said to be even more cluttered.

Yesterday’s Republican included an article by Mary Ellen Lowney featuring this property titled, “Mess worries neighbors.” The piece was part of the paper’s “quality of life” series spotlighting dismal, depressing properties in the city and how dismal and depressing they are.

City resident Arelys Diaz, captain of her neighborhood’s Avalon Crime Watch, submitted the property for the newspaper. A few days prior, she had circulated an email describing some of the property’s problems in detail, accompanied by photos. Diaz graciously gave permission for the information to be published here. (more…)

This morning I had just sat down to get some work done when I heard yelling behind my house. My attention was drawn to a rear window where I could see two men in an abutting driveway behind my yard, next to a multi-family, three-story building that seems to have been vacant for maybe eight weeks now. One of the men, a beefy, light-skinned, afro’ed young guy I’ve seen before playing basketball in that driveway in months past, was yelling at the other, a slight, baseball cap and coat-wearing person cowering as he wheeled away his bicycle, loaded with a few belongings wrapped in black garbage bags.

As I watched, I saw the younger man grow increasingly hostile with his body language and his yelling, while the other man looked to be trying to leave, slowly wheeling the bicycle toward the sidewalk, away from my vantage point, with their backs to me. I couldn’t see the baseball-capped man’s face at all, but his body language made him look scared and docile. The yelling man seemed to be angry about something related to his belongings or something that was owed to him, but I can’t remember, and couldn’t quite hear, his exact words. (more…)

Springfield resident Bob Powell sent along pictures (above) from his vantage point last Saturday at the Duggan Middle School parking lot, where scrap metal, tire and mattress dumpsters were located for collection of junk across the city that day. View them all here. (more…)

As Mike Cass and I toured the city’s “dirty dozen” sites last Saturday during Keep Springfield Beautiful’s citywide cleanup, we passed a work crew of inmates from the Hampden County Correctional Center as they purged trash from Rifle Street and the adjacent bank along the city’s Mill River. (more…)

Mike Cass, who works for the Office of Housing and Neighborhood Services, kindly allowed me to tag along with him during Saturday’s Keep Springfield Beautiful citywide cleanup. I showed up per his instructions at the cold and foggy Duggan Middle School parking lot in Sixteen Acres, near where Cass lives, at 7:30 that morning to find a few dumpsters waiting alongside trucks and a handful of folks.

For over an hour, I got to watch Cass (pictured below), who organized and oversaw the day’s cleanup details, operate his off-site “war room” using the hood of his Jeep as his desk. (In planning a strategy for the day, Cass told me that he really did have what he called a “war room.”)

Volunteer Bob Powell sorts through KSB shirts dropped off at the Duggan lot

Gradually, supplies began to arrive, such as coffee and donuts courtesy of Dunkin’ Donuts, shirts for volunteers, and work gloves. At about 8:15, KSB President Charles Contant arrived with tables and chairs, which he had yet to deliver to all the other staging areas as well. He came and went quickly. Prior to his arrival, School Committeewoman Antonette Pepe offered the use of her hatchback for the issuance of refreshments, acknowledging the importance of coffee to start the day.

Before 8:00 or so, Cass had already called 911 to report difficulties at a cleanup site in East Springfield known as Mallory Village. It was one of the worst dumping sites Cass had targeted for special crews, a collection of places he referred to as “the dirty dozen.” Apparently, early in the morning, residents at Mallory Village realized there were dumpsters available for taking out the trash, and so they wanted to bring out garbage from their homes—and there was a lot of it. This caused some city workers on-site to worry about the consequences of turning them away. Cass received a call from city forester Ed Casey, reporting the problem, and did not hesitate to contact police.

A small sampling of refuse brought out by residents at East Springfield’s Mallory Village

As it happened, there was no need for alarm, as peace was maintained and garbage flowed relatively calmly into the increasing amount of dumpsters required to collect everything at Mallory Village. One city employee was stationed near the dumpster we visited to monitor trash collection traffic there, and to wait for a truck that would haul it away, once full. More were coming—at least four were needed, and this was before 9:30 am.

Residents toss household trash into dumpsters intended for cleaning public space

One resident brought out old holiday decorations that won’t fit into a regular trash bin

By the time we visited, the place was a beehive of activity, with many residents rushing around, hauling out large items from their home, taking advantage of what looked to be the only opportunity they had to remove garbage and bulk junk from their storage spaces. So much was brought out that KSB organizers were faced with a tough dilemma: let them add their junk to the dumpsters, or have them pile it up on the curb, only to allow it to become more problematic.

The decision was unpleasant but also offered a learning experience; these residents appeared not to know how to handle trash on an ongoing basis, given the sheer amount being purged Saturday. KSB senior project manager Ivette Cruz later told me that some follow-up work will take place for this city neighborhood to ensure this doesn’t happen again, and to try to find solutions for the residents.

As Cass put it, “We turned lemons into lemonade.” Residents bringing out their trash were not turned away, but they were encouraged to sign up and be counted as volunteers toward the day’s total.

Meanwhile, city crews toiled away in Mallory Village at the corner of Farragut and Cameron Streets, where many bulk items had been dumped. We passed through just as a large couch was dropped on top of the heaping mass.

City crews pile unwanted material into a dumpster at Farragut and Cameron Streets

Listen to a podcast documenting a portion of this first part of the day, in which Cass explains a little bit about his job, handles phone call crises, and darts around to various parts of the city with enthusiasm and humor. More photos from the day are available here.

The view of Springfield’s Mill River behind 12-14 Noel Street (pictured), along the edge of the Forest Park and Six Corners neighborhoods, was vastly improved today by a cleanup crew from D&R Contractors, with help from the sheriff’s crew. Click on the images to see more samplings of their great work filling an entire dumpster from this one site, one of Mike Cass’s “dirty dozen,” as well as 100-plus other images showing the volunteer cleanup work that took place across the city today. More to come from this adventurous day.

Unwanted electronics wait while a truck loads scrap metal in the Duggan Middle School lot

City superhero Mike Cass surveys a lot at Union and Orleans Streets in Old Hill prior to cleanup

A group from Chestnut Middle School sweeps down a street near Fisk Ave. in Brightwood

D&R Contractors clean up a badly neglected property on Pendleton Avenue in Old Hill

KSB Captain Melvin Edwards (in baseball cap) stationed at Rebecca Johnson School in McKnight

Mallory Village residents bring trash out in a “lemons to lemonade” scenario in East Springfield

All photos by Heather Brandon

This coming Saturday a massive citywide cleanup effort will take place from 8:30 am to 3:00 pm, organized by Keep Springfield Beautiful, with considerable assistance from many groups, institutions and individuals. At last count, senior project manager Ivette Cruz told me the list of coordinating organizations to thank and appreciate at an upcoming May 9 event has topped 150.

Four staging areas in the city—where people are to gather at 8:30 am and begin the day’s work—correspond with four zones encompassing all the city’s neighborhoods. In the map above, Zone 1 is orange, Zone 2 is green, Zone 3 is yellow, and Zone 4 is blue.

Blue tacks on the map represent numerous “dump sites.” Red tacks represent the locations of 32 dumpsters. Of these, the majority will be for regular trash, but four are specific for metal collection, two just for mattresses, and two others just for collecting tires. Ten of the dumpsters are being donated by Joseph Freedman Co., a local scrap metal recycling company.
Four green tacks on the map represent the locations of the staging areas. Pink highlighter pen marks the locations of the 210 or so streets across the city that have been targeted for cleanup, with input from the neighborhood associations.

The zones’ staging areas, corresponding neighborhoods and targeted streets for Saturday are as follows:

Zone 1
Staging area: Rebecca Johnson Elementary School, 35 Catharine Street (pictured).
Neighborhoods: Upper Hill, Old Hill, Bay, McKnight, Six Corners, South End.

Streets in Zone 1
Upper Hill: Byron Street, Dearborn Street, Dresden Street, Roosevelt Avenue, Wilbraham Road
Old Hill: Eastern Avenue, Orleans Street, Pendleton Avenue, Union Street, Hancock Street
Bay: Bay Street, Hayden Avenue, Oakwood Terrace
McKnight: Buckingham Street, Dorchester Street, St. James Avenue
Six Corners: Brigham Street, Central Street, Clifton Avenue, Hancock Street, Knox Street, Pine Street, Spruce Street, Cedar Street
South End: Central Street, Richelieu Street, Wendell Place

Zone 2
Staging area: Chestnut Accelerated Middle School, 355 Plainfield Street (pictured).
Neighborhoods: Metro Center, Memorial Square, Brightwood, Liberty Heights, East Springfield.

Streets in Zone 2
Metro Center: East Columbus Avenue, Main Street, Pearl Street, State Street, Worthington Street
Memorial Square: Arch Street, Calhoun Street, East Hooker Street, Greenwich Street, Jefferson Street, Patton Street, Sheldon Street, Church Street
Brightwood: Clyde Street, Demond Avenue, East Fisk Avenue, Hyde Avenue, Newland Street, Orchard Street, Washburn Street, Worcester Avenue
Liberty Heights: Armory Street, Beauchamp Street, Cherrelyn Street, Cunningham Street, Franklin Street, Nursery Street, Warwick Street, Webster Street
East Springfield: Bircham Street, Bowels Park Ext., Campechi Street, Carew Street, Edendale Street, Page Boulevard, Price Street, Stanley Street, St. James Boulevard

Zone 3
Staging area: Duggan Middle School, 1015 Wilbraham Road (pictured).
Neighborhoods: Pine Point, Boston Road, Indian Orchard, Sixteen Acres.

Streets in Zone 3
Pine Point: Arnold Avenue, Bay Street, Boston Road, Breckwood Boulevard, Crittenden Street, Delaware Street, Breckwood Circle, Grayson Drive, Preston Street, Wilmington Avenue
Boston Road: Grayson Drive, Lamplighter Lane, Methuen Street, Parker Street, Pasco Road, Slater Avenue, Wallace Street, Wisteria Street, Wollaston Street
Indian Orchard: Berkshire Avenue, Center Street, Goodwin Street, Lyons Street, Main Street, Oak Street, Page Boulevard, Pinevale Street, Quebec Street, Water Street, Whipple Street, Worcester Street, River Street, Pasco Road
Sixteen Acres: Bradley Road, North Branch Parkway, Old Farm Road, Plumtree Road, Sunrise Terrace

Zone 4
Staging area: Forest Park Middle School, 46 Oakland Street (pictured).
Neighborhoods: East Forest Park, Forest Park.

Streets in Zone 4
East Forest Park: Abbott Street, Allen Street, Island Pond Road, Paridon Street, Plumtree Road, South Branch Parkway
Forest Park: Belmont Avenue, Dickinson Street, East Alvord Street, Forest Park Avenue, Fort Pleasant Avenue, Leyfred Terrace, Locust Street, Orange Street, Sumner Avenue, Trafton Road, Washington Street, West Alvord Street, White Street, Woodside Terrace

Mike Cass provided pictures (above) of some of the worst offending sites for cleanup, what he has come to call the “baker’s dozen.” These were on display at the Keep Springfield Beautiful table during Sunday’s Earth Day festival at the Quad, and a sampling of them was also published here last week.

Cass will visit these sites on Saturday along with a troupe of around 60 inmates from the Hampden County Correctional Center to do cleanup work. Barring complications, I will accompany them as well to document the ordeal, and see just how bad these worst-offending sites really are, and what goes into purging them of junk.

Springfield is competing with 600 other Keep America Beautiful affiliates on various measurable factors related to cleanup efforts: tons of trash removed, square footage of graffiti removed, beautification, and public service announcements. Keep America Beautiful maintains a community toolbox that shows how these factors can be measured. The toolbox also features additional resources and best practices in other US cities.

If you’re out doing cleanup work somewhere in Springfield on Saturday, and you have a camera, please send photos my way and I’ll publish them here.

And if you can’t offer assistance in the form of physical labor on Saturday, consider a tax-deductible contribution to KSB. Send a check to 1600 East Columbus Avenue, Springfield MA 01103. With questions contact senior project manager Ivette Cruz at (413) 886-5044 or icruz@springfieldcityhall.com.

The Springfield Quad hosted an Earth Day celebration on April 22

The weather couldn’t have been better for an Earth Day festival at Springfield’s downtown Quad yesterday afternoon. Several booths were set up in the shining midday sun on the green lawn, and a large tent on the plaza at the back of the central library branch offered some shade for the free ice cream doled out all day courtesy of Friendly’s. The only drawback to the setting was that the leafless trees couldn’t do the same.

ReStore director John Majercak at the CET booth

John Majercak, director of the ReStore, was there manning a booth for both the store as well as for the Center for Ecological Technology, its parent non-profit. Majercak told me he’s an Ohio native who lived in the Boston area for a while, and happily relocated to Franklin County 15 years ago for the great western Massachusetts quality of life. He lamented our overdependence on the car for getting around, though.

Mary Ayala with some of her displays of positive city news (click image for more)

Realtor Mary Ayala was there alongside fellow city residents Linda Langevin and Charles Contant to give a boost to the Keep Springfield Beautiful campaign. Ayala had on display three large poster boards showing off the positive press Springfield has received in the Republican over the past year. She told me that she thinks there’s a lot more positive news that never made it to the paper.

She was hopeful that coverage of last Saturday’s event—during which Keep Springfield Beautiful was made an official affiliate of Keep America Beautiful—will get some press in Wednesday’s neighborhoods section of the paper.

Charles Contant and Linda Langevin with official Keep Springfield Beautiful certification

Langevin and Contant had the official certificate proudly on display at their table.

Also on display was an informative city map showing cleanup sites for Saturday’s massive citywide effort. More details on that to come, in a separate post, for reference.

KSB’s working map of cleanup sites and strategy (click for larger view)

Ed Casey explains how to care for a blue spruce sapling—it likes sun

City forester Ed Casey was on hand to distribute baby spruce trees, and DPW employee Greg Superneau manned a table giving away miniature blue recycling bins (the 96-gallon, automated kind). I grilled Superneau for a moment to ask how residents could get their hands on the life-sized bins of this type—residents interested in recycling more than they throw away, for example.

Greg Superneau with his miniature blue recycling bin collection for giveaway

Superneau told me that residents simply must prove (by calling and providing a persuasive case) that they can process that much of one “stream” of recyclables. Springfield recycles in two streams: paper products in one, and metal, glass and plastic in another. He said that typically day care centers and multi-family homes, for instance, can prove an ability to recycle this much material. The bins need to be full every two weeks, he said, for automation to be justified and worth the cost and extra time it takes. All recycling bins are free; if your bins are overfull every two weeks, you can always get more of the smaller bins. I asked Superneau what the miniature bins were good for. He suggested using it to recycle bottle tops, and then just wheel it out to your curb.

The Boys of the Landfill offer some cool bluegrass sounds to counter the hot April sun

Also on hand was the Shutesbury-based Boys of the Landfill, a bluegrass band, providing a pleasant diversion from the heat when it grew uncomfortable. They played one song and then said, “If you’re sick of us already, you can go inside and catch Tom Ricardi presenting birds of prey.” (I never get bored of Ricardi’s presentation and his amazing cohorts—having seen the presentation multitudes of times, it’s always entertaining and informative, and the birds are such characters.)

Juanita Martinez of ECOS (Environmental Change for Our Schools) had an information table set up to demonstrate paper-making for kids. The process is amazingly easy.

Juanita Martinez prepares paper scraps and water to make pulp

She used a blender to mix a few paper scraps with a lot of water, which she dumped into a large tub with a few grass clippings and flower petals. Sometimes she adds glitter, too.

Using a screen you can buy at Michael’s, she plunged her hands into the water and picked up some pulp. At home, you can just lay this out directly to dry. For her purposes, she had to transfer the pulp onto some newspaper to dry so she could reuse the screen for all the kids she had coming to try it out.

Martinez helps a child sponge off extra moisture before laying the paper out to dry

Solar energy materials were also on display. Kosmo Solar showed how you can transform your conventional home into one that draws on solar power and can actually earn you credits with your power company as you begin to feed energy back to the grid. This is one of the most practical ideas around and is soon going to find itself attached to my new home.

Also available were some very shiny and hot reflector ovens. One I examined closely was roasting peanuts at nearly 350 degrees Fahrenheit.

A group from the High School of Science and Technology had a booth set up promoting their Envirothon competition effort, focusing on researching renewable energy sources, such as the fast-growing perennial switchgrass.

The Connecticut River Watershed Council had a booth to demonstrate the effects of pollution on our natural water supply. Kids were fascinated by this one as they observed dirt traveling through lots of channels in a miniature ecosystem of sorts.

The Western Massachusetts Electric Company was giving away energy-efficient light bulbs as well as toy bulbs of this sort, made of foam.

Topping off this great event was the free bottled tap water available from the Springfield Water and Sewer Commission. My children were a little confused at first as to whether it was bottled sewer water, which made for some funny jokes for a while, but in all seriousness it is the best drinking water anywhere.

Keep Springfield Beautiful has been ramping up its month-long campaign. Some days into April, I learned that there is a week-by-week strategy for the month, each week with its own theme, and there are associated activities.

The week of April 9 focused on graffiti removal in all city neighborhoods (photos below courtesy Mike Cass), including an anti-graffiti public service announcement broadcast on the government channel. Seen it yet?

This past week focused on continuing anti-graffiti efforts as well as ramping up an anti-litter campaign and public service announcement. The week culminates tomorrow with a certification ceremony at American International College, starting at 9:30 am, during which Citizens for a Clean Springfield becomes Keep Springfield Beautiful and is officially an affiliate of the national organization Keep America Beautiful. The ceremony is expected to be filmed and perhaps broadcast live on the city government channel.

Next week, automobile use will be the highlight. A free workshop on April 26, 10:00 am to noon at 70 Tapley Street, is intended to help city residents understand how to handle hazardous waste, among other best practices when it comes to auto care and the environment. From a Republican article about the workshop:

“It seems there really is a need for auto repair facilities to become aware of the environmental regulations, particularly in terms of managing, storing and disposing of oil and other hazardous waste,” [Eva] Tor [of the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection] said.

Tor and Code Enforcement Commissioner Steven T. Desilets said that incidents, such as the illegal disposal of oil and other automotive fluids in storm drains and soil, have serious environmental consequences.

“This will be an instrumental week to remove unregistered vehicles and metal items,” KSB director Ivette Cruz told me, in addition to sharing news about the workshop. “Joseph Freedman Co. will give the city a percentage of the money collected on tonnage of metal.”
A site on Union Street targeted for cleanup by Keep Springfield Beautiful. Photo by Mike Cass

Another effort this month, which will culminate on Friday, April 27, is the city’s Operation Clean Sweep. Tina Quagliato, program manager at the Office of Housing and Neighborhood Services, said the city did this once in 2005 and three times in 2006. This year, the city hopes to do three again, she said, starting with a Housing Court (pictured) blitz of “clean-and-lien” efforts on Friday, April 27, one day before the citywide cleanup planned in all neighborhoods at various sites.

“We bring in at approximately 100 to 150 cases to Housing Court for court orders to ‘clean and lien’ the property,” Quagliato said. “We then use both a private crew and the city’s ‘Clean Cities’ crew to clean up these properties and lien them for the costs.”

“Recently, we’ve been getting what we call ‘repeat entry orders,’” she continued, “which basically allow the city to continue going in and cleaning a neglected or abandoned property that we can prove has a code enforcement history through a certain amount of time. We try to have it extend through the summer/fall season when litter and overgrowth are at their worst.”

The effort this year, synchronous with KSB’s citywide cleanup event, is aimed at some of the worst offenders. More than that, it puts lawyers to work in more ways than one.

“For this round of OCS,” Quagliato said, “the city attorneys, who bring all the cases to court, and their families are also volunteering with KSB to do a ‘full service’ on properties, doing both litigation and cleaning.”

The citywide cleanup event will take place Saturday, April 28, from 8:30 am to 3:00 pm. Of the event, Cruz said, “This day, all participating organizations and citizens will take to the streets to send the biggest, strongest message this city has ever experienced since Shay’s Rebellion.”

The week of April 30 will continue a focus on exterior housing violations, with dozens upon dozens of cases going to Housing Court.

Various sites are targeted for cleanup on April 28 (several pictured here, thanks again to Charlie Contant and Mike Cass), including 170 specific streets selected. Groups are still presumably joining in the effort and collecting more volunteers. Individuals not yet associated with a volunteer group can still sign up. With questions about how to get involved, feel free to post here. Below is a sampling of what volunteers may face at the beginning of the day—but by the end, it should look a whole lot different.

Volunteers are asked to send photographs of their cleanup work to me so I can publish them and share the results of your hard-won efforts to make the city clean.

On a different note, Tuesday’s letter to the editor in the Republican, by Springfield resident Raushaun James, addresses remediation efforts. James wrote:

I am writing in response to the article printed earlier this week about the removal of graffiti in Springfield, as part of the Keep Springfield Beautiful movement.

I understand that many residents see the tags and designs as filth; however, I suggest supplying a legal medium for the artists to express themselves. As tennis courts are provided for tennis players, baseball diamonds supplied for ball players etc. I believe the walls should be erected for the artists to express themselves in a legal way.

These “art walls” could be set up in certain parts of the city, and would dramatically reduce the levels of graffiti on private and public property. It is a reality that graffiti will never just go away, so the government should try to find a more practical solution to solving the issue of vandalism in Springfield.

It would be great to hear more from graffiti artists who are working to make their craft a legitimate part of the local arts landscape rather than part of the vandalism plaguing the city.

In the meantime, folks have a lot of cleaning to do.

Last year, the non-profit Concerned Citizens for Springfield (of which I am a board member) brought Longhill Omega, LLC to Housing Court for numerous code violations at Longhill Gardens Condominiums between Longhill and Edgeland Streets, where the LLC has a majority ownership stake (192 of 211 units). Part one of an interview with CCS board members Russell Seelig and Bill Malloy was recently published here.

On March 29, a cold and brilliantly sunny day, I toured the complex with Seelig and Malloy. We viewed a number of attempts to come within code compliance, such as a newly-paved parking lot where Seelig said the LLC is now attempting to rent out individual parking spaces to tenants (with only two to three takers so far). At the lot, drainage grates were installed, but in such a way that water flows out into the street rather than into the grates, and some are slightly uphill. No burm was installed along the edge of the lot next to the sidewalk—a three-feet burm is required by city code, Seelig said—but instead, a maximum number of parking spaces were squeezed out, including right up to the edge of the sidewalk.

We also saw some newly-installed hand rails and a much-improved metal fence along a high concrete wall, which up until recently had no fence at all. Initially, my guides told me, the fence was installed without a top cross-piece, so the cyclone mesh material sagged and drooped; in addition, the vertical posts were slightly askew. That has been remedied and the fence looks much better. But Malloy described the situation as one in which improvements are made—attempts to come within code compliance, based on court orders at this point—but then more problems are caused as a result, and tedious details constantly have to be brought back to court, delaying the entire process of improving the health and safety conditions at the complex.

My guides also took me inside two of the five units CCS owns. The units have been vacant ever since CCS purchased them (and for some years prior, as well) because according to the board, the complex is not safe for dwelling. The two primary reasons are the prevalent peeling lead paint problem and the significant lapse in safety due to vandalized main entry doors in nearly every building in the complex. I viewed and photographed many of these.

What struck me about the complex is how handsome it is compared to its reputation. Idealism is evident in the design; planners must have anticipated a social world unto itself among the five buildings of the complex, a kind of housing situation for the people.

The units are dignified and pleasant-feeling inside, with healthy-sized windows offering enjoyable views and generous light. The kitchens and bathrooms are efficient and decent. Between the buildings and off to the sides and back there are paved walks and charming private entrances.

Light-filtering glass block, now vandalized and used as stairwell ashtrays, adorns the narrow vertical window slots showing the locations of stairways. Where awnings have been replaced, doorways have some appeal.

Original metal casement windows were placed innovatively on the corners of the brick buildings, in the once-popular international style mode, which was known for showing off the capabilities of metal support structures (sleeker and slimmer in profile) over that of stone and brick, especially at weight-bearing locations. Now those metal support structures at the very corners must remain (rusted and with peeling paint), even as the windows must be replaced (with today’s more practical and economical vinyl). Still, one can look at all of that in sum and appreciate that at one time, this was a modern, attractive, and socially conscious space. Now, it appears to be none of those, but hope remains. Click on the images for more.

A brief article in today’s Republican gives a preview of today’s 11:00 am press conference in Room 220 at Springfield City Hall about the upcoming fiscal year’s trash fee. From the piece, by Peter Goonan:

The city plans to send postcards explaining the trash fee and its options on April 2 to approximately 48,000 billable accounts for homeowners and many small businesses. The first quarterly bill will be mailed on or about April 16. Homeowners will be asked to mark the box either accepting city trash collection for a $90 annual fee, or opting out by planning to make their own arrangements for trash removal….

Those people who already paid the prior trash fee or part of the fee have the option of having it credited to their new bill or taking a refund, both owed to the owner with interest, as directed by the court ruling….

A 25 percent discount on the fee remains for homeowners who qualify as a senior citizen, blind, or a veteran with a service-related disability. Those who qualified for the discount under the prior fee remain qualified unless the property was sold.

Recycling and yard waste collection will remain a free service to all residents, whether or not they opt for the trash fee, officials said. In addition, bulk collection will continue to be available by appointment.

The press conference will feature Springfield Mayor Charles Ryan, Department of Public Works Director Allan Chwalek, and Senior Financial Analyst Peter Graczykowski announcing, according to the city’s media advisory, “details and procedures surrounding the newly re-implemented trash fee.” I’m not sure if there’s much else to say; Goonan’s article covered it pretty well. Then again, a lot of that information is already up on the city’s Web page about the trash fee. Residents with questions may wish to continue to monitor that page.

Here’s hoping that the public relations effort with Trash Fee, Take Two goes a little smoother.

Trash collection services in Braintree used to be covered by property taxes, but for a few years now, residents have had to pay an annual fee for the same services. From a January 6 article in the Boston Globe, by Brian R. Ballou:

The town has billed residents annually for garbage pick-up since 2003. But many have fallen behind on the $180 payments, partly because it may have taken time for some residents to get used to paying separately for the service, which had been covered by their property taxes, officials said. This year, some 254 households in the town are delinquent. …

Charles Ryan, the Board of Selectmen’s chairman, said, “The town had a real bad problem before [Braintree Department of Public Works director] Thomas [Whalen] took over. Before, we were hundreds of thousands of dollars behind in collecting trash fees. Since then, we’ve met the budget requirements. Is this the way I would do it? No, but we gave him a job to do and he’s doing it.”

What’s Whalen doing to collect the $49,000 in delinquent trash fees for the current fiscal year? He’s resorting to an old-fashioned New England tradition, what Ballou calls “public humiliation.” From the article:

Public works employees have stenciled a white circle with the letters NTS—No Trash Service—on the pavement in front of three homes with long-overdue bills, and are threatening to do it at more.

With only three homes stenciled so far, the example has apparently been highly motivational for those who are a bit behind on their payments to avoid the branding. This way, trash haulers don’t have to refer to a list. If someone is sorely delinquent in paying for their service, they really don’t get pick-up.

Denying the services can bring other problems—like trash piling up. In Braintree, for example, one of the three stenciled houses has actually been vacant for a year or so; otherwise the trash not picked up might have been a terrible nuisance.

Citizens for a Clean Springfield is hosting a public meeting Saturday, December 16, 9:30 am at AIC’s Cultural Arts Center on State Street. The organization, which is in the process of becoming formally affiliated with Keep America Beautiful, has arranged for Sue Smith, KAB’s director of education and training, to discuss the benefits to the city of such an affiliation.

Following the public meeting, a team organized by CCS of private and public sector representatives will convene for a three-hour “pre-certification” workshop.

CCS is also making plans for April, which the group, in a campaign partnering with the YMCA and the city, has declared Pride in Springfield month. Events focusing on a clean city are planned to include public education, various site clean-ups (such as 34 lots in one day, dumpsters provided), and beautification projects.

Bill Dusty of The New England Rogue Journal posted yesterday part two of his three-part series, “A Springfield Story.” This one focuses on neighborhoods, and includes a number of Dusty’s photos from a few different parts of the city. At the very beginning, in paragraph two, he takes a look at my own neighborhood. From the article:

Witness the Forest Park neighborhood between the “X” business district and the South End neighborhood to the north. It is an odd mix of well-maintained, tree-lined avenues with beautiful houses and well-manicured lawns on the one hand, while at the very next street over, absentee landlord-owned multi-family houses lay largely neglected by both their owners and their renter-occupants. Fences are broken down, trash swirls about the streets, and lawns are unkept and overgrown.

Dusty’s right, it is an odd mix indeed. The chaos of the litter, the blight, the heavy auto traffic of commuters zooming through, graffiti on traffic signs and other surfaces, run-down, weed-covered fences, and vacant homes and storefronts make this neighborhood downright frightening to walk through sometimes. But it’s home.

The area of Forest Park where I live does border along some historic districts, which tend to look nicer. But there is sometimes a fortress mentality for those districts: rather than expanding what could be a nicely kept-up neighborhood, there is more of a pressing need to protect the nice area from becoming worse. As Dusty points out, there are plenty of areas in Springfield without nice houses and lawns to speak of, but instead with “practically no middle class support structure at all.” It seems to me that neighborhoods of mixed-income are a good thing, and the more integrated they are, the better kept-up they begin to appear. Where residents are working on this deliberately, it makes a difference; all the same, as some residents have joked, “What’s the point of making sure everyone’s grooming their lawn when there’s an active crack house on your street?”

Loose trash and “swirling litter,” as Dusty calls it, may not really be the most important thing to worry about in Springfield, but I can say that it affects me on a daily basis, and I must not be the only one. It’s very discouraging. The push-and-pull between whether or not to bother picking it up trash is a regular concern. Some long-time residents may have this down to a science, but not me. I’m more likely to photograph the litter than to pick it up. On my daily walks to school with my kids, we pass a lot of trash. Should I walk by with a trash bag and do pick-up? Maybe so. This week, one of my sons picked up a discarded set of fake vampire teeth from the sidewalk, remarked on it, thankfully didn’t put it into his mouth, and then tossed it back on the sidewalk.

I was surprised to hear myself not saying anything to stop him. Have I caved?

Trash problems are a sanitation issue, as well as a statement of our collective self-esteem. In his piece on Springfield, Dusty points out how piled-up trash in dumpsters ends up getting picked up by the wind instead of the DPW, scattering on the street, and “vagrants are digging through garbage in search of bottles and other useful treasures, leaving opened trash bags and tossed litter as they go.” It’s also the case that residents may not know how to handle their trash. A neighbor on my street routinely leaves cardboard out in a way that prevents the DPW from being able to pick it up, and this morning’s trash left out for pick-up included an opened and spilled bag on the ground, with litter from it all around and traveling into neighbors’ yards. What is an appropriate response to this? Just get out there and clean it all up?

After the DPW had passed through, the bag was still there, along with the scattered trash. It gradually becomes evident that this mess is just par for the course for the DPW. Sometimes the residents come out and pick it up, if they care. Sometimes they don’t. Usually, if the place is owner-occupied, the residents are more likely to care. If the owners live in Tampa, Florida, why then they have no idea this is going on anyway.

At the same time, this complaint is so minor, compared to other problems across the city with blight, crime, abandoned properties and so forth, that one begins to wonder if it’s even worth mentioning. This is the kind of peculiar imbalance residents might find themselves in, many of them having picked up and left the city already. Residents who want to clean up the city, make their streets, homes and lawns look better, and gradually improve their neighborhoods, need a sense of teamwork and, dare I say it, hope.

Maybe I really will start carrying a trash bag with me on my walks to the school. The hope has to start somewhere, and I don’t think I want to watch my son toss trash on the ground anymore, even if it was already there to begin with.

Bill Dusty of The Rogue Review, based in Springfield, posted photos yesterday of symptoms of bulk-trash-dumping in two city spots.

The photos were taken at the prominent intersection of Maple and Central Streets, along a row of beautiful yet sadly neglected townhouses. Tons of motor traffic pour through this intersection on a daily basis, holding people up just long enough to get a good, solid look at all the garbage.

Yet we don’t often stop long enough to get out of our cars and take pictures of the situation.

Any amount of disorder on the street, including these tossed blue recycling bins after the DPW passes through, can accumulate and contribute to a feeling of chaos. Photo by Heather Brandon

My husband and I have an ongoing disagreement about whether or not it matters that employees of the Springfield Department of Public Works have a consistent tendency to throw our blue recycling bins on the street, sidewalk and treebelt after they are emptied every other Friday. The photo above is the scene this morning, outside our house. The bins appear almost as though they were strategically placed so that none of them are upright. How do DPW workers accomplish this with such panache?

Until today, I brushed this trend off as minor. The workers are busy, moving down the street. No matter that hardly anyone else on our street recycles. They are shoving off to the next port of call, collecting recyclables with expediency. They can’t be bothered to place bins upright, much less stack them.

My husband, on the other hand, has said that the DPW workers’ approach is hugely significant in how it adds up to the appearance of chaos on the street. It doesn’t take that much effort, he told me this morning, to place the bins bottom-down—certainly no more effort than it takes to toss them.

In rehashing this subject today, he brought up Malcolm Gladwell’s book, The Tipping Point, wherein the author gives countless examples of how very small irritants add up to huge problems—the “broken windows theory,” for example, that some police departments have referenced to re-examine their crime problem. (The theory, being more than 20 years old, has continued to be re-examined itself.) If the blue recycling bin-tossing is a serious problem, it’s a cumulative one, my husband indicated.

This is similar to another phenomenon on my street, which relates to how people use their porch lights. I’ve noted with interest that the Forest Park Civic Association—which is quite a bountiful resource for recommendations on making neighborhoods safer and navigating city departments—suggests that residents leave their front and back porch lights on all night, as a thief-deterrent. Some of my neighbors have wonderfully bright lights, but the culture here is that if you leave it on—sometimes even if you simply turn it on—you are attracting undue attention. The norm is darkness; a porch light on is like a spotlight saying, “Steal from me!”

Today I’m plugging these thoughts into my reflection on the Pioneer Valley Planning Commission’s recently-drafted, 136-page analysis of Springfield, prepared in anticipation of the Urban Land Institute panel visit next week. The analysis, which I’ll continue to draw out and discuss as long as it takes to pore over it, and then some, sums up Springfield’s public safety, auto insurance, poverty and unemployment situation thusly:

During 2004 and 2005, the city of Springfield had a violent crime rate nearly double that of all eight comparison cities [of similar population size and nature as central to their region]. While the murder rate, which is a subset of the violent crime rate, was not as out of proportion, Springfield has a significant public safety problem that is particularly severe [my emphasis] in the area of violent crime.

Furthermore, Springfield has the highest rate of motor vehicle theft among peer cities, which has consequences for the cost-of-living in the city as auto insurance rates are triple those of neighboring communities. Springfield certainly has high rates of poverty and relatively high rates of unemployment, but these are generally comparable to peer cities, whereas the crime rates are an order of magnitude larger than the peer cities.

This suggests Springfield has a public safety problem that is out of scale with or not explained by the degree of socio-economic distress in the community.

This finding is somewhat revolutionary, because it addresses a concept commonly accepted in the region: poverty and unemployment are directly correlated with public safety. Perhaps they are, but Springfield’s issues encompass something additional, a mystery factor. What is this factor?

These weeds are my responsibility, and I let them go because sometimes I just don’t care. Sometimes it seems like my neighbors don’t notice whether I weed, or not. Photo by Heather Brandon

I would argue that the explanation for the out-of-scale public safety problem, in no small part, has something to do with our physical space—the appearance of our streets, our buildings, our voids. I look at the neglected weeds sprouting out of my own front steps and I know that I am part of the problem, even though my neighbor’s weeds might be just as bad. Every weed I pull from my own sidewalk, I am making a positive difference, and my neighbor may see it and be motivated to do the same. Great, but it’s still a drop in the bucket compared to the way the rest of the city looks and feels.

Gladwell would probably say that Springfield could benefit from an accumulation of small, positive changes. When DPW workers place recycling bins back with care and respect for the public space, things look more orderly on trash day. When the majority of residents leave their porch lights on all night, the void of the street is filled with a sense of presence. When building code enforcement workers repeatedly return to a property to demand compliance and follow-through, properties keep up a better appearance—and it happens one at a time. When people walking down the street look each other in the eye, and say hello, there is a slow and gradual spread of a humane sense of welcome and acceptance.

These are small changes, and there is more to public safety than the upkeep of physical space. (Caring about each other comes to mind.) But I am beginning to learn that small changes do make a difference, not on their own at first, perhaps, but as they add up. The solution lies not in pointing the finger and yelling, but in methodically going about making the change. And those changes happen slowly, and they seem futile for a long time, a lone presence in the void.

Weeding my steps makes a difference. But I still feel conspicuous when I take the time to do it. Photo by Heather Brandon

Originally published at MassLive.com

In a recent article in Model D, a Detroit-based Web publication advocating for the city, downtown business owners and residents talk about what a difference clean makes. From the article, by Jon Zemke:

The crews do everything from picking up litter to power washing sidewalks to cleaning up alleys, bus stops and parks inside the downtown expressway loop. Goodwill Industries of Greater Detroit provides workers for the cleaning crews. Those crews work with the city department of public works in various shifts all week. Private sector and foundations provided the initiative’s $3-million budget. That covers the cost of employees, management and equipment. It’s expected to last until the fall of 2007.

[Griswold Pharmacy owner Ahmed] Ankouni says the largest impact is psychological. People are more respectful of the neighborhood. His customers are in better moods. Overall, his business is improving. “Cleanliness is related to peace. Filthiness is related to chaos,” Ankouni says. “It just makes everybody feel like the city is moving forward.”

Clean-up crews begin their work at 4:00 am—making way for an influx of downtown city workers to greet their workplace environment with some degree of freshness. This is a great step to help make room for more development and business in the downtown area.

I voted today. Did you?

It’s nice to see that gas prices are settling down a little. I wish I could time my empty gas tank with the prices. Unfortunately, I’m not in the mood to rush to the gas station unless it’s absolutely necessary. Especially considering the tight financial pinch I’m feeling.

I heard on the radio that home heating prices this year are going to be approximately double what they were last winter. The oil company we use estimated a $220 monthly budget for oil. I can’t tell if it’s steep or not, since we were only in the house a year. It’s definitely more than we paid last year, and getting started on the payments felt risky. We had to shell out $440 to cover payments for August and September. I wrote the check, held my breath, sent it in the mail, and waited for it to clear. Nothing happened. Some days later, I got a notice in the mail that said, more or less, “If you don’t pay this amount right away, we are going to come in the thick of night and steal your children, and you will be taken off the budget payment plan, and by the way, another $220 has been added to your bill.”

Trying not to panic, I wrote another check for $440, sent it in the mail, and put a stop payment on the previous check, stating that it was lost in transit. For this courtesy, the bank charged me $25. Some days ago, I got another invoice from the oil company, showing that they processed the second check, and had attempted to process the first, as well, but got an “NSF charge” in response. The fee from the oil company? Another $25.

A few weeks ago, thinking that a working fireplace might really be a good thing this year, we hired a chimney sweep to come and give the thing a look-see and a decent cleaning. It only took her a few minutes to assess the sorry state of the bricks-and-mortar situation. Face, clothes and hands grimy with soot after visiting several clients with the same hopes, I imagine, the chimney sweep informed us that our chimney is not lined, and therefore it cannot be cleaned. The fee for learning this information? $50. On the bright side, we don’t have to shell out anything extra for a cord or two of wood. To avoid potential carbon monoxide poisoning, we won’t attempt the fireplace again, as we did last winter, nearly smoking out a group of living room guests (but only once).

Last week, due to a computer glitch, my husband’s paycheck did not get processed on time, but several scheduled electronic payments went through. The net result is over $100 in bank overdraft fees, no cash for grocery shopping, and a cloud of doom that has settled, like so much hovering soot, over the house. We had been holding off the shopping for over a week until pay day as it was, so this was a grim joke of some kind, surely. We buy organic brown rice in bulk through friends who are part of a co-op, so that’s in ample supply; we had run out of pasta, milk, beans, eggs, cereal, napkins, most vegetables, just about anything frozen except bread, tortillas, tomato sauce, and—nearly—the cat food.

The check finally cleared today and I was able to pick up $50 of food. I’m looking ahead to the rest of this week and next, wondering if this amount of food will last. It has to, because we have other payments to make, including for private pre-school for our youngest child, ostensibly so I can earn a little money working from home. The snake is eating its tail. And I’m keeping the house temperature down, even though the monthly payments will not vary. I type this with cold hands and an empty belly. I have a lot to be thankful for: at least the house has not been repossessed—the mortgage payment went through even if there was no money to cover it. We have our health, and no substance abuse problems. This gives me perspective.

Meanwhile, our family in-box is flooded from schools and other organizations with requests for canned goods. It’s that time of year, Thanksgiving approaching along with cold weather. People are in need right and left. I won’t even splurge on canned goods for myself—I’m going for the dried beans this week. And forget about frozen. I’m wondering if I can harvest the weeds out back and make flour. But things are dying off now. Besides, the weeds are probably toxic. With the home heating situation, and the fireplace unusable, I can’t even break up old broken chairs and burn them for warmth, unless I want to get an old, rusty oil drum and experiment with burning furniture outside. But then I’d probably get a citation, and that would result in yet another fee I can’t afford.

Originally published at MassLive.com

In traffic-island news, the intersection of Dickinson, Orange, Mill, Hancock and Locust Streets has received a much-needed, and really eye-popping, facelift. When I first saw it, while driving through, I did a triple-take, and nearly crashed. I wonder if these kinds of dramatic intersection ameliorations are, in a way, a kind of traffic violation in themselves?

Map by Google. Photos provided by Jeremy Cole, forestparkca.com.

Originally published at MassLive.com